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I'm wondering about shows you saw the first time and didn't really like, but they grew into a favorite. I have a couple that fit the bill:
--Press Your Luck. I remember watching the first episode when it originally ran and thinking "I don't think much of that". Soon, it became a must-see
--Greed. When I first saw it, especially the Dan-Melissa-Curtis episode, I didn't really like the mean-spiritedness of it, but after a while I really looked forward to watching it every Friday evening
I guess there are some shows that take more than one viewing before you know if you like them or not.
Anyone else have any?
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[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' date=\'Jan 17 2005, 12:24 PM\']I'm wondering about shows you saw the first time and didn't really like, but they grew into a favorite. I have a couple that fit the bill:
--Press Your Luck. I remember watching the first episode when it originally ran and thinking "I don't think much of that". Soon, it became a must-see
--Greed. When I first saw it, especially the Dan-Melissa-Curtis episode, I didn't really like the mean-spiritedness of it, but after a while I really looked forward to watching it every Friday evening
I guess there are some shows that take more than one viewing before you know if you like them or not.
Anyone else have any?
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I had the same feeling for Win Ben Stein's Money. But it has grown to be a neat show.
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I got a few myself.
Wipeout: First few episodes I saw, I was like meh, nothing special. Eventually I got into it, enough so to the point that as long as it was on USA I would make every opportunity I could (which wasn't easy considering I was in 1st and 2nd grade during most of this time) to catch it.
Hollywood Squares (Bergeron version): I was so used to the Davidson version of the Squares, which I did enjoy (despite its bad rap from some). The first few episodes of Bergeron's Squares bored me. It also seemed to me that Tom was trying too hard that first year (don't ask me why). However, the more I got into it, the better IMO the show got. I didn't watch as much the last year (time slot change putting it opposite J!), but I was still a fan and was sorry to see it go.
Greed: I got almost the same response as Ian. I didn't like the first episodes I saw, but it didn't take very long for me to get hooked.
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[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' date=\'Jan 17 2005, 12:24 PM\']I'm wondering about shows you saw the first time and didn't really like, but they grew into a favorite. I have a couple that fit the bill:
--Press Your Luck. I remember watching the first episode when it originally ran and thinking "I don't think much of that". Soon, it became a must-see
--Greed. When I first saw it, especially the Dan-Melissa-Curtis episode, I didn't really like the mean-spiritedness of it, but after a while I really looked forward to watching it every Friday evening
I guess there are some shows that take more than one viewing before you know if you like them or not.
Anyone else have any?
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I can think of two examples.
TJW '90-I was disappointed when it premiered, having grown up with the old run. But the show grew on me. I thought the format was alright, just don't think "The Joker's Wild" was the right name for it.
Feud (twice)-Having watched the Dawson run when I was a bit younger, I couldn't get used to Combs at first. I was one of the few who said "Come fall, CBS will ask Bob Stewart to produce more episodes of $25K Pyramid again, just like they did when Blackout bombed." Ray grew on me, and became my all time favorite game show host. The second time was when Dawson returned. I had no problem with Richard, but the set looked like they put someone's bathroom in Studio 33, cutting it down to 4 family members per family, missing Ray's sense of humor, and keeping the Bullseye/Bankroll round, which had never grown on me. I got used to it, but it wasn't long before Fall '95, when the run met its demise. With Louie, it went the other way around, liked it at first, but then he started grating on my nerves. Thank god they found Karn!
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For me, I would have to go with a couple of the classics: Pyramid and Password. This is mostly because when they were first in their prime, I was too young to really play along (only 11 when they both left for keeps in '89). But the USA reruns of the 100K version got me going with the tournaments, and GSN helped get Password on my side, too, especially the Plus version.
I've also found that I've had an attraction toward Scrabble lately. Not sure why, but I've been making a bunch of my own clues lately and playing with my study hall students. They like it, too.
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For me, I'd say Whew...took a coupla eps for me to get used to the game's fast pace and truly understand its subtle nuances that made it what it was.
Chuck Donegan (The Illustrious "Chuckie Baby")
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[quote name=\'Sonic Whammy\' date=\'Jan 17 2005, 04:54 PM\']I've also found that I've had an attraction toward Scrabble lately. Not sure why, but I've been making a bunch of my own clues lately and playing with my study hall students. They like it, too.
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You know what made Scrabble the game it was, was the writing. If they just used simple little crossword clues, the game would be boring as hell, but the creativity and the ability of the writers to turn a phrase made the clues something special, even if Chuck did bitch about them endlessly. :)
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Believe it or not, at first I did not like the Jim Perry version of $ale of the Century at all. That changed within the opening weeks of 1983 and it became my all-time favorite.
Stretching the topic, I couldn't stand the music to The $10,000 Pyramid at first. This quickly changed over time as I wised up.
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Not quite fitting the topic, but close...
I remember having sort of a grudge against Win Ben Stein's Money and Ben Stein when they stole the Emmy away from TPiR and Bob Barker one year. Once I actually saw the show, I instantly liked it.
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[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' date=\'Jan 17 2005, 10:24 AM\']
I guess there are some shows that take more than one viewing before you know if you like them or not.
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I would thnk the same thing applies to the folks you're watching, be it a host, moderator, or panelist...
I first began watching "What's My Line?" quite by accident. Afer watching the first episode, Dorothy Kilgallen was an instant favorite of mine. Sometime thereafterwards, I began to like AF, but DK always remained a fave.
During the time I was enjoying THESE TWO, I literally could NOT stand Bennett Cerf or John Charles Daly! I used to get so irked at Bennett because he always guessed the line before Dorothy had the opportunity!
OH! And JCD?!!! - With his long and rambling, precise and extraordinary explanations, I used to get TOTALLY frustrated with him! He used to get on my nerves to the point where I thought he was RUDE!
After DK's passing, I saw the exchange between Bennett and John. From seeing the older eps, I see that it's ALWAYS been there. Only, I suppose when DK passed, the panel seemed "different" and the JCD/Bennett exchange became more apparent, to me anyway.
I actually began to LOOK FORWARD to these two! Who woulda ever figured?
JCD and Bennett became my "new" faves. Unfortunately, and I know this will make me quite the unpopular one, I saw something in AF from the earlier shows that I didn't care for. However, she IS a good game player, I can't take THAT away from her.
. . . it didn't take very long for me to get hooked.
Yep, same thing here with me and WML. It almost seems like as I was watching it, one day *ever so subtly,* a single vine attatched itself to me. Then the next day another. And another. Before I even realized it, I was thoroughly wrapped up in these vines. At first these vines didn't attach themselves to me tightly, I imagine that's how I didn't realize I was getting hooked. Then, they began to get tighter and tighter.
To the comment someone else gave about the show they were talking about being a "must-see," - that's exactly what WML has become to me. As for all those folks who have *dozens* of tapes, I've often wondered how, or even WHY they would tape so many shows... that is, until I saw I was doing the exact same thing!
Stuff happens!
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In terms of traditional game shows, not very many come to my mind. However, I first heard in early 1987 about a show called Double Dare on Nickelodeon. That summer, I got hooked. Also, the following year, I saw a promo for a new kids' show, obviously a DD ripoff, called Fun House. I finally checked it out that November.
I missed only one episode since through the remainder of its run.
AFAIK, the only other true game shows that I resisted only to give in to were TTD and TJW (when I was young, I was afraid of those dragons and devils, but I overcame that), plus Supermarket Sweep. The list of non-traditional games is longer:
- American Gladiators
- Survivor
- American Idol
- Celebrity Blackjack
- Extreme Dodgeball
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The Price is Right. For years, I used to think Bob Barker was a mean, crotchety old man (although some things never change). I'd watch ANY competing game show, but never TPIR. And yes, that includes Bargain Hunters. Eventually, as game shows disappeared from network daytime, I'd have no choice, and I grew to like the show.
Tyshaun
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lol. I like that word. Crotchety.
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My reasoning is stupid here, but you must remember I was only 7. :)
Two of my favorite shows when I was a child were the $20,000 Pyramid and shortly thereafter, the $50,000 Pyramid (I even remember sneaking out of bed to see the 4:30am showing on WPIX-11). The reason I was nuts about those two shows were the solari boards used for scoring (and in the case of $20K and some of $50K, the clock, too). I was just fascinated with it, for some reason.
So, when I finally got to see the $25,000 Pyramid when it bowed on CBS in the fall of '82, I was absolutely floored when they moved to all-LED for the clock, and for the scoring, too. Not only that, but they took the tie game which I loved so much and changed it!! To this day I still prefer the $10K/$20K/$25K Cullen/$50K tiebreaking method.
The game, however, really began to grow on me when it entered syndication once again in 1985 with a dollar value of $100,000. At first only being 10 when this version debuted, I really had no concept of money and thought the first trip to the winner's circle would be $50,000 and the second for $100,000! I waso once again disappointed to find out it was virtually a carbon copy of the daytime show in gameplay but with the $100,000 tournament being the difference. Those tournaments are what really got me to like the show in its '80s life.
Veering off topic, but something I thought about as I composed this.....What was the first show to have a timer on that had the colon to it, and NOT LED? I'm thinking WLoD...
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[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' date=\'Jan 17 2005, 12:24 PM\']I'm wondering about shows you saw the first time and didn't really like, but they grew into a favorite. I have a couple that fit the bill:
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When I was a tweenager of 12 years, and I first got GSN, I heard of "Match Game". I thought: "What the hell kind of show is that--do they strike Matches all day? [in part, due to the fact the GSN website had a non-related game at the time called "Strike A Match"], and refused to watch it. Then, when it came on immediatly after "Price" when the G-T contract came back up in '98...I gave it a chance..and have loved it ever since.
On the flip side; I loved Press Your Luck as a kid...but can't stand it or it's stepbrother now.
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The Price Is Right definitely was one that was out there for me at first. The show itself was good but I didn't really like Barker in his early years. As tne years passed, I grew more attatched to it, then it became one of my all-time favorittes.
Another one was Scrabble. Thank heavens I didn't see the episodes where they actually had to SPELL the words out. At first I thought, did they totally screw up the original board game to make a whole new game out of it? Later on, I figured out what was going on & got hooked on it thereafter.
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Greed. I took a look at the first episode, and immediately wrote it off as a Millionaire ripoff. It grew to be one of my faves from that era.
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I didn't appreciate The Newlywed Game until I began an adult.
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"Card Sharks"--When I first saw it, I dismissed it as G-T trying to do an H-Q-style gambling-themed show with poll questions instead of extremely easy general-knowledge tossups. In coming back to it when I got GSN, I got to appreciate the symmetry between both of the game elements and reappreciate the ability in the poll questions to go from the serious to the silly and back again, not to mention Jim Perry's performance as a host and the fact that you could easily get caught up in Money Cards. (In fact, one of the many problems with "Card Guppies" was that the symmetry between the tossups and the card-calling was gone completely--not good. And the problem with the Eubanks version, other than the unnecessary tweaks, was that with him you couldn't go from "100 wives--does your husband snore?" to "100 Congressmen--are you in favor of abortion?"--you had to keep it feather-light.)