Wednesday and Thursdays, 9pm,
ITV1
Blimey. It was August 2013 when we started banging on about Korean show The Genius, and it’s fair to suggest that we thought that first series was a bit of a mixed bag, but the hits *really* hit, and across its four seasons it really learned what worked and what didn’t (check out our commentaries in the Specials Board), and by the end we were declaring it “probably the best show in the world being made today”. So it’s thrilling that after a bit of a Dutch misfire, we’ve got our own version that’s hopefully learned some lessons, made by people who seemingly really love the original. Let’s be clear here, it probably isn’t commissioned without the success of The Traitors. But let’s also be clear here, this pre-dates The Traitors by the best part of a decade, and actually isn’t *that* much like it.
Genius Game sees a group of people playing as individuals but invariably having to strike and break coalitions across games of strategy and intelligences both social and logical. Winning games means earning Tokens of Life (i.e. immunity) which you normally get a couple of to give to someone else except the person who finishes bottom in each game who is automatically up for elimination, and who must challenge a player of their choosing to a Death Match to survive. Doing well in games also earns Garnets – the show’s currency. These represent power and can be traded with other people for favours or traded with the house for game advantages – but at the end of the series all the Garnets in play are converted into cash, £1,000 each, that the ultimate winner will receive.
The original Korean show is, undoubtably, extremely cool. It featured an incredible soundtrack (from electronic band Idiotape) as well as found music – the strings of Extreme Ways by Moby used excellently and famously to signify a “checkmate” moment. At its best its edited like a brilliant heist movie, flashbacks and flashforwards, plans coming together, plans falling apart, “how the fuck did that just happen?” moments, moments of interpersonal comedy and drama, moments of people finding out how to hack the game that leaves everyone open-mouthed – it’s cool, sexy people playing games hard.
The question is how much of that will have translated to our version – it remains an unusual format for a channel that doesn’t usually do unusual formats so this is a big swing. On the plus side they’re really going for it, pushing it largely, giving it a 75-minute slot to allow everything to breathe, a lovely set, David Tennant to draw people in – you absolutely cannot say they haven’t put the effort in (which makes putting it up against Race Across the World and Taskmaster a bit baffling – this is going to need word of mouth quickly). But have they managed to make it cool and sexy? Have they got the reveals right? That’s a question we can’t answer for now.
If you’ve watched it let us know what you think in the comments, however for episodic discussion check out #geniuschat in our Discord.
A lot of eyes going to be on the overnights for this, so for comparison Celeb Big Brother did 1.3m against RATW’s 3.2m last Wednesday. This will not initially have CBB’s catch-up, but look to see if it grows throughout the run.
Also this is likely to do decent numbers in the sort of demos that make the channel money if it works out like the Korean show, so keep a look out for those. Basically, everyone needs to hold their nerve – if it’s not turning people around by the end of week two then be disappointed, but everyone needs to work out what it *is* and *isn’t* for themselves.
Ridiculous to schedule it against one of the BBC’s most watched formats – should have gone Thu/Fri. Hopefully they have the sense to release it early on ITVX or YouTube.
Very very excited to watch this
Haha. That’ll teach me to get excited about a TV show. It was so painfully boring. I cannot believe how slow and old fashioned it was.
I’m so sorry but this is FAR TOO overwrought for 9pm Wednesday on ITV. Was it commissioned for Saturday 9pm?That feels slightly more realistic.
You lose so much by Tennant not being in the room or at least describing the rules in-vision.
Feel like ITV viewers are really going to struggle with this, regardless of scheduling. I like it but it feels like something that would be on BBC4 if it had a massive budget.
Alright I liked this a lot but with some caveats.
I like the set, I’m fine with the way they’ve incoporated Tennant, I thought the first Main Match was simple and decent – I was a bit worried about The Rules Dump, that’s always going to be the big sticking point, but I’m not sure you could have an opening Main Match much simpler – pick a vault, don’t get too greedy, knobble someone over – good decent game – think there’s some performative thickness on the socials – a pity but was always going to be the case. Good players, good play, enjoyable.
But I probably would have waited a few episodes to bring out Gyul Hap – an absolute classic for sure, but it probably needs to wait until viewers are more familiar with what’s expected before bringing it out, it *is* a challenging game to just expect people to immediately understand in episode one. We know Same Picture Hunt is coming, I might have opened with that, that’s just “remember where the pictures are” – a pretty easy game to grasp.
Also it’s a shame that the editing and especially the soundtrack is a bit more… conservative than the original. I suspected we weren’t going to get Idiotape, and there’s no Hashtag MobyMoment incoming, but the soundtrack was very much part of the identity of the original – it was a *cool* show. This? Not so much. I quite like the Close Encounters-esque sting but it’s not much on its own, the rest of it felt a bit anonymous. And waiting for the end for the flashback? It was neatly done, but remember how exciting the first flash *forward* was ten minutes into the first Korean episode? It’s a shame we got nothing like that.
Basically it’s a *good* interpretation of the show from episode one and I look forward to watching the rest going forward, but I’m not sure it quite passes the cool and sexy test. I’m still thrilled that they’ve had the balls to do it, and it’s a relief that after a decade of trying it’s finally hit the screens.
Actually I did also think the puzzle boxes was quite a neat way of opening.
Had a lot to live up to but felt it dragged a bit – should have been kept to an hour with a tighter edit. Cast weren’t likeable enough really to be engaging and Tennant was completely under utilised.
I think they picked the wrong game to start with as we didn’t really see it unfolding for ourselves which perhaps made it look more complicated than it was. The death match had a much better playalong factor and was easy to follow.
The set and graphics look great though.
Well reading some of the reviews this morning and listening to the comments here seems like I am in a minority here but I really enjoyed it.
I was watching with a friend who was not as focused on it as I was and he is a smart guy but could not really follow what was happening in the first game even though I listened and thought I understood I was still not fully understanding after the first round. Maybe some onscreen graphics would have helped?
However we both loved the elimination game. That felt like a head to head 1% Club puzzle and was much more the kind of thing I was expecting to get here.
I liked the presentation and the set and David was a great choice for this Like I thought he would be.
My concern is any casual viewers will look at this and decide it’s a bit complicated or slow and switch over.
1.2m episode 1. A bit lower then they’d like I suspect.
110k in the late night repeat though.
I also really enjoyed it. The main match was psychological gameplay like I don’t think I’ve ever seen on TV before (though I’ve never seen either the original, nor The Traitors), and the death match couldn’t have worked out more exciting if they’d scripted it.
The fact that David Tennant isn’t in the room with them is very odd, though. And I don’t think they ever really explained what the garnets are for, or why all the contestants carry little black bags around with them. Do they have some garnets to start with, or are their bags all empty until the end of the first main match?
Everyone gets one to start with – it was in the puzzle box with the invitation at the beginning of the show. Eventually you’ll be able to use them to buy advantages in games (or to swap them for chips for a poker game that will be converted back after), but obviously doing that reduces your potential prize. Death Match losers give all of theirs to the DM winner, although it will end up with one person getting all of them in the Final anyway.
In the first episode of the Korean one one contestant just leaves theirs lying around, and another enterprising contestant finds it an trades it back with him for information without him realising it was originally his own garnet anyway.
That was most enjoyable.
Set design: strong yes. Camerawork: strong yes. This show looks great, I’m not going to have trouble finding a good picture for the Week.
Soundtrack works for the ITV viewer – it’s unobtrusive, doesn’t get over the voices, and (when I rewatch the episodes over the weekend) I expect to find it’s given us a subtle guide for emotions. Sure, it’s not Idiotape / Moby / Gary Monaghan’s Playlist, but it works for the audience.
Contestants? They’re a complex bunch, they are people, they have layers. I suspect we’re going to see all shades of humanity – the good, the bad, the ugly. That very human drama is what unstructured telly is all about, and “shared humanity” is something ITV does better than any other channel.
Main game was easy to explain, and they gave us viewers a lot of help, but it all became a bit fiddly to keep up with. It’s a lean-forward show, demands concentration, couldn’t have it on in the background.
Loved the foreshadowing. In the opening segment, one of the group of five proposed the winning strategy, but took it no further. And we saw someone correctly call Paul in his heist, in a multitude of guesses. Again, I expect to find some more goodies – maybe for later in the series – on a second watch.
Same break-hanger twice in a row? Could do better.
Death match was complicated, and I suspect that people turning over for News at Ten would be surprised to see this.
David Tennant is the attraction to hook people in, he’s not going to be the star of the show. Already, contestants are setting up alliances for the end, and setting up rivalries to follow. This ain’t 99 To Beat, it ain’t The 1% Club, it’s Survivor in clothes as smart as the players.
Contestant and FOTB Ben is doing a Youtube commentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFwYX9xFuT8
Episode two was good, Zombie Game is one of the better S1 Korean games, but I still think it’s lacking a certain… energy? I felt it a bit when they were arguing over Bex and scrambling a bit but otherwise it’s all a bit… quiet I think. It’s where the soundtrack added to the original, but the lack here detracts.
846k yesterday night, that’s rough.
I dont’ think today’s audiences can deal with only having two games an episode. The first game in episode 1 dragged and would have killed off a casual viewer I would think tuning into episode 2. Interesting if Gogglebox cover it tonight.
The extra 15 minutes really harms it more than it helps. The Traitors has 4 format points in an hour plus the “reality” downtime and that downtime is perhaps what is really missing here.
Sadly it’s dead on arrival. The zombie game was better than the opener but the edit made it overly complicated to follow and basically left us with half an hour of people shaking hands with viewers not being told how the game was played out. The death match was then incredibly dull to watch and to top it off one of the most annoying contestants to watch seems to be coming out on top and dominated the preview for next week. The laws of reality TV editing suggest he won’t last too much longer though.
I don’t think even Tennant could save it but he needed to be there in person at least for the death match.
Sort of official Genius Game podcast, Dealer’s Room, out on wherever you get your podcasts now.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/68dcEaL2ccERWpI0GPRSRn?si=fNxAtZycQHGQvh30WYPCCA
Large suggestions they’re dropping this from Thursdays and going Wednesdays only.
Yep, showing Celeb Millionaire on Thursday now.
Confirmed for this week according to ITV schedule website. Celebrity Millionaire on the Thursday 9pm instead.
Knew Genius Game wouldn’t land the trailer seemed very lame and boring so can’t be bothered to watch it, Who Want’s To Be A Millionaire is clearly doing very very well in ratings for ITV to fill the slot with that considering the first half of the new series on Sunday nights finished in March then many speculations read that the rest of the 16 part series would be aired in the Autumn especially considering their twitter said “Later This Year” They have surprisingly brought the second half of the new run forward from the Autumn to now. I’ve never known a show which finishes a run and returns just a month later it’s clearly landing very well where they’ve put it in the schedule and I respect ITV believing in the show so much. I love Millionaire myself find it very relaxing and chilled out for Sunday night viewing no fancy lighting, complicated rules or constant chat just 15 questions to play along with and some decent banter and presenting from Clarkson, The most near to perfect reboot i’d say believe it or not since September last year ITV have aired 18 episodes (24 by the end of the run) which is like 6 months of shows.
It occurs to me re: editing that it’s a pity GG doesn’t weaponise ‘coming up’ segments for intrigue like The Genius did, which is a rather ingenious way of using coming up segments in a way that adds rather than spoils and detracts (even though they still basically do exactly that).
Scene:
Ben finishes explaining his Bubble Strategy, “…but this will only work if we all stick together!”
One hour later
“Bex, come here! Don’t talk to them Bex!”
“I WILL TREAT THIS AS BEING A TRAITOR OF THE HIGHEST ORDER!”
“I’m just talking to them!”
One hour earlier
Who’s not going to stick around for that?
LOL they do it Ep3.
I don’t think ep3’s main match worked that well, because it was never particularly clear what the undercover agent was doing, or at least whether he was doing what he said he was doing, and how that fed (or didn’t) into what the other contestants submitted in the dealer room each time.
It probably needed a running commentary.
Watching The Devil’s Plan, I think it shows up something that I think is a pity, the Korean shows are about equal parts drama and laughs, tears and silliness, Genius Game has opted for drama drama drama, and I think it could do with a few more laughs. If it didn’t have Ben scrambling every episode I’m not even sure they’d be much volume.
It feels like I’m slagging it off with every comment so I just want to indicate that I do like it and think it is good and it comes from a place of wanting it to be as good as it can be.
739k! It’ll be moved to ITV2 at this rate.
I think we’re all in denial. I started coming to this site years ago because of the genius game and I came back because it was coming on the telly here. But it’s not just a bad version of the show -it’s a bad show. Everything else here that says otherwise just wishful thinking I think. It’s unbelievably boring. It’s old-fashioned and it’s not entertaining at all. Sure you can entertain yourself by playing along with the games but it doesn’t INVITE you to do that. It’s like watching chess played by unlikeable strangers in a park, if you really love chess- without any theatricality added to the game. So all of the pleasure is coming from chess which is not what TV is supposed to do. It is not a game SHOW. And it’s the show part that’s more important in all of these things whether we like it or not
I’d be amazed if it hasn’t dropped down to closer to 700,000 viewers which is pretty much what ITV would get in that slot if it just put on a test card that said normal service will be resumed in 45 minutes.
I don’t think that’s quite fair, pretty much every comment I’ve made is “I like it buuuuut…” and that’s sincere, but having The Devil’s Plan on right now also brings its shortcomings into relief.
I wondered how much the word game last night *needed* an undercover agent, and if the whole thing might have been more fun played straight as an incomplete information shared-pool puzzle solving exercise. If you go and read our old commentaries, it feels like this series has quite a lot in common with the meta for S2, which was quite a lot of “ignore the game, knobble someone over” which didn’t go down that well – I still think it’s the weakest series, but the subsequent ones were really really good and I’d hope Genius Game would improve on that as well, but I suspect its one chance is over now.
Yes fair enough.
Maybe gameshows have changed so much that even if this up version had made a carbon copy of latter GG seasons that were great, it still wouldn’t work. Maybe what fans of game think works and what gets TV figures is diverging. As a show, it’s not working at all, that’s for sure. And I don’t judge the viewers for not liking it.
I keep hearing how good original Genius Game and was looking forward to this version. Disappointed to say that it’s dull, well made but dull. I commend ITV for trying but the overnight ratings aren’t great and the consolidated ratings look set to be under 3m.
Episode four HASHTAG MOBYMOMENT.
Thought this was a great episode (social deathmatch not withstanding – I think the it was an improvement on Tact8cal RPS in the original but I think they improved on the idea wirh Sun, Moon, Star so the put upon person can fight back), felt a bit more in the spirit of the original, still a bit drama drama, but lots of small group talking was fun.
I 100 percent had a jaw drop with #mobymoment right now.
Really enjoyed this episode. Played better socially than others tbh.
how did it do ratings wise?
Flat.
This is such an inert cast, and that’s rewarded by making avery game gang-uppable. And you’re supposed to put an individual skill deathmatch after a mob game and vice versa, not pair them up for maximum boredom.
If the thought processes of these people are in any way representative, RIP UK I guess. But also, the part where you’re offered information and a win and react vindictively to it only makes sense if you insert racism into the equation. The back half of the episode was pretty uncomfortable.
Now, the show’s music generally is pretty inept and missing the mood, but I didn’t know I could be angry at it until they decided that was Moby-worthy.