Three eps on Wednesdays for three weeks from March 26,
Netflix
12 people rock up at Peter Serafinowicz’s mansion and each shown to a room, and inside each room a box, and inside one of the boxes one MILLION dollars. That’s for that player to take away provided none of the other contestants suspect them of having it and eliminating them. To help the contestants work out who is the secret millionaire, tasks are set, the winning of which earns clues to the millionaire’s identity. It sounds like there’s a Round Table and at the end of each episode someone gets accused and eliminated, the money being reassigned if the millionaire gets caught presumably.
It’s Fortune Hotel…meets The Traitors!!! Although there’s no obvious signs of case swapping or murders. What the trailer does suggest is lots of overemoting Americans being undercut by Serofinowicz who seems to be having a great time administering it all. Probably there’s little here we haven’t seen before, but it still looks like fun.
We’re always a bit worried about shows where producers give out clues to players – where does the difficulty balance lie? How hard done by should you feel as a contestant by a perceived gimme? Is it just an easy way to get a favourable result? We’ll find out how fair it all feels by the end.
When you’ve watched it, let us know what you thought in the comments.
I’ve watched the initial three episodes and so far I *quite* like it, giving the Millionaire a challenge to do things to earn advantage so people start to point out behavioural changes is quite clever and fun. But I fear as they’ve picked up on by the end of the third episode – who has the money at this point doesn’t *really* matter and it’s in real danger of just becoming “Peter Serofinowicz’s Posh Survivor” – at that juncture none of the interesting things of the format, the agendas, the tasks, the trophy room really matter and that’s a bit of a pity really.