We have finally found the stupidest people in America. They are all contestants on THE RICH LIST, the newest and easiest game show on television UNLESS the players are dumber than a tree stump and these contestants would need tutoring to reach that level.This is another import from Great Britain by the same annoying folks who brought you THE WEAKEST LINK. Same pinball machine type set, same overly dramatic techno music punctuating every sentence the imported host (Nathan Lane with an English accent) has to say.
The hook here is that they only find village idiots to play. One mismatched pair of morons squares off against another. They are given a category. TOM CRUISE MOVIES, STEVEN KING NOVELS AND SHORT STORIES, THE TOP ONE HUNDRED NEWSPAPERS, BEST PICTURE WINNERS, DISNEY ANIMATED MOVIES (INCLUDING PIXAR). How many can they list? One group said they couldn’t list five major newspapers. Another had trouble after just a few Steven King stories even though there are 175 to choose from. One group could only answer six Best Pictures. And my favorite, this same team of cretins could only name six Disney animated features. They got TOY STORY then couldn’t think of another one. Even TOY STORY 2.
Here’s what’s scary. REALLY scary. These people serve on juries. These people drive cars. And on Tuesday these people vote. Maybe we’ll be lucky and the concept of punching holes in a ballot or pulling a lever will be too confusing for them.
Sorry, Ken - this isn't ours, even if the host (Eammon Holmes) is. This is a new show for the States, and hasn't appeared on British TV yet (to the best of my knowledge, that is - and I've been wrong before...)
ReplyDeleteSix???? I saw the commercial for this show, which was a clip of them saying that there were forty Disney features to name. I was chagrined that I could only name half of them without having to stop and think! And that's without the Pixar films, too.
ReplyDeleteClearly, game shows need me.
Ken,
ReplyDeleteWe have cast our "ballets" (sic) and have decided you should go on the show. The spelling category...
Ken, these are the people who have watched your shows. Are you smoking something we might share?
ReplyDeleteWell Dog Eat Dog is no longer on, they need to find something to watch.
ReplyDeleteNot only are they voting, they keep winning. Maybe Darwin was wrong after all.
ReplyDeleteIf you've gotta watch a game show, watch the best.
ReplyDeleteGet one of the "You Bet Your Life" boxed sets.
Julius Henry Marx at the top of his form (and with the assistance of writers, Ken!).
12 Yard developed and they are for the UK, but the US is the first market that is airing the show.
ReplyDeleteI will give you that they were stupid, but colourful. And if you were giving away potentially unlimited amounts of people, wouldn't you be casting for people who were just engaging enough to watch without breaking the bank?
I'm proud to say that I don't think I could name more than one or two things Stephen King has written.
ReplyDeleteAt best I might be able to say that he "wrote that one about the dead area or something, right?"
I think this may be the shortest run for a game show since Jackie Gleason's infamous "You're In The Picture" back in the early 60s. It was stupid, ran only one week, and for week two, Gleason sat on an empty set and talked about what a bomb it was. Which was 142 times more entertaining than the original show.
ReplyDeleteTo Malachy Walsh,
ReplyDeleteI assume from your being "Proud to say" you couldn't name more than two King works, that you haven't actually read any, in which case you aren't familiar enough with how good or bad he is to cast an informed judgement and be "Proud" of your ignorance. I have read nearly all of his books. They vary greatly in quality, from crap like "Christine", "Dreamcatcher" and "Rose Madder" (King's pick for his worst)to some of the finest American popular literature of the last century, with terrific novels like "The Shining", "The Stand", and "Misery" (His pick for his best so far). I spent last night watching King speak in Beverly Hills (Thus missing this horrible new game show. Oops.), with the David Ulin, the editor of the Los Angeles Times Book Review moderating, and Ulin said that King's best was above popular literature and was actual literature, though fun, popular beach-read works like "CELL" still encourages the snobs out there to put him down.
And King's book "On Writing" is a really good work on writing.
As my mother said of lima beans, if you haven't tried them, don't knock 'em. (I tried 'em. They're hideous.)
And one should never be proud of ignorance, that "Delicate exotic fruit" as Oscar Wilde called it. I consider Harold Robbins's books to be unreadably terrible, and you couldn't pay me to read Tom Clancy either, but I could name a good sized list of either of their trash output.
My Rich List Dream Teams:
ReplyDeleteKen Jenning and Alex Trebeck
vs.
Ozzy Osbourne and Paris Hilton
Damn, FOX has really taken a beating this fall.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing I know about TOM CRUISE MOVIES is that I wouldn't watch one if my life depended on it. Otherwise, I'm pretty good at trivia.
ReplyDeleteI can imagine them being asked to name Rocky movies; “um... Rocky, Rocky 2, Rocky 4 and Rocky 5?”
ReplyDeleteDoug, you're so serious.... Jeesh.
ReplyDeleteMal,
ReplyDeleteYeah, that countered my criticism deftly. Just trivialize my sense of humor, although my books are both humorous books, and I've been writing jokes for money for 38 years.
I just hate seeing something criticized by someone who doesn't know what they're talking about. I have no problem with someone peeing all over King's books, if they've read them. Harold Bloom despises King's books, but he's at least read them.
Are the contestants genuinely stupid, or are they just freezing up under pressure when they have a TV camera pointed at them?
ReplyDeleteAnyway, it's not as bad as the guy who advocated posting the 10 commandments in all court rooms, only to have Stephen Colbert nail him by asking him to name all 10.
Hey! Eammon Holmes is IRISH and has a very strong IRISH accent (not English as you said!). We in Britain find him difficult to understand because of his accent and odd delivery, so you folks in the good old U S of A must have had a really tough time.
ReplyDeleteThank God the programme never aired here, it was purely a USA-market show and seemed certain to flop. Best wishes from the UK!
it wasn't that bad, hey its was fun watching the stupid people, and seeing how many of each category I could list. Believe me I've seen a lot worse
ReplyDeleteOh, Doug, did you write your hilarity with the same sense of humor you use to put King on high?
ReplyDeleteGod help your readers.