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.
Alright, giveaway clue episode 4.
And it’s gone all Survivor again.
I’m finding the push for this a bit weird to be honest. I mean, it’s *fine*, I like Peter Serafinowicz in it, but it’s just become another elimination-process-by-numbers show where the contestants have overridden the format points. And the clues are too easy, so that bit’s not very satisfying.
It’s apparently tracking at just under 10m hours and 3.7m viewers after week one, which puts it broadly in line with The Circle, which in Netflix terms is low-mid tier.
It looks like Million Dollar Secret added 15m hours last week taking it to around 25m hours, giving it an effective viewership of around 5m, which puts it in Circle S6/Buying London territory, if my understanding of the Netflix Top 10 is correct. Still, two weeks in the top 10 is probably not to be sniffed at. They’ve recommissioned worse performers.
I enjoyed it, but felt the format needed work, as there was no point at all of getting rid the Millionaire, the key was just to survive until the final.
If the Millionaire had been able to transfer $50,000 (say) into their own bank account each night that they held the Million, then there would have been some reason to try to find the Millionaire each night, instead of just getting rid of your biggest opponent.
It would also have added jeopardy in terms of how long do you risk holding the Million, siphoning off money, against becoming more suspicious the longer you hold it.
Yeah I think this turned out being the very definition of a 7/10 show in the end. I wonder if siphoning off the prize would just make the comparisons to Fortune Hotel even bigger, even though they’re not alike *really*. Also you have to get the numbers right, $50k is a lot of money for a night of holding the right box, I wonder if having it in your back pocket might make you a bit devil-may-care, for better or worse.