At the beginning of this year, I got hooked on a TV show that was a blast from the 80’s.  On this blog, I documented how much I enjoyed American Gladiators.  I think that a part of the draw is that people sitting at home think “hey, I could do that!”…well, that and the fact that people are getting pummeled.

Unfortunately, as winter ended, so did the season of Gladiators.  This summer, a new season started, but I’ve been highly disappointed.  They’ve altered the show by trying to tell us about the personal lives of the contestants and by adding in some really weird events.  Look NBC, the show worked because of events like Powerball.  You  have people running into each other at full speed.  Knee ligaments were flying into the stands….that’s good fun!  These new events, like the one where you crawl around upside down on a track, are just weird.  And interviews, with the contestants? There’s no threat of bodily harm there…what’s my incentive to watch?

NBC dropped the ball on this new season…but ABC picked it up and ran with it.  ABC’s new show Wipeout is absolutely one of the best things that I’ve seen in a while.  They take the “Hey, I could do that” factor and then mix in a lot of the “bodily harm” that I love so much.  The results are beautiful.  I watched the re-airing of the original episode last night, and at one point I laughed so hard I woke up Ladybug.  Heck, Kelley even giggled a time or two.  (She’s going to claim that she was working on a scrap book, but don’t let her fool you!)

The show seems to be based on a wacky Japanese game show that was picked-up and run by Spike TV.  (Spike TV’s motto is “Guns, Sports, and Sex…in any combination.”) Of course, Spike TV dubbed over the original dialogue and provided some funny commentary.  Similarly, ABC has put John Henson in “the booth” to provide colorful and humorous commentary.

The premise is that contestants have to run through this incredibly hard obstacle course.  The obstacles are falling into water, falling into mud, getting punched into the mud, falling off of big rubber balls into water and finally, swinging into a wall…and falling into water.  Of course, if you were really good, none of these things would happen, but that isn’t near as much fun to watch.  It never fails to make me laugh when these people bounce around like rage dolls and plunge into the water.

Of course, ABC wanted to make sure that they provided ample entertainment.  So, they added more events based on knocking people down or watching them run full speed into stationary objects.  You’d have to be crazy to participate in something like this knowing that the entire nation is hoping you’ll fail.

I know what question your asking yourself and I don’t appreciate the implication.  The answer is Yes, I’d do it in a heartbeat.

*Photos “provided” by their respective broadcast stations.