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Not overly thrilled about yet another battle of the sexes, but at least GSN found something else (http://\"http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/01-07-2005/0002785258&EDATE=\") for Kennedy. I've even heard of most of the players. Gee, maybe they might add a live audience of...dozens! Let's hope Robert Williamson can smuggle in some reasonable commentary.
This was inevitable after the network got respectable numbers with their first poker show, despite $4.95 production values.
In other soon-to-debut news, the horseracing show got a decent review (http://\"http://www.latimes.com/sports/college/basketball/la-sp-tvcol7jan07,1,7317372.column?coll=la-headlines-sports-coll_baske&ctrack=3&cset=true\") from the LA Times (sorry about the obnoxious registration screen). I don't know that I'm much interested in a behind-the-scenes or an in-front-of-the-scenes look at horseracing, but I'll try an episode.
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[quote name=\'CaseyAbell\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 02:35 PM\']Not overly thrilled about yet another battle of the sexes, but at least GSN found something else (http://\"http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/01-07-2005/0002785258&EDATE=\") for Kennedy. I've even heard of most of the players. Gee, maybe they might add a live audience of...dozens! Let's hope Robert Williamson can smuggle in some reasonable commentary.
This was inevitable after the network got respectable numbers with their first poker show, despite $4.95 production values.
In other soon-to-debut news, the horseracing show got a decent review (http://\"http://www.latimes.com/sports/college/basketball/la-sp-tvcol7jan07,1,7317372.column?coll=la-headlines-sports-coll_baske&ctrack=3&cset=true\") from the LA Times (sorry about the obnoxious registration screen). I don't know that I'm much interested in a behind-the-scenes or an in-front-of-the-scenes look at horseracing, but I'll try an episode.
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PAAAAAAAAASSSSS!
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How long has this poker show been on, anyhow? I only first noticed it on New Year's Eve, I think. (Shows how much I watch GSN anymore. Basically, it's the weekend Blockbusters run, and that's it.)
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[quote name=\'Fedya\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 11:05 PM\']How long has this poker show been on, anyhow? I only first noticed it on New Year's Eve, I think. (Shows how much I watch GSN anymore. Basically, it's the weekend Blockbusters run, and that's it.)
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Only a month or so.
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Kennedy is a good pickup for this show. And Tom Leykis ought to be interesting.
I saw the list of players, and am excited that they got some of the top male players in the world - guys like Chris Moneymaker and Greg Raymer, who are the two most recent World Series Of Poker championship winners. Amir Vahedi is a very popular player too.
Then I look at the female players and am disappointed to not see Annie Duke's name there. Annie is the closest a female has come to being a poker legend on the order of Amarillo Slim or Texas Dolly.
But there are some names that are familiar to folks who follow World Poker Tour, like Clonie Gowan and Evelyn Ng (who was a guest commentator on the first episode of "Poker Royale"), as well as Kathy Liebert, who was the only female player on "Poker Royale".
GSN is justified in moving the Poker to Friday night, by the way, to get it out of the path of the returning "Celebrity Poker Showdown" - now Bravo's top-rated show (take that, "Queer Eye" guys!) - beginning the last Tuesday in January.
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[quote name=\'davemackey\' date=\'Jan 8 2005, 08:59 AM\']
Kennedy is a good pickup for this show. And Tom Leykis ought to be interesting.
I saw the list of players, and am excited that they got some of the top male players in the world - guys like Chris Moneymaker and Greg Raymer, who are the two most recent World Series Of Poker championship winners. Amir Vahedi is a very popular player too.
Then I look at the female players and am disappointed to not see Annie Duke's name there. Annie is the closest a female has come to being a poker legend on the order of Amarillo Slim or Texas Dolly.
What about Doyle Brunson?
Brian (still waiting for GSN to be a basic digital channel).
The Jehovah's Witnesses distribute Mad magazine?
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[quote name=\'davemackey\' date=\'Jan 8 2005, 08:59 AM\']Kennedy is a good pickup for this show. And Tom Leykis ought to be interesting.
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What? Is CNN or MSNBC looking for a "Hannity and Colmes" clone? :) :)
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Kinda drifting, though I mentioned the horseracing show in the original post...
It's tough to imagine almost any new reality show getting strongly favorable reviews because the genre is so disreputable for most critics. But GSN's horseracing show is getting at least some tepid approval. Typical is the NY Times (http://\"http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/10/arts/television/10gate.html\") (apologies again if you get the irritating registration screen):
"The likability of the 12 contestants goes a long way toward making American Dream Derby less idiotic than many examples of the reality genre. So does the fact that at least some of the competitions involve brainpower (analyzing a racing form, devotees will tell you, is a science). The relatively harmless, emotionally unthreatening goal for the players is to prove superior equine knowledge in a series of horse-related contests."
For a debuting reality series, that's about as strong an endorsement as a teevee critic will cough up. I'm no racing fan, couldn't decipher the Daily Racing Form to save my life (or even Matt Ottinger's). But I'll watch an episode tonight to see what the show is like.
Back on topic: the structure of the new poker show at least promises to keep some suspense to the end. GSN's current poker series is heading to its final ep with one player so far in front that it's hard to see how he could lose. About the only suspense remaining is the $10 million dollar deal, and the odds are massive against the payoff.
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[quote name=\'CaseyAbell\' date=\'Jan 10 2005, 09:30 AM\']About the only suspense remaining is the $10 million dollar deal, and the odds are massive against the payoff.
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Since I'm not watching this, what's the Deal, as it were? Player gets five cards, if he flops a Royal, he gets $10 mil?
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Naw, a full house or better in one deal of five cards. Odds are 589 to 1 against. If the deal hits, the player and a GSN viewer split the ten million.
BTW, the poker show is far from awful, though GSN obviously spent few pennies on production. Robert Williamson III has too many initials but is a decent commentator, light-years ahead of Evelyn Ng on the first episode. The show moves briskly, much better than the Travel Channel's two-hour ambles. The problem is that a one-game but multi-episode show can get anti-climactic if one player builds up a huge stack. The format of the new series seems designed to prevent this.
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[quote name=\'CaseyAbell\' date=\'Jan 10 2005, 12:30 PM\']For a debuting reality series, that's about as strong an endorsement as a teevee critic will cough up. I'm no racing fan, couldn't decipher the Daily Racing Form to save my life (or even Matt Ottinger's). But I'll watch an episode tonight to see what the show is like.[/quote]
Thanks for the heads-up. Next time my life depends on deciphering a Daily Racing Form, I'll make sure you don't get the call.
Meanwhile, GSN is putting some money into promoting this. There's a full-page ad (the sort that can't be cheap) in the current Entertainment Weekly magazine. IIRC, the only other show they've eevr given that treatment to has been Celebrity Blackjack. Clearly, they have high hopes for this.
Me, I keep hearing Fugue for Tinhorns in my head.
(Randy, that one was for you.)
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Okay, Matt, for you I'll make the sacrifice. I WILL decipher that damn Racing Form. I will I will I will.
Happened to see a promo for the show on ESPN, so yeah, GSN is spending some ad bucks. The MultiChannel story also indicates that major money, by GSN's standards, is invested in the ponies:
"GSN has spared no expense for the eight-episode unscripted series (including the purchase of its team of horses), and it's really no surprise. A lot is riding on the success of the series."
"Riding" on a horseracing series? Anyway, despite the relatively favorable reviews for the show, I'm starting to smell BBB (big bucks bomb). See Alexander...on a much smaller scale, of course.
GSN looks to have spent next to nothing on the poker show, and it did okay in the numbers. That's because poker is hot right now. Horseracing? Gee, the sport's endured a multi-decade decline. Beyond the one-shot success of that Seabiscuit flick, I haven't noticed many signs of a revival.
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They are really going crazy over there. I posted a "i knew it would be a reality show about horsey raising instead of horsey racing. Where is the game in Dream Derby when GSN is the network for games?" response to your Dream Derby analysis and it got deleted.
I've canceled my account over at GSN. The minute they start allowing only 1 sided arguments to their shows is the time when I leave and never come back.
They are scared to death of that show failing and they do not want ANY negative responses to Dream Derby. I think Cronin himself might be logged into the boards deleting negative posts. Guide Angel usually emails me when she deletes something. Got no email this time.
No wonder there are only 2 posts in the Dream Derby thread. Pathetic.
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My post had some unfavorable remarks about the show. On the other hand, it wasn't unrelieved bashing. I'll check later today to see if my review has been deleted.
By the way, the idea that anybody important at GSN cares about that board - or should care about it - is a really bad joke. It's a nice place for a few posters like me to express some opinions. But any exec who bases programming decisions on opinions from self-selected and non-representative Internet posters is, to put it delicately, nuttier than Emeril's fruitcake.
While we're on the subject, a loose paraphrase of my review of American Dream Derby's first ep from the GSN board...
THE PREMISE: A dozen contestants vie in various horsey challenges for a quarter-million and a bunch of horses to eat the money.
THE GOOD: Sparkling visuals. Pretty horses, pretty race track, pretty scenery, pretty mansion, a pretty model among the contestants, even the stable doesn't look too tacky. Some honest-to-goodness horseracing gets into the show, including a one-on-one match race, which is a nice change from the sport's usual format. The handicapping challenges require brain use, and the show features a trainer who seems to know his business. The ep leads up to a concluding race, which helps maintain suspense through the hour. The contestants don't spend every minute bad-mouthing each other.
THE BAD: Digging through horse poop with your bare hands? Way too Fear Factor for me. Steve Santagati gets on my nerves with his constant grin. Unless you're at least somewhat interested in the ponies, the show's appeal is inherently limited.
THE REST: No less than Rich Cronin himself is credited with the concept, so GSN's expenditure of serious coin on the show is no surprise. Will the payout pay off?
THE VERDICT: The emphasis on the sometimes arcane world of horseracing gives this effort some product differentiation from the usual reality fare. But that's a two-edged sword (or a two-pronged pitchfork) because not everybody is fascinated by this particular arcane world. In fact, the decline of interest in horseracing over the past several decades argues that the potential audience for the show - especially among GSN's usual viewers - may be all too limited. I might watch a few more eps, and I might not.
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Someone obviously cares. This is the first time they have EVER deleted posts for bashing a show. As you know, in the past, only posts that were directed towards specific people were ever deleted.
Basically my post said "I told you guys that this show would be more about horse raising than horse racing. 2 minutes of the last episode will be the actual "game" part of the show. So why is it on GSN "The Network for Games"
That was almost my entire post word for word. No Cronin bashing or anything like that.
I don't care that I'm through with the boards, it's been so long since I liked anything on GSN primetime that I've found other things to do. Only things I ever watch are weekend mornings, MG, and FF. That's still an hour and a half a day which is more than enough for me when I watch TPiR too.
By the way Casey, what ever happened to Starz's ratings that they were supposed to put out every month? I was always interested in following up with that but I can't find anything about it since the original ratings done in August or whenever.
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I checked the GSN boards last night sometime after the show had aired, and there was another unfavorable message about the show that I had noticed got deleted since then as well. The post sounded like someone who knew about raising and taking care of horses and how GSN's show didn't have a clue about this. Apparently, there's someone who's running the boards who doesn't like to read about the unfavorable reviews of the show.
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[quote name=\'xibit777\' date=\'Jan 11 2005, 01:40 PM\']I don't care that I'm through with the [GSN] boards[/quote]
Anyone who can post coherent thoughts will find themselves out of place there. Just walk away and don't look back.
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I just checked the GSN board and my original post (http://\"http://www.gsn.com/buzz/showthread.php?threadid=75489\"), with all its unfavorable comments intact, is still up. Some replies dump on the show, some praise it. The post from "somebody who knew about raising and taking care of horses" seems to be back, if it ever got deleted in the first place. One of the posts is a long complaint from somebody who tried out for the show and missed. That post is later rebutted in the thread with a differently phrased list of the contestants. All in all, it looks like a lively, interesting discussion.
Don't know what was in the deleted post, but you don't have to look far to find negative comments about the show. The funniest reply: "I really think that was fake horse poop." The thread seems pretty coherent to me. A few misspellings, but I've been guilty of those.
As for the Starz press releases, I wish the network was still putting out numbers, too. All their releases are here (http://\"http://www.prnewswire.com/micro/ncor/\"). As you can see, they haven't followed up the original report on November 11 with any subsequent releases, despite their promise of monthly numbers.
Don't know if they ran into trouble with Nielsen, or if Starz' own numbers weren't so good in subsequent months, or if they just forgot. Too bad, the numbers provided a quick and dirty glimpse of a wide cross-section of the cable world.
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Yeah, now I do see that post that I was talking about as being deleted back on there. I could have sworn it wasn't there this afternoon when I looked. LOL, in my opinion, the discussions about the show seem to be more exciting than the show itself.
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Have to agree...looking through the thread is more fun and less time-consuming than the horseracing show itself.
SPOILERS ahead, folks...
To get back to the original poker discussion, GSN's first hold 'em series wrapped up last night with the expected result, as James Van Alstyne won easily. He had his last opponent, Lee Markholt, outchipped by a ridiculous ten-to-one margin. All Van Alstyne had to do was play smart, cautious poker and wait for the inevitable stroke of luck to wipe out the short-stacked Markholt. Eventually the luck arrived on an inside-straight draw, and Van Alstyne copped 125K.
The live aftermath was more than a little confused but kind of fun. Kevin Nealon apparently had trouble keeping track of when the camera was on. He still got off a few funny lines, though, and Robert Williamson memorably compared himself to Vanna White.
The deal produced a pair of nines and a split of 30K between Van Alstyne and an equine message therapist (get her on Dream Derby!) named Malin-Maria Teal (http://\"http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/01-11-2005/0002819124&EDATE=\"). The live audience was large and enthusiastic. Hey, GSN, you could really jazz your poker and blackjack shows by bringing in a few warm bodies to watch the proceedings.
Drifting off-topic again, the celeb blackjack finale last night was terrific, even without the live audience. (Actually, it seemed like a live audience had wandered in because the crew was laughing so much.) Lance Bass bombed out early after a ridiculous run of bad cards, though he got a message from one of the eye candies as a consolation prize. The other three players racked up huge scores.
Anything could have happened on the last hand, but Jason Alexander was the only player with "male genitalia," as he commented on an earlier show. He bet big while the others chickened out, and he came home the winner when Stann busted on an excruciating five-card draw. Alexander also chipped in the best laugh lines (Animals for President, among other comments), though Stann, Probst and Vasgersian all managed some respectable zingers. Kelli Williams looked good, which was enough.
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[quote name=\'CaseyAbell\' date=\'Jan 12 2005, 08:45 AM\'] Kelli Williams looked good, which was enough.
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Kelli Williams ALWAYS looks good.....IMHO, she's one of the most beautiful celebrities out there. First caught my eye in the TV-movie "Flowers for Algernon" a few years back, and this past Christmas was the star of another made for TV-movie on Hallmark....
ObGameShows: The original movie on which the book "Flowers for Algernon" was based ("Charly", 1968) featured Dick Van Patten, who later guested on "Just Men".
;)
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The live portion of the Poker show was marred by poor lighting of Nealon and the other guys. Maybe they should have done some applause tracks during the taped portion, because it was quite jarring to have such a pumped-up crowd during the short live portion.
I liked the music on "Blackjack." It sounded reminscent of one of the cues from "The Big Showdown."
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[quote name=\'CaseyAbell\' date=\'Jan 12 2005, 08:45 AM\']Anything could have happened on the last hand, but Jason Alexander was the only player with "male genitalia," as he commented on an earlier show. He bet big while the others chickened out, and he came home the winner when Stann busted on an excruciating five-card draw. ...
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I wonder if Oakwood School, Alexander's charity, would be pushing for a Jeopardy!-style rule about minimum guarantees for future tournaments. They got $200K for Jason's win ($300K total), which isn't shabby, but I believe he broke his own chips record with a final score of $442K. (What I wouldn't give to have that kind of night at the Blue Chip Casino in Michigan City! :-) ) But while Jason had the guts to bet big in the final hand, he had a little luck on his side as all three of his wins ended with final-hand dealer busts. Between this win and exorcising the Seinfeld curse, I'd say he's having a pretty good season.
No word on whether there'll be a season 3 yet, but I'll be looking forward to it. Meanwhile, nine days until World Series 2...