I just watched this season’s first episode of Junkyard Megawars, and the producers blew it big time.
First, they changed the format. Now there are two permanent team captains who pick the team members from a pool of six “experts”. It reminds me of the humiliating process of choosing players for ball games back in elementary school. I cringed when the last one chosen was the token “chick”.
Second, they seem to be trying to give the whole show a new “flashy” feeling. This show used to be smart, but now it looks just like all the other new reality shows out there.
But the worst cut of all is the new hostess - the “effervescent and hip” Bobbi Sue Luther. I seriously doubt whether this blonde bimbo has ever even heard the word “torque” before. What were the producers thinking? I know no one can replace Cathy Rogers, but I thought Karyn Bryant did a great job last season.
I looked forward to this season’s opening show for weeks. I am so disappointed.
If I understand it correctly it was a British show which became an American show with little changes but then TLC felt the need to keep changing things to make it bigger and badder letting it drift too far from what it used to be.
TLC has shown the original British version as well. Until now, the American version was identical to the British version, except for a different male host and of course the teams were American. I missed the beginning of tonight’s episode, so I was unclear on the format changes, but the new host annoyed me so I only watched a couple of minutes.
It hasn’t been the same since original host Robert Llewelyn left, and I stopped watching altogether when those two dorks (Tyler and Karen, I think) took over.
Oh, that guy. Tyler? Is he the skinny guy that tries to hard to be the goofy, funny one? I hate him. My hatred of him burns like the fire of a million suns. He’s every kid who tried to be The Goofy Kid Who Impresses Girls in high school. And the American version is way, way too upbeat. The British host would take a certain amount of glee in the disasters that inevitably sprang up. And it used to have a fabulous Mad Max-ian aura that’s gone.
GMRyujin I think you mean George Gray, who was co-host on the American version for about a season. He’s currently pedalling that goofy schtick of his as the host of the American syndicated half hour version of The Weakest Link.
Do you mean Robert Llewelyn left the British version? Please say it isn’t so. He was the pitch perfect host for the show, the right mix of charm, wit, and humor. Able to commiserate with a team when he saw they were in trouble, but still able to rub his hands with glee at the when it was funny. Excited when a team broke out the heavy cutting tools to cannibalize some wreck for parts, and come across with the right amount of comradere and “stiff upper lip” when talking with a team facing crunch time. I always liked when he would join a team for a spot of tea, just the right kind of calm during the storm our version could use.
I never liked the American version anyway. American teams were too competative. I remember an episode where one team hoarded all the tires, knowing the other team needed some. That crap never happened on the British version. They wanted to have fun, and win based on skill.
Er, I guess I need to get out more, 'cause I got all steamed about the new format as well.
Firstly, “JY Megawars” has till now been a term reserved for special episodes involving three teams with an expanded build time and format. A one-hour show with two teams is not “mega” anything.
Secondly, they’ve apparently hired the film crew from a bunch of MTV rejects. The quick cutting was making me nauseous.
Thirdly, both machines in the first ep were pretty much failures. If we’re stuck with the same captains supervising the design process, rather than an expert from whatever field holds sway for the week’s challenge, there will be many more such failures to come, methinks.
As for the new hosts, ugh. I’ll add to the chorus and say bring back Robert Llewelyn and Kathy Rogers.
Not much to add except to agree with the criticisms so far.
The junkyard itself seems much bigger (did they expand into a parking lot next door), and there were a few too many annoying video gimmicks - no more rewind/fast forward crap, please (although the on-screen ‘rusted metal timestamps’ at key hours is somewhat nicer than the silly ‘time spider’).
The only thing that really irked me is the change to two ‘permanent’ team captains (Crash and Boley?) picking from a floating pool of, well, hired help (I say floating because next week’s show has a black man on a team, whereas there was no black man in this bunch). Why? From their ‘insider’ shows they indicated they had plenty of talented teams vying to get on the show, so it’s not like they wouldn’t be able to find 8 teams for a given season (plus, the old way you’d pick out a team to root for - now you just want to bang Crash’s and Boley’s heads together). You’re telling me teams like ‘Detroit Muscle’, ‘The Low-riders’, or ‘Wenches with Wrenches’ couldn’t have built snowtractors that would have worked at least twice as well as the crap those clowns threw together. And how are they going to build excitement (such as it was) as before when you progressed through 7 shows/3 levels to the Wars’ final?
Since probably all of the episodes are in the can already, the producers won’t be able make changes in reaction to ‘negative’ public opinion for this series - and where did the Summer series of British shows go?
Only good thing - Bobbi Sue and Rossi[?] seem less annoying than Karen and Tyler.
I don’t like the pick-a-team format, but the original Scrapyard Wars did have the same teams all season. And it’s Bowzer (who was in the original British series) vs the American, Crash, so that’s vaguely mega-Wars. But yeah, my initial impression was disappointment.
I only saw a bit of it, but I was disappointed that they didn’t have an expert in the field supervising the design. Bowser’s team made a HUGE mistake in their screw design, and it (apparently) took the host pointing it out for them to even understand that their design wouldn’t work.
I also HATED the ‘Real World’ talking to camera crap.
It seems to me that with the new team set up we won’t be looking at a season as a progression toward a final championship. I never felt that the elimination element was a primary reason for watching the show, but it did have the effect of keeping the competition sharp and pretty much ensuring that the teams who kept coming back would be good competition for each other. I’ve also enjoyed the largely friendly interaction of the teams and the new format seemed to produce an excessive level of griping.
Finally, I’m not an engineer, but right from the start it seemed unlikely to me that that screw propulsion thing was going to work. I understand that the producers might want the teams to pursue different solutions to the problem, but in the past I’ve noticed that most of the creations rely on some sort of design that’s already proven practical in the real world. Is there a screw-drive snow vehicle in use anywhere?
Yeah, I found it amusing that Bowser (oops, not Boley) made a major error (and here’s one place that the ‘rewind’ video bit worked, when they quoted him saying ‘Make three more just like that one’), but I really didn’t like the host pointing it out to him directly - Cathy Rogers, Rob Llewelyn, hell even Tyler would have hemmed, hawed, hinted, implied - but not directly pointed out that the design sucked (of course, now someone will point out a time that Cathy Rogers did just that).
And yeah, in my rambling prior post I forgot to add that the first series(es) of Scrapheap did have 2 teams throughout the season, but this series looks like Crash and Bowser just pick some random contractors each show to help build their contraptions (‘Journeyman Mechanics War’). Yea, team spirit.
Eh, I’ll watch it because the show is still interesting enough, but it won’t be as much fun
I’m so upset by these changes that I forgot to mention that this gimmick isn’t new, they’ve had the (unfortunately named) ‘Tool Cam’ :wally for the past few American series, with a team member complaining (or gloating) about something or other.
I think Radio-Shack ‘sponsored’ it.
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that I forgot to mention that this gimmick isn’t new, they’ve had the (unfortunately named) ‘Tool Cam’ :wally for the past few American series, with a team member complaining (or gloating) about something or other.