This thing doesn't deserve to last, which means it will probably be a runaway hit. The idea is paper (styrofoam?) thin, but could be some good fun. Instead, it's tawdy humor of the lowest order. The producers seem to have gone out of their way to cast obese people and then give them holes that are flat-out impossible for an obese person to pass through. That's unfair and unfun. In episode one tonight, I was actually impressed with the game's fairness. The sumos got larger holes, the jockeys thinner ones. In episode two, however, both teams were oversize (including the daughter of Fred "Rerun" Berry, for Pete's sake!), but the holes were sized for supermodels. It was epic fail after epic fail, and it all seemed calculated for cheap humor at the big people's expense. Shame. But perhaps that's to be expected from a show that a) casts Brooke Burns as hostess and b) dresses her in the shortest dress they could get past network censors.
As for "Get ready to face... the hole." I assume the mass audience snickering was edited out.
Posted by Peter at September 11, 2008 10:02 PMI was quite surprised they made a whole show out of it. From the youtube videos of the Japanese version I had always assumed it was one game of many on a game-variety show. You might be right that it will be a hit, look at Deal or No Deal which has a premise nearly as thin.
Posted by: Steve on September 12, 2008 8:56 AM