What started out as a strong gameshow (I originally gave the show an A- in my initial review) filled with pressure cooker tension and timed bouts, eventually became rather monotonous. It didn’t help that the same people were on Winner’s Row for practically the entire televised run, and that we didn’t have many people to clearly root for. [It drove me nuts that the fakers on Winner’s Row pretended to like each other.]
Tonight’s grand finale saw an unlikable red-headed geek take home a 2.6 million dollar grand prize and one of the Winner’s Row final four lose his earnings in the very last seconds to a woman from L.A. who already looked rich. In fact, nearly all of the players who took home ANY money looked like they were already pretty well taken care of, and it’s a little hard to root for people who are, essentially, playing for days on end just to win the cash equivalent of what—-to them—-is less kingmaker money, and more “I can finally build up my roth IRA savings” money. [The winner’s job apparently pays him so well that he won’t give it up when though he’s just won millions.] It just seemed like the stakes weren’t nearly high enough after all, and the disappointing final match (in which 19 year old whiz kid Brandon seemingly gave up halfway through) did nothing to raise them. Grade for game: B…Grade for finale: C-