Game shows have always been a staple of television, so it's harder than ever to come up with new, successful and original concepts for this type of television program. Action-themed game shows based around what can freely be described as obstacle courses have gained popularity in recent decades, and now the experimental subgenre of game shows where scripted storylines are combined with more or less typical physical and mental challenges is slowly becoming a thing as well. This is where Take the Tower comes in.
Take a once relatively popular action B movie star who has a sense of humor about himself (so, Steven Seagal is out then) like Dolph Lundgren, have him star as an over the top version of his movie self, and bring in his old fans to pretend to be in one of his movies as heroes and try and beat timed and movie trivia challenges to win cash prizes as well as a chance to meet their favorite villain (for fans of Rocky 4 or Universal Soldier) or hero (for fans of Dark Angel aka I Come in Peace).
In each episode, a team of four contestants consisting of the usually (over)hyped team leader and his or her three teammates take on three scripted challenges before facing Dolph, who plays his meta self (he keeps cracking scripted jokes about himself, his career and the players), but if he was a dangerous crime boss like Kingpin, to win a cash prize and a trip to New York City. Each challenge is based on a concept that could be found in most generic action movies (people locked in a room threatened by a radioactive leak or some kind of explosion), but there is also a challenge taken straight out of the first Mission Impossible film (the high tech ceiling infiltration scene with the infamous sweat drop). Each challenge is tackled by the team leader, who is effectively the hero, and one of his or her teammates whom he or her has to save by completing a task that's usually based around guessing more or less super famous film titles, and then doing some more or less simple physical challenge like hanging from the ceiling while plugging in a computer or navigating a ventilation system before the time runs out.
If the player wins the challenge, his or her teammate is saved. If the player loses, the teammate is sent on the top floor of the building where the show is set to be grated by taunting Dolph and immediately defenestrated. Between the challenges, the players get to play simple q&a games to win some spending money where questions are both about movies (guess which movies a star was in before a "bomb" burns all the money) and of a more trivial, general knowledge type.
The final challenge has the team leader facing Dolph in a simple "Simon says" paintball target shooting contest. If the player wins, he or she gets to go to New York City. If they lose, both them and their entire surviving team is thrown out of the window to their deaths. This means that they get nothing and Dolph gets to gloat. This makes the show a real nailbiter, since even if a team plays a perfect game, wins lots of spending money, and everyone survive to meet Dolph at the end, if they lose the final shootout game, they lose everything.
The biggest flaw of the show is production values, since they clearly could not afford to have more than 5 or 6 type of games per season, but then again the show is suppose to mimic the B action flicks of the 1980s, the 1990s and to an extent current era, so that's not necessarily a bad thing. Although the show is set in the UK and all contestants are Brits, it's real easy to imagine having this show being set anywhere else around the world really. And if the show proves to be a success (although its imdb rating implies otherwise), it's easy to see a knock off of this with for instance Don the Dragon Wilson or even someone more famous like Van Damme.
Besides, all it really takes to enjoy it is to like the star, the team and to be a bit of a cinema buff.
Take a once relatively popular action B movie star who has a sense of humor about himself (so, Steven Seagal is out then) like Dolph Lundgren, have him star as an over the top version of his movie self, and bring in his old fans to pretend to be in one of his movies as heroes and try and beat timed and movie trivia challenges to win cash prizes as well as a chance to meet their favorite villain (for fans of Rocky 4 or Universal Soldier) or hero (for fans of Dark Angel aka I Come in Peace).
In each episode, a team of four contestants consisting of the usually (over)hyped team leader and his or her three teammates take on three scripted challenges before facing Dolph, who plays his meta self (he keeps cracking scripted jokes about himself, his career and the players), but if he was a dangerous crime boss like Kingpin, to win a cash prize and a trip to New York City. Each challenge is based on a concept that could be found in most generic action movies (people locked in a room threatened by a radioactive leak or some kind of explosion), but there is also a challenge taken straight out of the first Mission Impossible film (the high tech ceiling infiltration scene with the infamous sweat drop). Each challenge is tackled by the team leader, who is effectively the hero, and one of his or her teammates whom he or her has to save by completing a task that's usually based around guessing more or less super famous film titles, and then doing some more or less simple physical challenge like hanging from the ceiling while plugging in a computer or navigating a ventilation system before the time runs out.
If the player wins the challenge, his or her teammate is saved. If the player loses, the teammate is sent on the top floor of the building where the show is set to be grated by taunting Dolph and immediately defenestrated. Between the challenges, the players get to play simple q&a games to win some spending money where questions are both about movies (guess which movies a star was in before a "bomb" burns all the money) and of a more trivial, general knowledge type.
The final challenge has the team leader facing Dolph in a simple "Simon says" paintball target shooting contest. If the player wins, he or she gets to go to New York City. If they lose, both them and their entire surviving team is thrown out of the window to their deaths. This means that they get nothing and Dolph gets to gloat. This makes the show a real nailbiter, since even if a team plays a perfect game, wins lots of spending money, and everyone survive to meet Dolph at the end, if they lose the final shootout game, they lose everything.
The biggest flaw of the show is production values, since they clearly could not afford to have more than 5 or 6 type of games per season, but then again the show is suppose to mimic the B action flicks of the 1980s, the 1990s and to an extent current era, so that's not necessarily a bad thing. Although the show is set in the UK and all contestants are Brits, it's real easy to imagine having this show being set anywhere else around the world really. And if the show proves to be a success (although its imdb rating implies otherwise), it's easy to see a knock off of this with for instance Don the Dragon Wilson or even someone more famous like Van Damme.
Besides, all it really takes to enjoy it is to like the star, the team and to be a bit of a cinema buff.