Review of 20Q: OK, I Was Wrong

I don’t think you have to be a regular reader to know that I wasn’t a fan of the original 20Q pilot shot for syndication.  When I heard GSN picked it up, I had low expectations.  Before the tapings began the network tried to make me excited for it.  They said how much they improved it and all that stuff, but I still wasn’t sold.  I know there may be some people, especially at the network, who think I’m negative about a lot of stuff they do (which isn’t true since I’ve only been really negative about Big Saturday Night so far, but I digress).  I have to make a u-turn on my original thoughts and feelings of 20Q, airing Saturdays at 8:00PM ET on GSN.  I went in not expecting anything much and came up pretty happy.  A lot more happy than I expected, actually.  GSN did a terrific job with 20Q.  As I’ll repeat below, it’s one of the many cases of me being really wrong and GSN being really right.

The game’s really simple.  Contestants try to guess a person, place, or thing based on questions and clues given to them.  This is done in numerous ways.  The grand champion plays the game against the computer, Mr. Q..  If the player solves it before the computer, the player wins $20,000.  Really simple show, but it works in its favor.  You know the basic idea of it, and if they kept to one method of doing the format it would tire quickly.  They throw some variations in often to mix it up, and it panned out nicely.  I couldn’t help but feel that parts of the show felt like the former Canadian game show (and current US syndicated show if it’s in your area) Inside the Box, but that’s a good thing.  The play-along value for this show is immense.  You can’t help but interact.

I’ve been a vocal fan of Cat Deeley since she did a guest-hosting stint on Who Wants to be a Millionaire and when I heard she was replacing the original 20Q host Joey Lawrence, I was overjoyed.  I’m glad I wasn’t let down.  She just had fun and acted like herself here.  It was great.  She’s one of the better hosts the network has.  I had a few problems with Mr. Q., though.  I felt like it was a waste paying the money for Hal Sparks as either you know it’s him and find the entire production of the giant 20Q ball corny, or you don’t know it’s him and it throws the entire man against computer vibe off.  I appreciate what they tried to do, but if the show comes back I’d honestly rather see them use a computerized voice type of system.  Or process Hal Sparks’s voice a bit.

The only actual major issue I had with the show is that it seemed pretty slow and drawn out.  This can be the result of a few things.  For starters, the show was originally a half hour long and they stretched it to an hour for the primetime block.  Again, they tried to mix it up but I can’t help but think it would have worked better in half hour form.  The drawn-out nature really comes from the entire Big Saturday Night aspect as well.  I like that GSN tried something new, but I was fearful of the shows when they said they were stretching the BSN shows to 90 minutes each to fit in more filler.  Looking at the clock they only got about 9-10 minutes of 20Q down in the first half hour.  I’ll be watching the show on the Sunday afternoon replays this week to see how it goes.  The other issue I had, and it’s minor, is that selecting a row of contestants from the audience (the first round) at random and letting one of that group of 7 or so play the game seems really needless.  I don’t think it would have worked any worse to just have around 20 players, to keep with the theme, all play and the first to buzz in and answer correctly goes on stage.  The show is really luck-less except for that one part.  It’s not a giant issue, but it’s just something to think about.

Just one final issue, and I think it may be due to Big Saturday Night and hopefully with a second season of 20Q it can change.  I can’t help but think that the $20,000 grand prize is cheap since you have shows like Bingo America and Catch 21 giving you the chance at far more than that daily.  I can’t speak for everyone here but I’d think that a vast majority would rather see the top prize of 20Q increase from less than the daily shows instead of giving away $10,000 a pop in tiny 30 second games during BSN.  It’s really strange seeing random people plucked from the audience spelling three letter words for around $10,000 or $15,000.  Meanwhile you have people in a giant hour-long fight for $20,000, not much more, on the actual show.

However, beyond that, I actually enjoyed the show.  This is one of those cases where I’m really wrong and GSN is really right.  It’s vastly improved from the pilot but the pacing just suffers a bit because of dragging the show out for an extra half hour due to Big Saturday Night.  They really hit the two game shows for the BSN block (20Q and The Money List) out of the park; more so than they have in a while.  I know I make fun of Endemol a lot also because of their track record, but this is one of their better game show efforts in a long time.  I’d really like to see GSN have a little more faith in this show if it has a second season, increase the prize a bit, and iron out a few rough edges.  I think they can really start a fantastic primetime game show tradition anchored by this show and The Money List if so.  I be lying if I said 20Q is better than The Money List, but with a few major tweaks from pilot to broadcast, it ended up being a nice little show.