More bad scheduling by the folks at GSN. Starting November 7th, the Super Password block at 11 am will be gone and in its place will be the return of Love Connection to the schedule and Hollywood Squares. Super Password will be on weekends only.
This reminds me of what SOAPnet did with Ryan’s Hope about 2 years ago. You DO NOT take a show with over 1,000 episodes and put it on weekends only. You DO NOT do that. Period.
I love Bergeron Squares, I really do, it’s my favorite version of the show. But I’ve actually grown comfortable with the late night airing, and I really don’t like the idea of Super Password being sacrificed for it. And knowing the current routine, it won’t be different episodes at all. I’ll bet it’ll just be another airing of the same episode. I would have removed one half of the hour, but instead putting Password Plus in the slot… another show that had no reason to be removed from the weekday schedule. And Love Connection is not a game show. I have nothing personal against the show, but it does not belong on this network.
On a miscellany note, to correct a previous entry: the one good thing I noticed though; it looks as though that promo for the Catch 21/Newlywed Game was a bit off; there won’t be all celeb shows all season. There’s at least one good decision made most recently. But still, it’s continuing to get to the point where I have little to enjoy with GSN now. Just way too little variety. I’ve enjoyed some things, but too many scheduling decisions have been either mediocre or just plain bad and have outshined any good.
Showing posts with label super password. Show all posts
Showing posts with label super password. Show all posts
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Online Pick of the Week: Super Password (6/5)
The pick this week comes from Super Password; an Alphabetics round worth $50,000. The clues are given by Sally Struthers, and it was uploaded by a fellow game show buddy of mine, gameshowluvr86.
One of the reasons why I think the majority of classic game shows get so much respect is the fact that there was indeed tension and pressure, but the pressure was handled the way it should have been. As evidently noted by the quivering in Sally’s tone of voice, the tension is obviously here. But any tension caused is from the element of the game and the game only. No overdramatics of any kind; no early NBC Deal or No Deal-esque commercial tosses, like for instance, “Will she get the last letter? Find out after this!” No extra long reveals. Just good old-fashioned game playing done right.
And of course there’s the hilarity, which makes it one of my favorite wins on a game show ever. Hair flies everywhere and the contestant shrieks several times “I LOVE YOU!” Glad to see Sally survived all that.
Great fun indeed. This big win from Super Password, my online pick of the week!
One of the reasons why I think the majority of classic game shows get so much respect is the fact that there was indeed tension and pressure, but the pressure was handled the way it should have been. As evidently noted by the quivering in Sally’s tone of voice, the tension is obviously here. But any tension caused is from the element of the game and the game only. No overdramatics of any kind; no early NBC Deal or No Deal-esque commercial tosses, like for instance, “Will she get the last letter? Find out after this!” No extra long reveals. Just good old-fashioned game playing done right.
And of course there’s the hilarity, which makes it one of my favorite wins on a game show ever. Hair flies everywhere and the contestant shrieks several times “I LOVE YOU!” Glad to see Sally survived all that.
Great fun indeed. This big win from Super Password, my online pick of the week!
Friday, May 29, 2009
GSN: A Schedule Change… Yet Again
Yet more changes for weekdays in daytime for GSN. All times eastern.
CHANGES LISTED ONLY:
10:00 am Family Feud (1988-94 syndie, replaces Super Password)
11:00 am Super Password (1984-89 NBC, one hour; replaces Bingo America and Whammy!)
Now despite my issues with lack of variety on the schedule, considering the circumstances, these are actually changes I can get behind. The only question I have is why couldn’t these changes have been made two weeks ago? GSN has the rights to Combs Feud and Super Password, so it makes no sense to have Bingo America and Whammy! in these slots just for a mere two weeks. It’s not like they got an extra Sony show or two from the vault and it had to take time to acquire the rights. Please don’t tell me GSN’s going to start resembling the Hallmark Channel where schedule changes are made every 2 to 3 weeks.
CHANGES LISTED ONLY:
10:00 am Family Feud (1988-94 syndie, replaces Super Password)
11:00 am Super Password (1984-89 NBC, one hour; replaces Bingo America and Whammy!)
Now despite my issues with lack of variety on the schedule, considering the circumstances, these are actually changes I can get behind. The only question I have is why couldn’t these changes have been made two weeks ago? GSN has the rights to Combs Feud and Super Password, so it makes no sense to have Bingo America and Whammy! in these slots just for a mere two weeks. It’s not like they got an extra Sony show or two from the vault and it had to take time to acquire the rights. Please don’t tell me GSN’s going to start resembling the Hallmark Channel where schedule changes are made every 2 to 3 weeks.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
GSN: More About The March Schedule Change
More details have come about March 30th’s schedule change thanks to the PDF files at Buzzer, and wow, I could not be more excited!
The $25,000 Pyramid episodes will be 1985-86, new to GSN and haven’t been run in well over a decade since USA had game shows as apart of its schedule. I looked at the episode guide and there are some really interesting and fun celebs. Markie Post, Nipsey Russell, Melody Thomas-Scott, Bill Cullen, Florence Henderson, and even Bronson Pinchot. And there are some pretty memorable moments; the 1968 Chevrolet Chevette blooper, and Tom Poston and his contestant partner getting $0 in the winner’s circle (apparently contrary to popular belief is not the first time that occurred, but still, can’t wait to see it in even better quality). Can’t wait! I’ve always preferred daytime Pyramid, and while I was hoping for the earlier episodes, this is still a great surprise and I’m ever so excited about it! Good job, GSN!
The $100,000 Pyramid episodes are from season 3. I’m actually a tad disappointed because I was hoping for season 1, but still, this season in particular hasn’t been seen on GSN in quite a while, and I know many people at this point would rather see this than season 2, which first resurfaced back in ‘05.
Hollywood Squares episodes are all Bergeron, from season 1, which apparently haven’t been seen on GSN in years. I am really eager about this too, as I love this version of the show and I haven’t seen much of the early years of the show since they originally aired. This will always be my favorite version of the show. Tom and the gang had me rolling from start to finish.
Password in the overnight are daytime color episodes from 1966-67, which haven‘t been seen since 2002. I’ve always wanted to see more of this era of the show! However, Super Password on the weekends starts from the beginning. Eh, not too thrilled about this. I guess another opportunity to catch any episodes that may have been missed.
Chain Reaction on the weekends will still be Lane's. Blah.
I’ve never had GSN when they showed any of color Password, first season Bergeron Squares, or $25,000 Pyramid on a regular basis. I’m still disappointed that Press Your Luck, Card Sharks, and the black and white hour are leaving, but these latest acquisitions from Sony make for some GREAT consolation. Only less than 3 weeks away!
The $25,000 Pyramid episodes will be 1985-86, new to GSN and haven’t been run in well over a decade since USA had game shows as apart of its schedule. I looked at the episode guide and there are some really interesting and fun celebs. Markie Post, Nipsey Russell, Melody Thomas-Scott, Bill Cullen, Florence Henderson, and even Bronson Pinchot. And there are some pretty memorable moments; the 1968 Chevrolet Chevette blooper, and Tom Poston and his contestant partner getting $0 in the winner’s circle (apparently contrary to popular belief is not the first time that occurred, but still, can’t wait to see it in even better quality). Can’t wait! I’ve always preferred daytime Pyramid, and while I was hoping for the earlier episodes, this is still a great surprise and I’m ever so excited about it! Good job, GSN!
The $100,000 Pyramid episodes are from season 3. I’m actually a tad disappointed because I was hoping for season 1, but still, this season in particular hasn’t been seen on GSN in quite a while, and I know many people at this point would rather see this than season 2, which first resurfaced back in ‘05.
Hollywood Squares episodes are all Bergeron, from season 1, which apparently haven’t been seen on GSN in years. I am really eager about this too, as I love this version of the show and I haven’t seen much of the early years of the show since they originally aired. This will always be my favorite version of the show. Tom and the gang had me rolling from start to finish.
Password in the overnight are daytime color episodes from 1966-67, which haven‘t been seen since 2002. I’ve always wanted to see more of this era of the show! However, Super Password on the weekends starts from the beginning. Eh, not too thrilled about this. I guess another opportunity to catch any episodes that may have been missed.
Chain Reaction on the weekends will still be Lane's. Blah.
I’ve never had GSN when they showed any of color Password, first season Bergeron Squares, or $25,000 Pyramid on a regular basis. I’m still disappointed that Press Your Luck, Card Sharks, and the black and white hour are leaving, but these latest acquisitions from Sony make for some GREAT consolation. Only less than 3 weeks away!
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Goodies from GSN’s vault replace a couple nights of PlayMania
I was ecstatic to hear that GSN would be replacing a couple nights of Playmania with some true goodness from inside their vault. The shows would be airing early Monday and Wednesday mornings. They are Super Password (NBC 1984-89), Double Dare (CBS 1976-77), Beat the Clock (CBS 1979-80), Body Language (CBS 1984-86), Trivia Trap (ABC 1984-85), and Now You See It (CBS 1974-75).
One of the reasons why I am happy about this is that everything was done logically. They’re continuing to air the SP episodes that were skipped back in 2005. It being apart of this block really compensated for the hour on Sundays being replaced for the seemingly forever repeating Dog Eat Dog. Then Body Language came back after about a five month hiatus, and they started right from where they left off. I feared so much that they would start all over from the beginning, and it‘d take forever to complete the run. Now it’ll take a while, but not quite as long to continue on. Beat the Clock with Monty Hall hasn’t been aired in nearly ten years on GSN and same for Double Dare, so it made sense to start from the beginning with these shows. Though a lot of us online were expecting them to start about in the middle of the Clock run.
Monty Hall’s version of Beat the Clock is probably most known for one thing, reverting to all-star status permanently within a couple months of the show’s run. Now, personally, for the most part, when it’s done only a few times out of the year, or every other year or so, I love all-star special shows. They can really be a lot of fun. Especially on shows like Password, Pyramid, Family Feud, Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy. But some shows in the past had a major problem with this, and the problem was that it became an everyday or every week scenario. The prime examples of this are the early 2000’s American prime time versions of Millionaire and Weakest Link. I admit this was fun at first, I mean, I loved seeing the soap stars and comedians on Link, and the funnymen and supermodels on Millionaire, but this became such a habit, and it was becoming more tiresome than enjoyable, and eventually the lot of us got sick of it and we’d want to see the regular contestants again. Especially on Link. It was like they were just throwing together any theme week or special they could come up with. It really helped both shows lose their magic. But for some reason, 1979’s version of Clock was different. It was fun seeing the celebrities sometimes get a little dirty and do the entertaining stunts. The magic was still in the air, even though it remained on CBS's airwaves for a very short time.
Now You See It, Body Language, and Double Dare were also short-lived CBS daytime game shows, while Trivia Trap aired on ABC. Now You See It was a word search game at its absolute best. It's just like the announcers Johnny Olson, Gene Wood, and in 1989, Don Morrow say in the opening spiel: "Every answer is right before your eyes."
Language had celebrity-contestant teams of two doing charades, and it was similar to a short-lived show on ABC, Showoffs. Though the difference between the two shows were that Language's acted out words all fit into puzzles. For instance: If you look SUSPICIOUS as you (PASS) through (CUSTOMS), they might STRIP SEARCH you when they STAMP this BOOK. The answer: Passport. This show had some great stars on, including loyal game show friend and true legend Betty White. Other guests would include Charles Nelson Reilly, Vicki Lawrence, and Soupy Sales. The words were difficult to act out sometimes, but it's still fun to see the stars and the players act them out. For instance it was truly classic watching Lucille Ball act out the phrase "toss and turn" and Melody Thomas Scott of The Young and the Restless act out "raid the refrigerator." And their partners guessed those correctly, too. Tom Kennedy was a great pick as a host for this show. And before I forget, the words in parenthesis are un-acted.
The Double Dare that aired in 1976 would be completely different than the version that premiered ten years later on Nickelodeon. It involved daring, but it was a trivia game. I admit, it was hard for me to grasp at first when I saw the 1977 finale. But after watching more episodes, I can get the hang of it more easily. The host Alex Trebek has been known for saying that he enjoyed doing the show, but he also thought it was too difficult for daytime.
Trivia Trap was another trivia game, as you can plainly see. This one is really fun, well at least the first format was. It was about eliminating the wrong answers. And the categories were rather enjoyable. I preferred the original format over Fact or Fiction. The host was Bob Eubanks. And I must say, he was a GREAT fit for this show. And I know some people did not prefer him on Card Sharks. And for those folks I say, you should really like him on Trap.
These blocks along with ABC Millionaire on Tuesday replaced a couple nights of the GSN late night interactive show. Where do I begin with this show? You know, I admit, I did not watch the show every night around its inception, but I did support and respect this show initially. It was a success in the beginning, as it was much easier to get the opportunity to call in and win. The games were more fun to participate in. Unnecessary drama wasn’t added to make the game more crucial than it was supposed to be. But somewhere along the line, GSN decided to change things up and split the series up into two different shows, 100 Winners and quiznation.
100 Winners was a horrible show. The ambiance of the show was way too cold. But the major problem with me was that the questions were so ridiculously easy a 5 year old could answer them. On the first night, I could have sworn I heard the question "What's the color of an orange?" No, I'm not kidding. The prizes were also a major step down. Now, no doubt about it, the original Playmania's prizes and cash awards were never on the lines of Super Millionaire, but they were certainly not as low as say, $10 or a cheap GSN cap. The fun of the show was gone, too. This was one of the things that made Mania such fun to watch. They had e-mails from viewers, and they even got to interact with the callers a bit more. On Winners, it was all "Come on, for Pete's sake, no time for talk, let's hurry up and get it done already! We've got better things to do!"
quiznation seemed to have been alright. The fun and the interaction between the hosts and the viewers which was known on the original series stayed, and some of the newer games required a bit more thought. I like Alphabuck$ and Crossword. But that's not the problem I have. You'll see in the next paragraph.
Now, I've checked the show out recently to see how it is, since I've heard they're getting close to reverting the format (even the set looks more like the original show) and I've literally wanted to throw a brick at my screen in frustration because of how horrid things are now. It's just not fun anymore. Why is there any need to count down several minutes on a clock for ONE person to call in at a single time? Do they seriously know how many games could be completed in a night if they eliminated this inane feature? Also, the unnecessary drama that builds up after it's been over a half-hour, an hour, or even longer since the game was first initiated. The cheesy Millionaire-wannabe music in the background, with the host of the night whispering "You gotta call in now and get this right." Are they serious? For heaven's sake, this is an effing CALL-IN show with games where you can win between $50-$4,500. This is not Greed or The Power of 10. And while this show has much more fun than 100 Winners did, this is a big portion of the show, and the fun can easily be sucked away. Drama is not needed for this show. Period. It's GSN's own fault for messing with something that didn't need to be messed with.
This viewer has only two things left to say to GSN about this chain of events. One, for the next time they have a hit on their hands, PLEASE, PLEASE, leave it alone. As the age old expression goes, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." And as for number two, thanks for replacing these nights with something special. The majority of the replaced shows have not aired in a long time. And thanks for using logic in these blocks, and not just flip-flopping and playing musical time slots like they've done the past several schedule changes. Good job on their part.
One of the reasons why I am happy about this is that everything was done logically. They’re continuing to air the SP episodes that were skipped back in 2005. It being apart of this block really compensated for the hour on Sundays being replaced for the seemingly forever repeating Dog Eat Dog. Then Body Language came back after about a five month hiatus, and they started right from where they left off. I feared so much that they would start all over from the beginning, and it‘d take forever to complete the run. Now it’ll take a while, but not quite as long to continue on. Beat the Clock with Monty Hall hasn’t been aired in nearly ten years on GSN and same for Double Dare, so it made sense to start from the beginning with these shows. Though a lot of us online were expecting them to start about in the middle of the Clock run.
Monty Hall’s version of Beat the Clock is probably most known for one thing, reverting to all-star status permanently within a couple months of the show’s run. Now, personally, for the most part, when it’s done only a few times out of the year, or every other year or so, I love all-star special shows. They can really be a lot of fun. Especially on shows like Password, Pyramid, Family Feud, Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy. But some shows in the past had a major problem with this, and the problem was that it became an everyday or every week scenario. The prime examples of this are the early 2000’s American prime time versions of Millionaire and Weakest Link. I admit this was fun at first, I mean, I loved seeing the soap stars and comedians on Link, and the funnymen and supermodels on Millionaire, but this became such a habit, and it was becoming more tiresome than enjoyable, and eventually the lot of us got sick of it and we’d want to see the regular contestants again. Especially on Link. It was like they were just throwing together any theme week or special they could come up with. It really helped both shows lose their magic. But for some reason, 1979’s version of Clock was different. It was fun seeing the celebrities sometimes get a little dirty and do the entertaining stunts. The magic was still in the air, even though it remained on CBS's airwaves for a very short time.
Now You See It, Body Language, and Double Dare were also short-lived CBS daytime game shows, while Trivia Trap aired on ABC. Now You See It was a word search game at its absolute best. It's just like the announcers Johnny Olson, Gene Wood, and in 1989, Don Morrow say in the opening spiel: "Every answer is right before your eyes."
Language had celebrity-contestant teams of two doing charades, and it was similar to a short-lived show on ABC, Showoffs. Though the difference between the two shows were that Language's acted out words all fit into puzzles. For instance: If you look SUSPICIOUS as you (PASS) through (CUSTOMS), they might STRIP SEARCH you when they STAMP this BOOK. The answer: Passport. This show had some great stars on, including loyal game show friend and true legend Betty White. Other guests would include Charles Nelson Reilly, Vicki Lawrence, and Soupy Sales. The words were difficult to act out sometimes, but it's still fun to see the stars and the players act them out. For instance it was truly classic watching Lucille Ball act out the phrase "toss and turn" and Melody Thomas Scott of The Young and the Restless act out "raid the refrigerator." And their partners guessed those correctly, too. Tom Kennedy was a great pick as a host for this show. And before I forget, the words in parenthesis are un-acted.
The Double Dare that aired in 1976 would be completely different than the version that premiered ten years later on Nickelodeon. It involved daring, but it was a trivia game. I admit, it was hard for me to grasp at first when I saw the 1977 finale. But after watching more episodes, I can get the hang of it more easily. The host Alex Trebek has been known for saying that he enjoyed doing the show, but he also thought it was too difficult for daytime.
Trivia Trap was another trivia game, as you can plainly see. This one is really fun, well at least the first format was. It was about eliminating the wrong answers. And the categories were rather enjoyable. I preferred the original format over Fact or Fiction. The host was Bob Eubanks. And I must say, he was a GREAT fit for this show. And I know some people did not prefer him on Card Sharks. And for those folks I say, you should really like him on Trap.
These blocks along with ABC Millionaire on Tuesday replaced a couple nights of the GSN late night interactive show. Where do I begin with this show? You know, I admit, I did not watch the show every night around its inception, but I did support and respect this show initially. It was a success in the beginning, as it was much easier to get the opportunity to call in and win. The games were more fun to participate in. Unnecessary drama wasn’t added to make the game more crucial than it was supposed to be. But somewhere along the line, GSN decided to change things up and split the series up into two different shows, 100 Winners and quiznation.
100 Winners was a horrible show. The ambiance of the show was way too cold. But the major problem with me was that the questions were so ridiculously easy a 5 year old could answer them. On the first night, I could have sworn I heard the question "What's the color of an orange?" No, I'm not kidding. The prizes were also a major step down. Now, no doubt about it, the original Playmania's prizes and cash awards were never on the lines of Super Millionaire, but they were certainly not as low as say, $10 or a cheap GSN cap. The fun of the show was gone, too. This was one of the things that made Mania such fun to watch. They had e-mails from viewers, and they even got to interact with the callers a bit more. On Winners, it was all "Come on, for Pete's sake, no time for talk, let's hurry up and get it done already! We've got better things to do!"
quiznation seemed to have been alright. The fun and the interaction between the hosts and the viewers which was known on the original series stayed, and some of the newer games required a bit more thought. I like Alphabuck$ and Crossword. But that's not the problem I have. You'll see in the next paragraph.
Now, I've checked the show out recently to see how it is, since I've heard they're getting close to reverting the format (even the set looks more like the original show) and I've literally wanted to throw a brick at my screen in frustration because of how horrid things are now. It's just not fun anymore. Why is there any need to count down several minutes on a clock for ONE person to call in at a single time? Do they seriously know how many games could be completed in a night if they eliminated this inane feature? Also, the unnecessary drama that builds up after it's been over a half-hour, an hour, or even longer since the game was first initiated. The cheesy Millionaire-wannabe music in the background, with the host of the night whispering "You gotta call in now and get this right." Are they serious? For heaven's sake, this is an effing CALL-IN show with games where you can win between $50-$4,500. This is not Greed or The Power of 10. And while this show has much more fun than 100 Winners did, this is a big portion of the show, and the fun can easily be sucked away. Drama is not needed for this show. Period. It's GSN's own fault for messing with something that didn't need to be messed with.
This viewer has only two things left to say to GSN about this chain of events. One, for the next time they have a hit on their hands, PLEASE, PLEASE, leave it alone. As the age old expression goes, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." And as for number two, thanks for replacing these nights with something special. The majority of the replaced shows have not aired in a long time. And thanks for using logic in these blocks, and not just flip-flopping and playing musical time slots like they've done the past several schedule changes. Good job on their part.
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