TVSquad

Do you think when Neil Simon created the character of Felix Unger in The Odd Couple he knew that he was spawning a generation or two (maybe more) of Felix Unger wannabes? Today, over 40 years since Felix became part of our movie/TV collective conscience, there are lots of people and characters that bring to mind Tony Randall's alter ego.

It's Tony's Felix that I think is etched in our minds. He made Felix all he could be, and week in and week out -- opposite Jack Klugman's Oscar Madison -- he typified the ultimate neat freak, persnickety, hypochondriacally, impossible-to-live-with, supercilious know-it-all that made us cackle with laughter.

So, as I was watching TV -- an occupational requirement -- recently, it occurred to me that there are quite a few Felix Ungers on screen right now. Most are fictional, like Two and a Half Men's Alan Harper and, most obviously, Adrian Monk. But there are a couple of Felixes in real life on TV, too, like MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and ESPN's Mike Greenberg.

By my count, there are seven "Felix Ungers" currently on TV.

Back in December, I wrote about my reactions after watching the premiere of ABC's new game show, Duel. Back then, I was entertained by the show but had concerns about the host. When I heard the show was getting a second season, I hoped that ABC read my column and your comments so that Mike Greenberg would stop holding that pen and would say something different than "Screen up!" and "You're watching Duel on ABC!", that the suspense music and pause would be toned down, and that we would actually get more than one question answered before we go to a commercial break!

Because I liked the difficulty of the questions, the one-on-one face offs, the sudden death, the picking of your opponent, etc., and because the ads for this new crop of episodes promised me changes, I decided to give season 2 of Duel a chance. Did it meet my expectations this time around?

December 17 marked the debut of ABC's latest game show: Duel. This week-long competition is described by the network as "a high-stakes tournament-style game show" at the end of which the winner could win over $1.5 million dollars.

I didn't really know what to expect from the game but, thanks to most of my series being in reruns and to ABC's online and on-screen marketing campaign, I decided I needed to give the show a try.