Now that we’re deep into the summer, I tend to spend a lot of time watching old game shows. Network fare has more or less dried up, and with the writer’s strike there isn’t even a good supply of talk shows to watch. So, I end up looking at older TV shows, things that will help calm my mind after a long day. Game shows are just the thing.
The allure of old game shows
Let’s say you were born sometime before 1995. (I’m guessing anyone who’s reading this probably fits into this category.) There are a lot of things you remember from your youth, but one of the treasured memories just might be those days when you didn’t have to go to school. Maybe it was a snow day, or maybe you just convinced your folks you were sicker than you really were. Either way, you had the whole day to do as you pleased, especially if your parents worked. What did you do? Parked yourself in front of the TV. And what did you watch? Chances are it was a game show.
Game shows were big in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s daytime scene for one reason. It was a captive audience of people who were very receptive to advertising. The people watching were very likely to be the ones controlling the household budget, and that made them highly prized by advertisers. This group really liked two things: game shows and soap operas.
With soap operas (originally named because of the household goods makers who advertised on them) people got to see a more glamorous world and could imagine they were part of it. With game shows, they often saw people just like themselves who had a chance to win big prizes. Either way it was a form of wish fulfillment that just worked.
You can relive those days.
In the 2000s and 2010s, a company called Fremantle Media went on a buying spree. They bought, among other things, the entire library of Goodson/Todman game shows. This included big names like The Price is Right, Let’s Make a Deal, Card Sharks, Match Game, and others. In 2015, they launched Buzzr, a broadcast TV channel dedicated to showing all that great old content as well as other game shows they’d managed to pick up.
The subchannel years
Buzzr marketed itself as a subchannel initially. For those who don’t have an antenna, a subchannel is a second broadcast source that travels along the same signal as a regular TV channel. Antenna fans love them but cable and satellite companies haven’t really embraced them. For example, you may get channel 13 on cable or satellite, but you probably don’t get channel 13.2, which happens to be where you can find Buzzr in the Los Angeles market. The idea of subchannels is great and if you want to get about 50 free channels with your antenna, I urge you to check them out. But antenna users are in the minority and it’s not a big enough market to make the folks at Fremantle rich.
I’ll take Paul Lynde to block
Luckily, if you’re jonesing for old game shows, you can stream them on FAST (free advertiser-supported TV) apps like Sling, Roku Channel, and Pluto. Buzzr can be found on all of them, and probably on other apps that I’m not aware of.
The commercial-based format of these apps really lends itself to old game shows. It helps preserve the original pacing of the shows and gives you a more authentic experience. Sitting in front of the TV watching game shows was the 1970s and 1980s version of bingewatching, and if you were too young to experience it the first time, here’s your chance.
Personally I love these old shows because they’re a very honest window into their times. There’s nothing hidden. If you want to see the bad fashions, political incorrectness, and weird social mores, all you have to do is tune into Family Feud.Just be careful not to get too close to Richard Dawson.
