Crazyclimber80's Look At The Game Show HIT MAN!
11Hey all-- time for another game show review! This time we take a look at the NBC oddity HIT MAN-- which does not feature hired killers-- and was released in early 1983 to April Fools of that year. This was notable for being Peter Tomarken's first hosting gig, even before he made his mark with PRESS YOUR LUCK for CBS. For those of you who remember a class video presentation followed by a quiz to test your memory of the video, well.. that's what this game show is all about. But Peter lends his endearing narration to the video presentations before the contestants are quizzed on them. Another unusual quirk to this show: the champion of the previous episode does not join the gameplay to start off-- they enter round 2, after one of 3 contestants are eliminated. They then are given the titular "Hit Men" (which for the champ are little spiky characters, and miniature helmeted knight-like characters for the other 2 players) and are given questions based on a video presentation seen earlier. They eliminate each other's hit men by correctly answering questions (or hoping one of the others misses or fails to answer in time). Whoever is last standing is the champ/new champ and goes to the bonus round where they try to correctly answer questions based on BOTH videos seen earlier in the show, to eliminate columns of black circles (each circle fills with a "Money Man" if a question is answered correctly), and they are not allowed to see the columns (only Peter's announcement of a completed column lets them know if they cleared it) and 3 of 8 columns cleared wins the contestant $10,000. I like that there are no straddled episodes; Peter does a magnificent job moving the show along at the right pace to prevent this. Creator Jay Wolpert at least tried some different ideas for this show; the cutesy "Hit Men" and the kind of dumb title, as well as some areas airing it against The Price Is Right, probably contributed to its short life span. Unlike many old shows this series is still intact-- I just don't know for sure who may have the rights to it, as Jay Wolpert himself recently passed. It will probably see the light someday on GSN or BUZZR, and in much cleaner quality than in this video (sorry about that and my voice at times, as I'm dealing with a nasty cold). Hope you have a great President's Day Weekend!! See you again soon! And of course.. if you'd like to be a contestant on Hit Man, FORGET IT!!! R.I.P. Peter, Rod and Jay.