Ho boy… Who hatched this dud of an idea? Better yet, who approved it for production?
As a follow up to the summer hit show “WIPEOUT!” ABC premired this thing last night.
The gameshow’s premise is to have the show atop a 10 story building. A large conveyor belt leads to the edge. On the conveyor belt are various prizes (jetski, piano, motorcycle, etc.) The contestant has to answer trivia questions quickly before their prizes go over the edge and crash below! Oh… wait… I forgot… the prizes that go over the edge are actually cheap non-working replicas of the actual prizes. “Oh no! Not the fake jetski!”
Then later on when things get really tense they take a contestant or contestant’s loved one and hang them over the edge. Screw up and they are dropped (okay, lowered really quickly) on a cable.
What? That doesn’t sound like an exciting hour of television?
How about I throw in professional wrestler Chris Jericho as the host?
What? Still sounds stupid and pointless to you?
Well you would be correct.
I was exposed to a few minutes of it last night. I don’t think it’ll get more than a half dozen episodes aired.
Someone should do a Downfall video about the Downfall game show. Talk about meta.
You just made baby Hitler cry.
Hitler finds out ABC is making a new show called Downfall
“Everyone who doesn’t like game shows, leave the room.”
Just make sure to match up the “Simon Cowell” subtitle with “STALIN!!!”
Yeah, not much excitement though I did find the trivia part more difficult than I’d generally expect for that kind of game show.
From the previews before it was clear they were dropping replicas my wife and I were complaining about how wastefull that is. So I was glad to learn it was just replicas, but that also sucked any drama out of them dropping since watching things crash into the ground isn’t all that exciting (on TV).
I did like the repeated stressing that they were on a “100 foot tall skyscraper!” I just kept wondering where they’re from that an eight story building is a skyscraper. It might be an interesting low budget Game Show Network type thing, but as a full scale primetime network TV game show: blegh.
Reminds me of the National Lampoon’s “Catch it and You Keep It” game show parody in the early 70s.
I was amused, but I also wasn’t watching it very closely.
Damn that host had some seriously white teeth, though.
My thoughts exactly. I didn’t know they were replicas until I opened this thread, and I was disgusted at the idea of deliberately wasting manufactured goods. I wondered what the carbon footprint of all that wastefulness would be. I reckon that the tacky plastic faux wastefulness is still quite wasteful, considering the lack of entertainment value it provides.
I watched this tonight - it is so bad is may even transcend into “So bad it’s good.” The trainwreck factor is strong in this one.
That first lady was funny, though. The bit about how she used to work at Hooters was funny.
I was also wondering about how they put her dining room set on the belt. For one thing, was that dining room set from when she was a kid? That was the most 1970’s looking piece of crap. But, when she was signed for the show, did they say, “Great. Be sure to bring your dining room furniture.” That seems like a lot of luggage for a vacation in Los Angeles.
I liked it, but I’m a Chris Jericho fan (been following his career since 94 or so) and think he makes everything he’s in better.
Sure, it’s a gimmicky show, but it’s fun. My only problem is that the editing was kinda atrocious, particularly noticeable with the sound. Lots of stuff obviously getting cut out for time, which is fine, but it shouldn’t be so frickin obvious.