A new show that started CBS in the US last night, which everyone seemed to be suggesting would be ABSOLUTELY CRAZY!!! but is basically felt like a safe, corporate version of Latino-ism really, it’s literally just bingo with a sexier accent. Pick a number off the board, if the symbol behind it is on your card mark it off and earn some cash, the first to get two lines of three goes through to the million dollar endgame. Occasionally there’s a bonus game with some quite easy questions with an element of music and dancing, but there’s not enough brass and not enough dancing throughout really.

The endgame is mildly interesting, at least mathematically – now you’ve got a 4×4 board, you pick numbers off a board of twenty. Behind 16 of the numbers is a symbol on your card and some cash, behind the other four are red skulls. Every time you complete a line you win $25k to add to your stash and have to decide there and then whether to take your money or play on, the risk is that if you hit a skull your bank is halved and if you uncover all four skulls you leave with nothing. However if you get all 16 symbols and fill your card you win a million. If you’re willing to risk, your chances of winning the million are actually very reasonable, my gut says it’s at least 20%, maybe a bit higher (if you choose a number at the beginning, avoid picking it, and there is a skull there you can’t fail). If you’re not willing to risk, getting out as soon as you’re able after $100,000 feels like the optimum play, you’d need to fill two more lines to get the money back up if you hit a skull, the rewards don’t really outweigh the risk unless you’re intent on going all the way to the end. Also there’s a weird bit where a challenge came up but they’d only add the money if the symbol was on your card, and unless they were going to waste an entire segment by putting a challenge on a skull space wasn’t worth the tension build, because otherwise the task would be unwinnable.

I didn’t hate it, Jamie Camil is good, but there’s not much to it.

Hulu in the US has commissioned a new SOCIAL EXPERIMENT from the mind of TV’s Glenn Hugill, Got to Get Out, where a group of ten people stay in a mansion earning up to $1m in prizemoney ($1 a second plus physical challenges), they can all split the cash at the end, the catch is at various points during the stay the front doors will open leading to a getaway car and if anyone gets out the gate they take all the money for themselves, to stop them there’s a big red button the other contestants can press to stop the escape.

Might be quite fun, but it’s ten episodes and what happens if someone escapes at the first given opportunity? Will it just be ten hours of watching people eye up each other in a room with a big red button in it? Could it be the next Jailbreak (and I mean that in a good way)? So many questions.

Join us in the Discord on Saturday night as we watch two German celebs battle it out over Elton’s €100,000 briefcase in what has been the third episode in about six weeks, but it will probably a be a bit longer until the next one because The Masked Singer is going to be on.

If you are interested in Jackbox 10 (releasing on 19th October), keep the evening Sunday 22nd free as I’ll be doing a Jackbox 10 night on the server.

On Netflix tomorrow (the 26th), four episodes this week, five the next Tuesday, three the following to finish.

To say we’re excited is an understatement, there have been two shows in the past decade that constantly had me thinking “this BLOODY show” – in a good way. The first is De Mol – the full fat Flemish one, the other is The Genius, both share common elements: smart challenges, an understanding of light and shade, fun contestants and really, really good editing.

And this is, to all intents and purposes, The Genius Mk 2. Largely the same production team, similar games of strategy and betrayal. When De Mol originally finished they decided to end on a high, and since it came back it’s been spectacular, not a duff series amongst them. The Genius similarly ended on a high. It’s been off almost ten years, could this be similar?

Of course it might be rubbish!

That’s just over £300,000 in case you were wondering.

Very similar graphics to the original, the set has all sorts of rooms for people to strategize in, we know at least one of the dealers is the same and towards the end it seems to be building up to an electrostomper of a soundtrack (Idiotape are very much still going and just released a new single last week but I don’t know if they’re involved here). Is there something special about the Pieces given their unusual design? Is there a potential strategy in using your currency to buy advantages to go bust in the expectation you’ll end up winning loads by the end of the game? Already stuff to think about.

My only worry right now is that Millennial In A Hoodie isn’t as good as Bandage Man, but we’ll see.

We know The Genius has been a difficult sell, if this is as good or at least on a level, hopefully it will make this sort of thing a bit of an easier sell if it’s seen to be popular.

I have started episodic discussions of it in #geniuschat on our Discord server.

In other news, thanks to an anonymous contributor for a report on tonight’s Pyramid pilot recording, apparently hosted by… Jane McDonald.

We’re just not bothering talking about linear television any more, there’s evidently nothing interesting coming any time soon, so here’s the advert for the upcoming Squid Game: The Challenge series on November 22nd. 456 people! $4,560,000 top prize! Two years after it was relevant! Various tales of contestant mistreatment!

Might be alright, provided we’re not getting 60-90 minutes of Redlight Greenlight.

In other news, Channel 5 are doing a documentary on It’s A Royal Knockout on Saturday Night at 8:30pm.

Studio Lambert are “doing” Surviving Paradise on Netflix coming October 20th. In it, 12 people think they’re on a luxury holiday but oh no! They’re not and have to earn their way into the luxury villa and the chance at a $100,000 prize. Also the trailer suggests there’s a bit that’s a bit like Carrot In A Box.

Of exciting streaming note in the next week the world’s first VR gameshow in the world ever (not my words, don’t write in), Virtually Impossible, on Joe Sugg’s channel on Youtube from Sunday 24th and more excitingly The Devil’s Plan from Tuesday 26th on Netflix, we’ll almost certainly be doing episodic chat of this in the Discord.