On a Technicality

And then, three weeks after it started, the first season of the newest version of American Gladiators came to a close. And it did so in a very weird fashion. This strange, truncated version of the series produced some interesting moments, but in general it wasn’t as good as I had first hoped. Things felt good in the series premiere, but as the season went on the cracks in the formula began to show, and by the end of it I couldn’t help but feel like the show has some good ideas but could really use a lot of polish if it wants to be anywhere near as good as the original series.

Let’s start with the good. At the very least I do like a number of the gladiators they brought on for this season. A few of them show the right level of competitive spirit tempered by a proper amount of good sportsmanship. The ladies were certainly better sports in general than the men, but both sides had plenty of solid athletes who could give it and take it in even measure. Some of the best gladiators to come out of this season include the charismatic Blaze, the towering Striker, and the cool and collected Eagle. I hope these three, along with a few of the others in the cast, come back for season two.

Unfortunately there are a couple of gladiators I could absolutely live without. Even understanding that this version of the show has a fair bit of crossover with wrestling and, thus, there’s an expectation for some actors to play heels, it felt a tad overdone by a couple of the players. Steel is a real asshole who seems to be in competition with Nitro from the original series to be the biggest dick on the playing field. Meanwhile Mayhem is a big dude who has absolutely no control, going way too far in almost any event he plays. I hated seeing these two out there as they completely threw off the vibe of the show.

Although, in fairness to Mayhem, the referees should have been better at doing their jobs. I think they don’t have the same understanding of the rules of the events that the refs on the classic show had because at times they let the gladiators get away with much more than they should have. There were times the gladiators were grabbing clothes or safety equipment the contenders were wearing, which was a strict violation in the original show. You didn’t do that because you could cause injury to the players, and the goal was for everyone to survive the games.

And it’s weird because at times the games seem like they’re designed to be less dangerous than before. Certainly Whiplash was made safer, as I pointed out in my review of the series premiere… although it’s also worth noting that the game wasn’t played again this season after that. Instead it was swapped out for The Ring, which is a one-on-one, head-to-head brawl between gladiator and contender as the contenders try to touch a button in the center of the play area while the gladiators do what they can to stop them. It’s like a safer version of Whiplash, which I think is honestly even better.

Other events certainly err on the safer side. Joust has shorter sticks and safer platforms. Collision, a new event, it’s that rough and is more about speed and balance than hard hits. The Edge is a game of balance on padded beams, and while the gladiator can tackle the contenders, it seems pretty safe in general. I get credit to the show for trying to take safety into account in most aspects, which is why it feels so weird that the “no grabbing clothes or safety gear” rule that was a big part of the original series has been largely waved in the new version.

And even then it didn’t stop injuries. There were a few major injuries during the season, some during standard play and a couple that happened right before The Eliminator in a couple of episodes. Standard injuries allowed an alternate to take the stage (and one of them, mild spoilers, does pretty well this season). The ones right before The Eliminator, though, led to a weird situation where the contenders didn’t run their races through the final event until all the main games had been played. Then the contender went up against a contender with the fastest Eliminator time in prelims. It was strange, and while I get what the show was going for, it left some episodes on a cliffhanger that didn’t really work.

But then there are other parts of the format I don’t really agree with either. The season is ten episodes long, which allows for six main episodes, three semi-finals, and then a finale. If you are doing the math in your head, that means three men and three women each go into the finale, but all the events are basically formatted for two players, not three. The solution: play a round of The Ring, with all three players, and the first two to touch the button move on while the third is eliminated. You made it this far, now go home in a single game. It’s shitty, and I didn’t like that at all.

Instead, the show should be bumped up by a couple of episodes, do a wild card match in quarters for a couple of the players that seeded well as alternates or maybe to let a couple of the players that were injured, but then recovered, play. Then you can do two semi-finals games after that, followed by a finale, and no one gets screwed over by a single event. That feels more fair, more interesting, and still only requires the same number of contenders. It can’t be that much more expensive considering this show is made on the cheap to begin with.

Seriously, you can tell that the whole set of ten episodes were filmed over three days. All the contenders are there, in the stands, watching each other, while the hosts come on for the six main episodes wearing the same outfits each time. Then the semis happen and the hosts change their outfits once while everything else continues on. It’s pretty clear that an event is set up, all the contenders for that event perform, then they set up the next event and go again. Six full episodes of events are filmed one day, three full episodes the next day, and then a finale the final day. It’s cheap and effective, so why not pack a couple of extra contender matches in and make it fun and fair for everyone?

Finally, The Eliminator needs to be tweaked. For starters, the Travelator, the upwardly angled conveyor belt, needs to be at the start of the event and not the end. By the time the players get to it at the end of their run their gassed, and not only do some fail to make it up the conveyer on their second or third try, a couple even get disqualified for simple mistakes on the obstacle, all because they took a misstep on the side of it and the referees didn’t catch them until after the fact. It feels bad for people to lose because their feet slip when they’re tired, dead, and just want to be done.

If you put it at the start, though, with a ref right there, they can send the player back down if they break the rules. That way, also, if they make a misstep and the ref doesn’t see it, their run plays. It should be up to the ref to catch it when it happens, not after the fact, because no one wants to win a match on a technicality. That feels bad for everyone involved, and every time it happens it’s pretty clear all the players in the show feel like shit. Why bring down the mood when an easy fix could be applied?

Finally, we need to talk about the talking. I thought the amount of talk and interviews in the first episode of the season wasn’t all that bad, but as the season went on, man, it got bad. We have 45 minute episodes and we’re only able to fit three events and The Eliminator into that time when the original show could handle six events plus in that span. That shows you just how much jabber happens here. I get it, we have players and hosts and people want to get a little fun chatter, but pull it back some and give us what we’re here for: athleticism.

So yeah, this first season of American Gladiators didn’t wow me the way I wanted. I like aspects of it, like many of the gladiators, plenty of the events, and the solid production values (especially for such a simple show), but there are a number of things that need to be tweaked to really make this show work. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and say, hey, this is a pilot season and they can tweak the format. If they do that, then great. I’d love to see it. I just hope that the second season improves because if it doesn’t, and it’s more of the same like this, I fear we might see the audience bleed off over time.