What the Happened with Match Game’s Revival?

One of the most frequently asked questions over the years has got to be, “What’s going on with the Match Game revival TBS was shooting?”  Well it’s not on the air so that’s clearly not a good sign.  The show wasn’t picked up and TBS decided to go elsewhere and stick with their more popular programming like the Tyler Perry sitcoms or George Lopez’s new talk show, both of which seem to be doing very well and were much better choices.  The pilot they shot was probably one of the few pilots to essentially follow the classic format, down to the set, in a while.  But even with that, and this is coming from a big Match Game fan, I just don’t want to see it come back.  It’s an outdated format at this point.

As far as I can look back from various places, the main game went basically the same as the old version.  I’m trying to find the write-up that someone did about the rules, but the only change was in the bonus round where the audience polling was gone and replaced with some quick matching round relatively like the front game, leading up to the Super Match where someone matches one celebrity head-to-head for ten times their money.  Format was fine, but what was the issue?  Overwhelmingly, from people in the audience or people working on the shows, the problem came from the celebrities.

I’m not a big fan of a lot of classics, but it’s clear to see why Match Game worked in the 70s and won’t work today.  The innuendo of back then, which is what made the show popular, simply won’t work today.  Saying the word “boob” back them was risque.  You’ll get yawns from that today.  Unless you start swinging the word “bitch” around, like many did on the pilot I’m told, you aren’t going to get a reaction.  The format is just dated and won’t work today.  They’d need to do some heavy reworking.  A few years back Fox was working on a Match Game pilot called What the Blank? that didn’t get picked up, but I heard it was a bit different (I’d love to hear how).

I’ve got no issue with swearing.  I like dirty humor.  But the legacy of Match Game became centered around the innuendo, which is something we really don’t have any more.  Rebuilding the old set for today means nothing to me.  Match Game is hardly a game show.  It’s a comedy show with a game thrown in, and that style of comedy is gone today and attempts to bring it back make it look like a joke, much like bringing back the classic set lightbulb for lightbulb.  They haven’t got a single Match Game pilot right in an ungodly amount of years; probably since the 80s.  Yet we keep seeing it pop up and it’s always crappy.  I’d rather just let it sit as it is high in game show’s history than constantly coming back and being doomed to failure.  So yes, TBS dropped Match Game and will not be picking it up, nor will anyone right now, and it really needs to stay that way.