The 1% Club

I agree with some of the reviews here regarding Patton Oswalt. I do find him likeable in stand-up, television and movies, but it almost seems as if this gameshow-speak was written for him and he's not crazy about it. It's not completely horrible, but seems a bit forced and rehearsed.

I'm not sure why he has to say, "Let's take a look" before every single question, but it gets old quickly. Again, I think it was written that way, and not Mr. Oswalt's creative choice.

It's an interesting premise, and the questions ranged from super easy to difficult (depending on how your brain works!) But when they gave a drum-roll effect to "revealing" what's happened to the pot since 4 people are out (simply meaning $4000 has been added to the pot), I found myself saying, "UGH, come onnn".

As someone who is so used to the UK version, I have to say, this version just feels like a bootleg. Like, a lot of the questions on this version aren't anywhere near as interesting. Yes, just like the UK version, this one does have filler too, with conversations with the contestants in between the questions and what not, but at least there was entertaining banter in the UK version, something this version is lacking. The contestants here just feels like NPCs by comparison, if you ask me! Also, admittedly I've never heard of Patton Oswalt before, but he's just not a good host for a show like this, just... no. Surely they could have found someone better?

If this whole show, so far, is anything to go by, I don't expect it to be anywhere near as successful.

Patton Oswalt hosts this quiz show, which has 100 contestants vying for money.

The questions posed to the contestants get progressively more difficult. Missing a question means elimination, as the pot grows larger. The difficulty of the questions is determined by testing them on groups beforehand. But these are not questions of fact or tests of knowledge; they are designed to test one's abilities of perception and logic.

The major problem is that it is very difficult to design the wording of such questions without any ambiguity. For instance, one question asks the contestants to imagine that some letters are turned 45 degrees, but it does not say on what axis. And it uses the terms "left" and "right", but a clockwise orientation might be more accurate. This might not matter as much if contestants had a minute to consider their answers, but they only get about 25 seconds, which doesn't allow for much trial and error or testing of hypotheses.

The banter with the contestants is hit or miss. Sometimes it is interesting, but mostly it is boring, especially when Oswalt asks a contestant why they missed a question and they are embarrassed, so they give senseless excuses for their answers.

Update 7/16/2024: By episode 7, the banter has improved, with Patton showing his humor. The ambiguity has reduced somewhat. I am bumping my rating up by one.

Lee Mack of UK version is way funnier than Oswald (and still without being mean or snarky like host of Australian version). Questions on UK version are much better. More varied, interesting and fun, and more original ideas. American version questions are overloaded with boring wordplay puzzles. Many of the questions are word puzzle types that will be familiar to many people (and will give those people an advantage). Like a lot of game shows other than Jeopardy, there is a fair amount of filler, such as explanation of how the game works, and music that goes on too long before results are revealed.

I like Patton Oswalt but he can't make a 100 fake smiling laughing people interesting. There is a ridiculous amount of filler asking the contestants "get to know you" questions. They are randos - I don't care to know them. Every question just drags out to the point where I just fast forward in between each question. Patton isn't funny enough to carry this if this is the format they are sticking with.

Password, another recent gameshow in comparison is filled with laughs and good times. This is just people smiling, fake laughs (password too) and bad conversation.

The questions and concept of show seem fine, it's just not entertaining.