We’re halfway through the series (original Show Discussion post here) and doubtless you have discovered by now that “The” Genius Game has not been the hit we were hoping for, and that is a shame as I think production have broadly got the format right and the mistakes its made I think are understandable. I think even with ITV’s fairly generous “sod it, give it another go” standards of late a recommission for this might be challenging. But, to be fair, ITV should be applauded for having the guts to say yes to this – really not an easy and obvious commission – in the first place, and I would hope in time people come to appreciate it.
I don’t blame anyone for playing up having David Tennant on board at all – if you’re going to have talent involved having one of the biggest names in TV across the last twenty years would certainly be seen as a draw. I don’t think anyone was expecting the idea that the way he was used – effectively playing the same role as a anonymous man covered in bandages in the original – was going to end up being a detraction. He only has to do a day of filming and rake in the money, but the public wanted him to interact with the players which would have been far too expensive for two weeks of filming I’d have thought. In the end you *could* have just had had someone anonymous doing the briefings, or you could have got someone far cheaper act as a wise-cracking authority in the studio, but this is something I think you could only know in retrospect. The Dealers carry authority but they lack the charm of their Korean counterparts.
I think by and large the games have leant a bit too hard into the alliances and betrayal aspect of the show in an attempt to appease The Traitors fans and this feels a bit of a shame. The game selection has been pretty good by and large, but I think its forgotten a little bit about the puzzle aspect of the format, how a lot of the bits that leave people open mouthed watching the original were people finding ingenious solutions and that’s been lacking a bit. Did Codebreakers require an Undercover Agent element, especially with the knowledge that in playtesting they never won? In that case you’re just giving someone a random chance of going to the Death Match by picking a card – it’s no wonder it ended up playing out as it did, as a viewer it was quite annoying not seeing the puzzle being solved, probably with people lying about the hints and someone eventually having a breakthrough, episode three of series one is too early for the sort of “ignore the game” meta to play out. I thought Lights Out on episode four (that’s just gone) was a good original game, a bit of memory, a bit of tactics, a bit of negotiation, a bit of lying, chunky props, it was quite fun. Death Match selection I’m broadly positive on although I don’t think I’d have used Gyul Hap/Same or Different for episode one, give viewers a chance to get attuned to the sort of mental agility required to understand it first, and Tactical Rock Paper Scissors was always a bit crap (basically a reversioning of, I want to say, Winning Streak from the original?), there are far better social deathmatches where the underdog still has a chance even if they don’t have the approval of their peers.
I think the casting might have been a bit off. There’s an elephant in the room in that one member is quite loud and direct (and I should add has been and is perfectly nice and informative off camera) and nine people who are a bit more… reserved (and one who could have probably have been a bit of a character and has come across well on podcasts since, but got kicked out early). I like many of them but I wonder if the edit is making them all seem a bit… serious. Genius Game is drama drama drama, The Genius is drama drama laughs and I don’t think that laughs should be understated, if anything a British reality audience loves a funny offhand comment, bit of silliness or downtime chat and I think more should have been included. The benefits of this are twofold, it breaks up the game a bit, and it allows us more of a glimpse of people’s relationships with each other which help explain choices down the line. I daresay Celebrity Genius Game with people more used to being on camera would find these moments a bit easier to include, and why shouldn’t it? The original Genius was largely a celebrity show anyway.
It’s a shame the theme and editing have been a bit conservative – you’ve come this far you might as well go for it, the theme tune could have been any ITV daytime post 4pm quiz from the last decade, the background music largely irrelevant, compare and contrast to the original where the music was a big part of the show’s identity. It was a nice surprise hearing the Extreme Ways strings (#mobymoment) strike up this week, a strange choice to wait until episode four for it, looks like a recent edit – I always remember it ending every episode as a “checkmate” moment – sometimes as a surprise – rather than when someone does anything particularly genius-like per se as people are suggesting but maybe I’m misremembering. I think their use of flashbacks is fine, I think they’ve missed out on some good potential flashforward moments – spoilers as intrigue! – Ben’s Zombie Game “…but this will only work if we all stick together!” *30 minutes later* “Bex! Don’t talk to them Bex!” “I WILL TREAT THIS AS TREACHERY OF THE HIGHEST ORDER!” *30 minutes earlier* felt like an open goal.
Four episodes in I do like it and think it is good but I’ve had to caveat with a lot of “buuuuuutt….”s. I’ll be pleased if the second half finds an audience and I daresay it’s getting juicier but if not, look, it stings a bit more because we really believe in the format but everyone will have forgotten about it by week three of Destination X, probably, and it’s just another glorious failure – a beautiful defeat if you like – in the great pantheon of gameshow flops.
And I also daresay that if you’re even vaguely interested in this sort of thing you ought to be watching The Devil’s Plan on Netflix, the second series of which is currently going out, and is a huge amount of fun – it’s basically The Genius II, the legally distinct sequel made by largely the same people as the original, but a bit more “reality” and heavy on the side mysteries around the complex its set in and resulting intrigue. I’m afraid there are rules dumps, some of them lengthy, and the occasional duff game, but it has engaging characters, brilliant reveals, banger of a soundtrack and some really great strategy.
My main issue is with the games and casting.
First of all the games they have chosen are quite broken in the respect a group of players can just band together and dominate. Any players that do try to play the games seem to be targeted for death match.
Combine that with the players chosen who are not out to play the games, I think it has actually made for quite a dull show. It’s a shame as I think a UK version had a lot of potential and there is a lot to like in the ideas, presentation and hosting. However to me when you get the two core elements of the show wrong (casting and games) no wonder people are turning off.
I can see why somebody like Benjamin was chosen but the loud brash way of playing the game completely ruined any chance of having a decent show.
While I don’t think the games are too complicated somebody casually interested can’t really come in part way through and be able to really understand what is going on. Twice now I have spent time explaining to somebody who joined me part way through an episode.
Its become far to much about your group of friends and protecting that than just having fun playing the games.
It was always a show even if done well is too much hard work for the average viewer, but ITV desperately want their very own Traitors so… They tried it with The Fortune Hotel which did enough to get a second run but this has rated far worse.
Anyway, I don’t see the point in recommissioning dead shows, and surely broadcasters, production companies etc are constantly trying to find the next big thing so shouldn’t need more time.
“It’s good, but…” seems like an apt summary so far.
I was nervous when they talked about having a named creator, but was quite curious at the thought of David Tennant – he absolutely has the creative range for it. He’s been quite fun in that regard, but the edit makes it painfully obvious it’s a pre-record.
I think the first three games suffered because the strategy identified in the first minutes of the game couldn’t be defended against – and we get a recurring “can’t play the game” narrative (the player in jail in episode one, the six players outside the bubble in episode two). That it was later revealed the undercover agent (in game 3) had *never* won in playtesting, that’s a problem…
That then leads to a second narrative of “won’t play the game” – people don’t want to go to the DM, but when the first part of the game breaks and they can’t win, then the only thing left is to “hide” to avoid being a target for the DM. It doesn’t make for good television, because you get neither “ugly victories” or “beautiful defeats”. This became painfully obvious in episode 3 where the undercover agent played the game the only way they could, but nobody was willing to fight back despite visible frustration that they couldn’t play the game (and the only person that tried, got sent to the DM)…
I actually don’t have an issue with the casting – I look towards the combination of gameplay issues above, and the edit certainly hasn’t done them any favours at all. Following two of the podcasts (Dealer’s Room, Ben’s recap on YT) there has been quite a few positive and funny interactions left on the cutting room floor – and similarly some game rules and alliances that haven’t been communicated to the audience. Also somewhat unfortunate that the first TWO boots were spoiled (one by PR, one by the garnet leaderboard).
This may have been compounded further with the change in run-time, which started at 1:15 [58m, 55m, 57m without adverts] but seems to have shrunk back to a broadcast hour [46m for episode 4]. Given the introduction of the #mobymoment in episode 4, I’m wondering if this has been re-edited at the request of ITV?
The first three DMs were fine, wasn’t expecting to see Gyul Hap! in the first episode – but we got quite a decent narrative out of it. Unfortunately the fourth DM again fell into the “can’t play the game” narrative…
But the biggest problem has to be the scheduling, they’ve held onto this for a YEAR and then schedule it into Race Across The World *and* Taskmaster *and* (before scheduling changes) Eurovision. As Brig mentioned on the discord, if you had a Venn diagram of those viewers, it would be “fairly circular”…
There are inevitable comparisons with Fortune Hotel, and that two day start allowed the show to “hook” into viewers – The Genius makes more sense as a slower-burn format, but scheduling the first episode into the second episode of RATW means those viewers are already committed – and The Genius either goes into the “watch later” pile (as demonstrated by 400k+ catch-up in the first two episodes), or misses the radar entirely.
For historical reference, the ratings we’ve seen mentioned:
Episode 1 – 1.2m overnight, 1.9m +7
Episode 2 – 846k overnight, 1.3m +7
Episode 3 – 739k overnight, unknown +7
Episode 4 – 721k overnight
As far as I’m aware the fourth episode being 60m was always the case, it was down as that in the listings mags for the second week, similarly tonight’s is back to 75 minutes.
I also think the RATW scheduling, whilst not ideal, is being used as a bit of a crutch for justifying the show’s non-success – it certainly doesn’t look like it’s making the numbers on catch-up, but I don’t know what they are.
Fair enough – I think it does demonstrate that a broadcast hour wasn’t enough and it needs that extra room to breathe… not only for the gameplay aspects that were not broadcast (as mentioned in the podcasts, players doing a premature lock-down to demonstrate they don’t have the black cube), but also for those lighter moments… (something I’m glad we’ve got the podcasts for, there’s some funny antics going on!)
As for the scheduling, I agree it’s important not to over-egg the impact here… it’s still a niche show, even with DT on board. I could see another 250k (so in the Fortune Hotel ballpark), but that still means episode 3 and 4 are under a million overnight…
Similarly, there is a small but loyal following on YT – episode 4 is up to 8.3k views, but the vast majority of those came within the first 24 hours of upload (and nearly 100 comments to date, even if many of them are annoyed at the DM).
Down to 620k last night.
https://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/ratings/george-floyd-film-informs-220k-for-bbc2/5205415.article
Ultimately, I think, when I think of The Genius I think of a contestant selling someone’s garnet back to him for information without realising. I think comically hiding under a desk to spy on people. I think of someone noticing the cards look almost imperceptably different if you turn them the other way up and managing to stack a deck in their favour because of it. I think of the hacks – episode five is a variant of a game that had an inbuilt system for particularly skilled players to pull out of the box what they needed which seemed to be completely missing here. The “how are they doing that?” moments.
It has the set of The Genius, it has the games of The Genius, but does it have the *soul* of The Genius? Does it leave you open-mouthed? I don’t know, it might not even make much of a ratings difference if it did, but I think one cool moment in the first few episodes might have given it a fighting chance and it’s been played almost a bit too straight.
What I am finding is there is no real benefit to anybody betraying their group that they form at the start of the match. The way the games are built in such a way that it’s almost impossible for a group with less people to win. I also really don’t like the fact you can have people on the sidelines of a game telling a player what to do. Safari Race is a good game, but when you have one player in a team dictating everything makes it a boring watch.
However I have really liked all the death matches
It was a lot more chaotic as Zombie Game (KR S04E02) – 12 players, 5 zombies (instead of 6, meaning 3 picks instead of 4) and 1-2-4 movement (instead of 1-2-3). In hindsight, this might have made more sense as the series opener with 11 players.
It feels like the adjustments caused some balancing issues – in the original the final player controlled 3 of the 36 tokens, so there’s more risk of them playing into a settled board. With 4 of 28, that balance of power shifts and they are more likely to have (one or more) casting votes… which lead to the predictable “abstain at first chance” strategy.
It’s a rough throw of the dice – they’ve made changes so you can’t copy the strategy verbatim from the Korean series, but the balance issues have introduced their own problems and we sadly get another “can’t play, won’t play” outcome.
As Brig said above, it hasn’t really found its soul yet – the music, the flashforward and flashback tension, the sabotage, the silly moments, the “ah ha” genius moments that unlock the game… some of it has been left on the cutting room floor (boo hiss), some if it seems to be missing entirely.
The funny thing with this show (I’m sticking with it) is I’m trying to watch it through the eyes of a standard ITV1 viewer. Because it’s SO un-ITV and it’s kind of intriguing that it will be picking *some* of them up. Honestly the Safari Race I’m currently watching must’ve made them tear their hair out. It’s a real miss of a game for a mainstream show I think, particularly hard work to follow in a series that most viewers are struggling with, and it’s never ending – one of the longer episodes too!
I’m sure he’s very nice IRL but Ben really has been an actual turn off for this series – as in I think people will have stopped watching because of him. He was extremely hard work during the episode where he was running round all over the place, it was not an entertaining episode.
It’s interesting because Ep 6, Diamond Dilemma, is one of the drier games from the original show yet I thought really worked here, it had surprises, it had laughs, it didn’t outstay its welcome, it SURGED to 692k.
Absolutely one of the things that’s missing that might have helped is the three line rule summary from the original – you get the rules, the contestants discuss for a bit, the narrator comes back and succinctly condenses everything into the three important things you need to remember then off we go.
I think the series has missed open goals, I think it needed something cool to happen in the first few episodes so people can grasp “oh, *that’s* what this is”, I can think of about 20-30 celebs who’d be really good value on this. It’s absolutely not shit, but for ITV it is a bit batshit. I hope they’ll give it a Love Island – I don’t know what the demos have been like, but obviously I wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t.
I do think they’ve overcooked the Ben v Bex narrative – although Episode 6 has demonstrated that Bex is playing a very devious social game that wasn’t entirely explained in earlier episodes… which can be high-risk and high-reward. I’m not buying the “accident” angle of it, but she does deserve an award for her acting because she fooled everybody…
Safari Race was a tough one to watch because 6 animals is too many – it would have done better with the original 5, or maybe even 4 (e.g. with two sets of tokens instead of one). I think they got that one wrong in playtesting because the power shifts too much to the last player (as demonstrated by the “abstain at first chance” strategy).
The comments on YouTube frequently ask questions about the game – some of which would be solved by the 1-2-3 summary (that Brig mentions above), and some that should have been mentioned but were edited out (and occasionally quite important, such as Lights Off had two additional ways to reveal the contents of your case). One of my main gripes of the NL series was they lost focus of the tiny details that make The Genius what it is, and I’m starting to feel the UK series is going down the same track (but not to the same degree).
In contrast to previous episodes where the production have been unlucky in how the game played out, they’ve been shockingly fortunate here – team red play 10 diamonds instead of 13 and it’s over in three rounds, or Ben and Charlotte get split and they execute their plan to filibuster the game by keeping all 10 diamonds… both make for a very dull episode and another chapter in the “can’t play, won’t play” narrative.
And as for Benjamin and Bex, well… if they continue to argue each other in a ruthless fashion, both of them will soon LOSE THEIR WAYS
BEN & BEX, IF YOU CARRY ON PADDYING WITH EACH OTHER, BOTH OF YOU WILL BE ELIMINATED – IMMEDIATELY! THE TOTAL NUMBER OF GARNETS BETWEEN YOU BOTH, WILL BE LOST FROM THE GAME FOR GOOD.
790k last night! Incredible growth. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that it’s happened with the two most fun episodes as well.