TVSquad

Here's the thing about game show revivals: you have to satisfy people on two levels. For fans of the old show, you have to make the gameplay of the new show familiar enough to keep them happy and coming back. And, in order to attract new fans, you have to modernize and add touches that will suck in viewers and help build drama. That's one of the reasons why most new game shows have Who Wants to Be a Millionaire-style darkened sets with swirling lights, and depend on ominous music and tight camera angles to create drama.

Million Dollar Password, premiering Sunday at 8 PM ET, has all of that. They even nabbed Millionaire's original American host, Regis Philbin, to give it that extra bit of primetime oomph. But does it work? Well... sorta. Fans of the Allen Ludden / Tom Kennedy / Bert Convy incarnations might be dissatisfied with what they've done to their old favorite, but even an objective observer can see that the gameplay has some flaws that are going to need to be worked out for the show to succeed.

(Originally aired Dec. 1, 1972)

Since CBS will debut a new, updated version of the classic game show Password this Sunday at 8, I thought it would be a good idea to talk about one of the great episodes of The Odd Couple, appropriately titled "Password." (it's also Jack Klugman's favorite). It's the one where Oscar is asked to go on the game show and he gets to choose his partner. Will he choose Felix, a nut for the show, or his girlfriend, who isn't too, um, bright? The answer after the jump...