American Weakest Link Revival Now Casting

[SamJ93]

Considering I didn't expect any of the format's flaws to be fixed, this was about as decent a revival as anyone could hope for. One change I liked is that Jane now provides her post-round analysis/insults before the votes are revealed--it makes the flow of the game much better.

[Unrealtor]

Saw some criticism pre-premiere that the middle part of the one chain we saw in previews wasn't steep enough - there were two consecutive questions which increased the bank by the same amount - and I have to say that it didn't feel like anyone was even trying to push past them.

[jcs290]

It's a frustrating game that's essentially "Survivor: Trivia Edition" tooled to keep prize winnings low originally for BBC daytime television. NBC could've jacked up the lower tiers to improve the final jackpot, but then the temptation to not bank is diminished. As it is, it still takes two 7-of-8 chains to equal one perfect chain, which is fine for the outcomes the show wants.

I thought Jane was as good as Anne Robinson. Her character seemed more passive aggressive and less scripted than Anne's presentation. The refreshed theme music and cues are well done. The updated graphics are retro but upgraded with smoother animation and effects.

Pressing a button to bank while also shouting "bank" seemed like an unnecessary addition. The clock disappearing mid-round and then reappearing in the final 30 seconds or so indicates tons of overly dramatic post-editing. And I didn't care for the jittery Matrix-like camera effect when panning between the contestant podiums.

[TLEberle]

If the contestants want big money then they should hold out for longer than a chain of two answers. Less forgivable were some of what i perceived to be brutal stopper questions.

In the main I liked it, but was not impressed by the final prize.

[Sodboy13]

I've been saying this since  the new money chains came out: Do not make a million dollar game show if you have no intention of ever giving away anything close to a million dollars. These chains - probably worse than the original network version and the first season of the syndie version - combined with the elimination of the two-player banking round, likely mean we won't see a million dollars total awarded across the 13 episodes.

Oh, and you can't have your host mock the players' banked money in each and every round, then give it the fullscreen gold and sparkly treatment at game's end.

[Joe Mello]

The show is probably fine, but there's are two things I have disdain for.

First, If the conflict between a) voting off a weaker player so the bank can build up, and b) voting off a stronger player to improve an individual's chance of winning is one of the major sources of tension for your show, why do you choose to eliminate that conflict when it would be at its highest point? Not having another bank building round after the last round of voting implies a lack of understanding of how the game works.

Second, if you cannot be bothered to show the clock for the entire round, then you really need to stop with all the bleeping post-production,

[MSTieScott]

The clock disappearing mid-round and then reappearing in the final 30 seconds or so indicates tons of overly dramatic post-editing.

Especially when near the beginning of one of the rounds (I want to say the third?), they took a shot from the back of the set and you could see part of the in-studio timer near the top of the screen... and it already didn't match the onscreen timer.

And I didn't care for the jittery Matrix-like camera effect when panning between the contestant podiums.

The camera was moving too slowly (was it preprogrammed to stop at a specific point for each player so the booth didn't have to worry about getting perfect framing on the fly?), so they tried to speed things up in post. Not everything can be made perfect in post.


All in all, I appreciate that they were faithful to what the show was in the '00s (although I hate that there's no incentive not to vote out the strongest link during the final vote). The Weakest Link has never been my cup of tea, but this show did a good job of making sure that viewers who liked it before should like it again.

(Now, when will people learn that custom-shaped LED strips don't look good in reasonably tight shots because they get all pixelly? It happened on Nickelodeon's Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? and it happened again here.)

[colonial]

When preview clips of the premiere were posted last week, BuzzerBlog mentioned that post-production editing was "still ongoing." It showed in the end result -- felt like watching the first or second draft of a show than the actual final product.

Having the clock vanish for much of a round is baffling, especially when it's common for TV sporting events to show the time clock at all times during play.

Contestants were right out of Central Casting, but that's expected given this show and what they are looking for in contestants (personality over brains).

Lynch was an upgrade over Robinson -- seemed more comfortable with ad-libbing and interacting with the contestants, but she did sound robotic at times.

The "Matrix" camera was also off-putting, but I'll presume it has to do with running robotic cameras and trying to have as few people on stage as possible in our COVID world. The fake applause and laugh tracks were a bit silly, particularly when it was quite obvious the show did not have an in-studio audience. With so many technical glitches, you can tell the show was rushed to broadcast.


The off-screen announcer was good -- went more into detail about player performance than in previous incarnations of the show -- but I didn't catch the person's name in the credits. Any clue who that was.

Speaking of player performance, I would have liked to have seen the show present graphics going more into detail of a player's performance, similar to the sports world's focus on "metrics." How fast or slow are players answering their questions, how much they are banking, etc. Would have been a unique touch to at least experiment with.


JD

[Jeremy Nelson]

Personally, I would have cut the game to six players and had an extensive deliberation before each voting round to let people make their case to the team. But that’s just me.

[Mr. Armadillo]

Saw some criticism pre-premiere that the middle part of the one chain we saw in previews wasn't steep enough - there were two consecutive questions which increased the bank by the same amount - and I have to say that it didn't feel like anyone was even trying to push past them.

The first *five* links in the first round are $1,000 bumps.  No reason at all to not bank after every single question, since nobody's going to paint a giant target on themselves by going for, and potentially blowing, a jackpot that is only 2.5% of the final total.

[MSTieScott]

Now that the episode is on NBC's website for me to rewatch, I see that the the onscreen timer and the in-studio timer in round three were only out of sync by a fraction of a second.

However, going by the times on NBC.com's media player, it looks like they did trim about two seconds out of round one and about one second out of round four.

The off-screen announcer was good -- went more into detail about player performance than in previous incarnations of the show -- but I didn't catch the person's name in the credits. Any clue who that was.

To my ear, it sounded like Jane Lynch on a different microphone.

[Casey Buck]

Do not make a million dollar game show if you have no intention of ever giving away anything close to a million dollars.

Try telling that to the producers of the syndicated version of WWTBAM.

[weaklink75]

they could have cut back on some of the set to splurge on the prize budget- boy are those chains cheap (and IIRC, in the original US primetime version they got 8 in a row once?)

Here's some of the music in the clear, from composer Paul Farrer's YT:

[Sodboy13]

Do not make a million dollar game show if you have no intention of ever giving away anything close to a million dollars.

Try telling that to the producers of the syndicated version of WWTBAM.

That was an extremely fair criticism of the syndie version for nearly its entire duration, but at least it occasionally awarded a quarter-million or half-million. This will take some fantastic in-game runs to achieve an eighth of a million.

[Neumms]

The fake applause and laugh tracks were a bit silly, particularly when it was quite obvious the show did not have an in-studio audience...

Speaking of player performance, I would have liked to have seen the show present graphics going more into detail of a player's performance, similar to the sports world's focus on "metrics." How fast or slow are players answering their questions, how much they are banking, etc. Would have been a unique touch to at least experiment with.

lt's not that obvious, though. Wheel, Jeopardy and Strahan's Pyramid are staged with an audience there but out of view.

The metrics idea is cool. It'd explain things. I've always wondered how they draw conclusions when players answer only two or three questions apiece. "Banking the most money" depends on the players ahead of you and doesn't take into account whether or not you should have banked.