Is this what we’ve come to?
Deadline.com reports that Merv Griffin Entertainment is working on a new “Wipeout”-style game show based on, wait for it . . . . Pac-Man.
Waka waka waka . . .
Apparently, there are so few new TV ideas out there that we’re reduced to reviving a 30-year-old bitmapped video game. Not a huge surprise though, considering that in the past year the networks have already been pitched tired remakes of “Charlie’s Angels,” “Wonder Woman,” “The Rockford Files” and “Dallas.”
In the Pac-Man show, contestants would run though an obstacle course chased by ghosts or . . . something. No word on whether they’d have to eat giant dots along the way, but I think that would make it both more entertaining to watch and more true to the original gameplay. Merv Griffin president Roy Bank described the concept as bringing “what is essentially the world’s biggest game of tag to television.”
Tag. We’ve been reduced to watching tag on TV.
Why stop there? If that’s how low the bar is being set, how about unscripted shows based on these classics?
Frogger: Contestants run across a busy freeway, dodging traffic. (Seriously, don’t do this. You will lose.)
Dodgeball: Use celebrity teams, give ’em those big red playground balls and let them go at it. Wouldn’t you watch for an opportunity to see Kim Kardashian or The Situation get smacked in the face? I would.
Centipede: Lock a guy armed with a hammer in a room with 100 flesh-eating centipedes. See who walks out.
Missile Command: Discovery could do a docu-series inside NORAD.
Battleship: Oh, wait, they’re actually making a movie based on this game. Even James Cameron thinks that’s lame.
Joust: Players ride ostriches and use lances to try to knock each other off. I’d totally watch this.
Pong: Two players knock a ball back and forth over a net, using some kind of racket-like device. Nahh, that sounds too boring.
Donkey Kong: Just have an angry gorilla throw things at a guy. Barrels, watermelons, whatever. Kinda similar to Dodgeball, but with a gorilla. As “BJ and the Bear” proved, anything can be improved by adding a monkey.
Duck Hunt: Oops, that’s already called the Outdoor Network.
Ms. Pac Man: Just like Pac Man, but with women!
And sorry, Human Tetris has already been done:
Got any other ideas for old games that could be made into really stupid TV shows?
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