SciFi game shows, part 2
Ok. So it’s been a couple of days, but I’ll still pick up where I left off. In the first part, I covered the new game show on SciFi called Cha$e. Now I’ll talk about the better of the two(IMO), called Estate of Panic.
Estate of Panic is hosted by the wonderfully creepy Steve Valentine. Steve plays the part of the owner of the house the contestants are competing in. He opens each show telling them there are literally thousands and thousands of dollars all over his house, and it’s all there for the taking. There are 7 contestants in each episode. Valentine takes them to various rooms in the house where they’re let loose to gather all the cash they can. In some rooms, there are items to collect(i.e., in one episode, a painting of the butler, Rupert, was split in half. If one person could collect both halves, they got a $1000 bonus).
The contestants all enter the room at once. They need to collect as much cash as possible to go into a collective “jackpot” as it were. The person who leaves each room with the least cash is eliminated. Also, the last person in the room is locked in that room, and eliminated from the game. This continues on until only one person remains.
This final “winner” doesn’t just get to walk away with all of the dough the team has collected. He instead goes into Valentine’s secret vault. It’s filled with lock-boxes in the wall, all unlocked, filled with cash, sawdust, maggots, snakes, just… things you either really want, or DO NOT WANT, as an lolcat would say. The finalist just needs to get as much money as he can and get out. Simple, right? I’ll spoil part of the first episode here. The dude was chained to the floor. He had to find tools in the lock-boxes to free himself. If he didn’t get out in time, he lost it all. There was an alternative though.
On the wall was a red panic(fitting) button. He could at any point slap that button, yell, “I’m panicking,” and the timer would stop. This was at the cost of half of the money collected by the collective team. The really tough part- the timer on the door? Steel ball bearings. When 10 fell, they connected a circuit that closed and locked the vault door. So, get out before 10 balls fall, pretty much.
Estate of Panic features the 3 staples of a great show:
- Hot chicks. There’s always AT LEAST one hot chick on the show. They’re also a problem. Why? They can’t deal with…
- Snakes. This is a big part of what makes the show so great. There are always snakes in the game. Hidden in barrels, hidden in cabinets, hidden any and everywhere. Let one of the hot chicks find a snake, and it’s like she forgets why she’s there. She stops collecting cash, and just starts screaming.
- Sense of dread. When one of the rooms in the show started literally closing in around the contestants, one commented, “They wouldn’t actually kill me, would they?”
- A butler. Rupert never speaks aloud, and can only occasionally be seen speaking to Valentine, leaning in and whispering. Kind of like Teller.
- Money. Enough said.
I can’t really review this show properly. I urge you to watch it at least once, with a tygr20.com full money back guarantee. That means that since the show is free to watch, you… well, you get nothing back if you didn’t like it. But hey, who’d have thought they liked peanut butter and mustard on toast if they didn’t try it, right? All kidding aside, this is a great show, and I really, REALLY recommend it to anyone who enjoys Fear Factor-ish shows. Also- watch it here! Hulu is offering the first 4 episodes to watch online absolutely free. Go check it out. Seriously.
