Floor is Lava starts on Netflix on Friday, which as far as we can work out is just the Museum from Fort Boyard, a three minute semi-regular event, turned into an entire series. Still, might be fun though.
We quite liked Rutledge Wood on Hyperdrive, and given he was a host on the US version of Top Gear now appears to be gunning for the role of The US Richard Hammond.
Edit: I thought this was going to be a pretty boring week, but in the last hour we’ve had ITV are bringing back The Cube and Cyril Feraud’s got a character job as a Ken-like doll gameshow host on Fort Boyard this year. Amazing. Edit Edit: And S3 of The Circle.
Uh…
UH…
The Cube is coming back
https://deadline.com/2020/06/itv-brings-back-the-cube-objective-productions-1202956878/
I thought this was going to be a pretty boring week but this is fairly exciting news! It’s set in a perspex box so it’s practically COVID-proof!
So big questions – it was five years since The Cube was last on, and eleven years since it pioneered its futuristic production ideas.
Will The Cube 2020 push those ideas further, or will it rest on its laurels?
And are we going to get more Nick Foster EXTREMELY TENSE music beds?
Basically *is there much point* of a Cube reboot, other than it’s something they can make and show?
Apparently the clever behind the scenes lot always managed to add something unique to each series, e.g. the cool effect of the game being built during the preview
I don’t think bigger prizes is the answer, they need *something* to stop 90% of contestants bailing out at £20,000 – £50,000 (at times not helped by the friends and family influence in the audience) but I’m not quite sure what…
What does ideally need to remain is Schofield, and the bottle of juice and caramel wafer bars for audience members (one of my favourite audience recordings to be honest, you could actually see me jump out of my seat when a contestant beat a game on their last life!)
Yep agreed on all counts. And Schofield is one of the best hosts for shows with audiences I’ve seen. The warm-up barely needs to do anything.
> “caramel wafer bars”
Are these Tunnocks’? Because OH, if they are…
Is Schofield still presenting it?
Lots of news, wonder if any of the stool pigeons know much about it.
i would honestly think Schofield will still host, but does make me wonder about the future of 5 gold rings.
Pull a “Brian Dowling hosting Big Brother” and get Mo Farrah to host it
Im guessing this also kills any chance of Small Fortune coming back too
Just to mention, in other game show news, Richard Osman has confirmed that they will record 95 episodes of House of Games in July. (1 week was filmed pre pandemic) The projected start date will be some time in September.
My guess would be that it will be just like series 3 with 10 in 20 and 10 in 21? 8 new weeks and 2 COC like last series!
Supermarket Sweep is being promoted from ITV2 to the main channel apparently…
https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/11879925/supermarket-sweep-itv-rylan-clark-neal/
If I’d heard of Hyperdrive before this I didn’t recall it, but I started watching and am enjoying it quite a bit. Thanks, Brig.
Hyperdrive’s a great little show – genuinely fun in a way I wasn’t anticipating. I think there’s too much emphasis on The Leveller in later rounds in terms of lap weighting, but I guess if you’ve blown the budget on it you’re going to use it.
Also great sound effects.
Right this is now out. On the basis of one episode it’s quite fun! Each episode is three teams against the same room, which has enough different routes and contraptions to keep it entertaining – it just about succeeds in staying fun in its almost 40 minute runtime. Rutledge Woods’ commentary style suits it pretty well.
There are ten episodes and each room is played twice – once as Level 1 and once as Level 2 – I’m hoping that’s a remix rather than just the same challenge over and over.
The level 2 eps alter the room slightly (removing a item that can be used as a bridge for example) and alter the teams in some of them (3 teams of 2 or 2 teams of 3 instead of 3 teams of 3).
It’s not bad, and a nice time waster if you have a spare 40 minutes I agree…
Thought the Floor is Lava was very disappointing – just the same thing three times and not climaxing to anything . Feel it needs at least a final round to give it some sort of point.
This essential would have been better as a kids show.
Halfway through the series now and to be honest not enough new ideas throughout, largely variants on a theme. Which is a pity, but it’s entertainingly produced so I’ll probably watch the Level 2 ones over a period.
Noticing on the study floor they showed ways to get across that are basically impossible including getting to a hippo?(or rhino can’t remember which while typing) which then allows you to somehow go around the edge to the exit despite there being nothing noticeable around it, oh and that the jump to get to the animal is impossible.
Agreeing with others that it feels like the level 2s were almost pilots for the game and then they added extra pieces knowing the difficulty (impossible for one person to get to the end of study if they’re the only ones left at the end for instance). Editing is all over the place with the winners too, they really don’t know what they were doing with the format it feels like. Still enjoyed it though and I agree a final round for the money (say 5k for each person across) would make more sense just a simple points and you win.
I find the studio environment Rutledge Wood is standing in with the door very odd, almost as if they had him talking to the teams beforehand and they were meant to go through that door to the game, and it was all cut? This show is quite baffling.
FIL Season 2:
– Only 5 episodes! Booo!
– The main game is the same as series 1, but now the top 2 (of 3) teams go through to “The Volcano”.
– The rooms for the main game are a little bit bigger than s2. Their infrastructure now has generic doors in all 4 corners so the rooms can be played in different directions. The final jump now has a crash mat (and the sinking stairs are gone) so it can be properly dived.
– Each player now needs to get an “exit pass” (a small badge) before they can leave the room. These are spread around to force the players to cover the full width of the room, which is quite nice.
– The rooms feature a few more puzzles than before. Some are classic (find the combination for a padlock) and some more abstract (do dance moves on a DDR machine). There’s a good number of swings and moving things, and a little less of “climb over this awkward shaped thing”. They’ve dialled up the lava explosions a bit.
– Rutledge now stands on a balcony which is implied to be above the game room (but I don’t think we ever see them in the same shot) and “reacts” from there. After their runs teams 1 and 2 (including the “dead” players. Rubbish continuity!) join him to watch the other teams, so we see a *lot* of team #1.
– The Volcano, then. In different episodes it’s played as a 2v2 or a 3v3 game (I think the 2v2 version works a bit better.) The teams race head-to-head over two identical paths. There’s some simple obstacles, then they reach the base of the volcano, a big mound which spews lava and is quite hard to climb without help. Each player has to deliver one rock from the base of the volcano to the top. Fastest wins. If a team member wipes out their scoring potential is gone, but their team can still win if they get the most rocks the fastest.
– For the volcano, Rutledge stands on the start line and part way through, goes over the obstacles too “to get a better view”. Incredible jeopardy!
– The loosing team get to take the Dave-Benson-Phillips slide down the volcano.
– Tonally, it’s the same show, although I think everything has been edited a bit more tightly. We don’t really see the teams strategise or struggle with things for any duration. The room improvements are nice, and the volcano works well.
Yeah agree with all of that, although I do think the Volcano is hamstrung by the falling-in-lava-ends-the-game rules – I want to see them prat falling down the slope Run the Risk style which it seems to promise but doesn’t *really* provide, as it is watching three people try and climb up a small volcano isn’t really as funny as the rest of the show and visually, actually not hugely great – it feels to me like it needs more, more stuff that happens, more lava, more comedy, more.
It’s not a deal breaker by any means, but having improved the first half hour the last five minutes is surprisingly dull by comparison.
Just seen the first three eps so far. It funny how much more “cerebral” the rooms have become since season 1. It’s kinda like one of those “mystery” games from The Crystal Maze just supersized!
I think it’s quite interesting that whilst there was no single ‘correct’ way to do a room in the first series, with the addition of the exit passes there kind of *is* a definitive way to do them this time round that takes all the obstacles in.