The Fox Game Show Machine
Does Fox have a patent on this? I swear to God they have a machine in their offices that takes a game show idea, puts it through a blender, and comes out with this exact same product time and time again:
1) A money tree with a safe haven
2) Three helps/lifelines/whatever
3) Mark Thompson's brooding announcing, as if every moment is a life or death decision (it's a singing show Mark, not open heart surgery)
4) Ridiculously unnecessary show previews at the start, pre-commercial, and at the end of the episode
5) Questions broken up by commercial breaks to "add to the drama" (but really just annoy viewers)
The Rich List, 5th Grader, and now Don't Forget the Lyrics for the most part have followed this exact same formula. Lyrics just doesn't hold a candle to its superior counterpart on NBC. The band on Singing Bee is far better than that on Lyrics, and by using professional singers to start the songs, you don't get the awkwardness of a contestant butchering an entire song, only part of it.
The games on Singing Bee are more creative and unique than Lyrics, which uses a flat fill in the blank format throughout the show. Also, the decision to focus on one contestant (5th Grader all over again) is a hit or miss idea that totally depends on that one contestant. By spreading the love among 6 contestants, Singing Bee can suffer through 1 or 2 bad ones (although the casting on Singing Bee has been near perfect as far as I can tell).
The show ground to an unbelievably slow pace at one point during tonight's episode, as we revealed the correct answer word by word. In a 30 minute format, getting through 5 songs is just ridiculous. Singing Bee handled so much more material in the same amount of time without seeming rushed.
Wayne Brady is, no surprise, more engaging than Joey Fatone, but even he can't save this show from looking decidedly weaker than its counterpart on NBC.
Also, I'm not going to guess which network developed their show first, but how is it that both sets wound up with marquee signs? That's just weird.
1) A money tree with a safe haven
2) Three helps/lifelines/whatever
3) Mark Thompson's brooding announcing, as if every moment is a life or death decision (it's a singing show Mark, not open heart surgery)
4) Ridiculously unnecessary show previews at the start, pre-commercial, and at the end of the episode
5) Questions broken up by commercial breaks to "add to the drama" (but really just annoy viewers)
The Rich List, 5th Grader, and now Don't Forget the Lyrics for the most part have followed this exact same formula. Lyrics just doesn't hold a candle to its superior counterpart on NBC. The band on Singing Bee is far better than that on Lyrics, and by using professional singers to start the songs, you don't get the awkwardness of a contestant butchering an entire song, only part of it.
The games on Singing Bee are more creative and unique than Lyrics, which uses a flat fill in the blank format throughout the show. Also, the decision to focus on one contestant (5th Grader all over again) is a hit or miss idea that totally depends on that one contestant. By spreading the love among 6 contestants, Singing Bee can suffer through 1 or 2 bad ones (although the casting on Singing Bee has been near perfect as far as I can tell).
The show ground to an unbelievably slow pace at one point during tonight's episode, as we revealed the correct answer word by word. In a 30 minute format, getting through 5 songs is just ridiculous. Singing Bee handled so much more material in the same amount of time without seeming rushed.
Wayne Brady is, no surprise, more engaging than Joey Fatone, but even he can't save this show from looking decidedly weaker than its counterpart on NBC.
Also, I'm not going to guess which network developed their show first, but how is it that both sets wound up with marquee signs? That's just weird.
posted by Brad @ 11:35 PM 8 comment(s)