TVSquad

Deal or No Deal, the stupid NBC game show that airs a couple of times a week, is being sued by a former "paid audience extra" on the show.

Judy Ann Myers was taping a segment of the show last February, and during a commercial break she was told to hurry up to get into the audience so she could take part in a dance contest that was being held. Well, Myers tripped on the way down (I guess there were no handrails on the stairs and the lighting was bad) and hurt herself, and now she wants $25,000.

I'm officially done with Deal Or No Deal. I've tried to like the show, because I'm a game show geek, but the show is just maddening. And now, even the NBC ads are ridiculous.

Did you see the ads NBC was running the last few days for last night's episode? They showed a woman who did really well in the game. So well that she got to the end of the board with most of the big numbers ($400,000 to $1,000,000) still in play. So why did I have to watch the episode? Couldn't I have just turned in really late in the episode to see what happened? Where's the build up in the episode? Where's the drama?

I've already given my review of Deal Or No Deal on these pages, and Joel gave his counterpoint, so this isn't another review of the entire show, it's just an observation I have about one particular part of the show.

After a player decides to take the money, screams "Deal!" and presses the button, Howie (and viewers) want to see what WOULD have happened if the player had continued to play the game. So he'll ask "what number suitcase would you have picked?" And then the player tells him. But this is illogical. Until you're in that moment of a decision, you don't really know what you would have picked. You can think you'd pick a certain thing, but until you're faced with that decision, you don't really know, you're just guessing.

It's even worse when Howie asks the player what they would have picked after that , and then after that. You don't really know what suitcase you would have picked one, two, or three moves down the line. Makes for OK television though.