Instant Recall: Review

There's a new hidden camera game reality show coming to GSN called Instant Recall. Blah. Okay, but the show has veteran game show host Wink Martindale in it. So that means it has to be good, right? Right? Uh... no.

It’s as if the folks behind the show watched the Orbitz commercials that Wink has done, taken that concept, and mixed it in with some hidden camera-type stunts and turned it into a series. I’ll admit the commercials were cute, but this show isn’t. There’s just so much to dislike. The silly dating show-type introductions for the players. The hidden camera scenes that took up most of the show were obviously phony, boring as all hell, and in all honesty, also badly acted. And then there’s the absolute worst aspect of the show: the fact that the only real game aspect of the show comes off as a horribly conceived parody. It’s as if they said “we’ve got a reality show, but if we take a few minutes out of it and make the people playing wear name tags, participate on a fugly on-demand set, and give Wink a traditional EMC-51 microphone, it’ll be okay!” Wrong.

Fans have been waiting for a long time to see Wink do another show, especially after his appearances on GSN Live when the interstitial series first started in 2008. And there's no doubt about it; he's still got it as a host. He's as quick-witted and sharp as ever, all the more reason why I say the man deserves better.

This is really a shame. I was hoping to give this at least some sort of decent review. I really was. I have no problem whatsoever with GSN coming up with original programming. But as mentioned here by me before, there has to be a limit. I’ve said I’m no big fan of Catch 21, but like it or not, it’s a real game show. Any dislikes with that show aside, I could at least understand producing new shows of that caliber. Instant Recall is NOT of that same caliber though. It’s not entertaining, and it hardly comes off as a game show, but it does come off as a cheesy (and that’s cheesy in the bad way, gang) version of one of their other crap fest recent shows, Hidden Agenda.

Give me Tic Tac Dough or Headline Chasers reruns any day of the week.