1 vs 100 season 2...

[15QuestionsAway]

...begins tonight as many of you know.

I can now reveal I'm part of the PermaMob - the nickname given to those of us who made it through casting and recasting to become permanent Mob members for the season. There are also a few permanent "celebrity" PermaMob members, a fact I'm sure will elicit some groans.

Since all 8 episodes were shot over a period of 3 days in mid-September, the 1 vs 100 powers that be decided to simplify the Mob casting process.

In tonight's episode, you'll see two Mobs - an all-male and an all-female one. From these two groups, the Mob for the rest of the series was cast.

Without spoiling the actual results, here's some of what you'll see this season:

1. The set is new. 1 vs 100's second season was shot in a different location, and as such they took the opportunity to modify the set a bit. The big difference is the huge screen in the centre of the Mob. The set is one row shorter, but a bit wider than in season 1. Bob Saget and the contestant now face the Mob most of the time thanks to the new screen.

2. The game has only one rule change. A fixed prize structure has been introduced, which was something originally discussed by the producers before the show aired in the US. For every 10 Mob members the One eliminates, the prize moves up one level. There is no prize until 10 Mob members are eliminated. If the One eliminates all 100 Mob members, the prize is still $1M.

I had some doubt about this rule change improving the game, but after seeing it in play, I have to say it has. The Ones seem to be more motivated to continue to play than in the previous season. Eliminating just a few more Mob members to advance a prize level has given them some motivation.

3. More double entendres in the questions. This plays to Bob Saget's strengths as a host. There will be a lot of cute questions and answers this season.

For oldschool Bored members, there is a special "treat" in tonight's male Mob. Look at position 64, to the left of the big screen. See if you can identify who it is.

[silvercamaro]

I'm glad to hear you'll be there, 15Q. Now I have an excellent reason to watch (besides the fact that the other choices are sparse.)

I hope you will have a chance to win some cashola, too.

[rayxtwo]

Just watched.

WOW!!!!!!!!!

Ray

[TheConfessor]

Sorry, I didn't see your post until after the male mob was gone. Could you put it in a spoiler?

That last question on the show seemed pretty obvious to me. I guess the the female mob must have been especially vulnerable to those distractor answers.

It seems to me that in most cases, anyone who reaches $500K would be nuts to risk that if s/he had to knock out ten more mobsters to reach the million. Against a top notch mob, that could take 10 or 20 questions, or more. I think some mobsters have gotten as many as 40 questions in a row correct.

Congratulations on getting the permamob spot. That sounds like a fun gig. If the producers are stacking the deck with other trivia whizzes like yourself, that doesn't bode well for the contestants.

[moonie]

Holy moses!

I cant believe the outcome of the last question. Could you imagine how 15 people would all have said the same answer?

[elwoodblues]

Spoiler

Doesn't it seem logical that many people give only one card for Mother's Day and Valentines Day but send out 20 of them for Christmas? I guess the women in the mob wanted to believe more cards would go out for the other two days.

[silvercamaro]

Spoiler

Doesn't it seem logical that many people give only one card for Mother's Day and Valentines Day but send out 20 of them for Christmas? I guess the women in the mob wanted to believe more cards would go out for the other two days.

Spoiler

Perhaps the women were misdirected by the first words of the question, "According to Hallmark...." That might be interpreted as "For which holiday does Hallmark sell the most cards?" If the members of the mob heard the question that way, they may have figured that most people buy their many Christmas cards from some place other than Hallmark stores, but a high percentage of valentine and Mother's Day cards do indeed come from Hallmark.

I don't know if that's an accurate reflection of their thoughts, but it's my best theory. If it's close, then the results would have been very different if the question had omitted the "Hallmark" to say simply "For which holiday are the most cards sent?"

[PlacentiaSoccerMom]

Spoiler

Emma and I were watching and talked about it. I told her that I usually bought seven or eight cards for Mother's Day (Mom's, Grandmas, Aunts, and we send a card from our bunnies to their bunny grandma). She knew that she gave out 35 or so cards for Valentine's Day, but I told her that most adults don't send out that many cards. We sent out 110 cards for the Christmas/Hanukkah as a family, so I figured that it would be the answer.

I like the rule change for how the money is given out. It's probably more tempting for the "1" to keep on going, knowing that he/she has just knock out two or three people to get to the next level.

[a1mamacat]

Spoiler

wow, just wow

[ontellen]

Like I think a lot of people thought, it was Mother's Day because I've heard many times that it's the highest phone call day. However, when he said Christmas I got to thinking of how many Valentine and Mother's Day cards I buy - 1 Valentine for hubby and 1 Mother's Day for my daughter. I did send out about 20 Christmas cards though.

Great moment and I commend his guts even though I couldn't believe he never heard of clean and jerk.

[Bob Juch]

Holy moses!

I cant believe the outcome of the last question. Could you imagine how 15 people would all have said the same answer?

Actually all 15 people had either one of the two wrong answers.

But yes, I find it hard to believe that all 15 were wrong.

[silverscreenselect]

Actually, what is interesting is the contestant's faulty logic on the earlier question that led to the right answer. For the question about weightlifting (Which of these is an actual Olympic weightflifting event), there were about 80 mob members. First he used the "Ask the Mob" to eliminate one wrong answer (Rub and Tug). Then he used the "Poll the Mob" to ask about the answer he thought was right (Snatch and grab) and only 33 picked it. So, he said, "I can do the math" and picked the remaining answer (Clean and Jerk). This might have been a reasonable supposition if only 4 or 5 people picked the answer but not when over 1/3 of the contestants picked it as one out of three.

What he forgot was that there were also people (about 15) who picked the remaining incorrect answer. So, the fact that only 33 out of 80 had Snatch and Grab as an answer didn't mean that all the rest had the right answer. Actually 34 did, practically the same number. If he had chosen to poll the mob about Clean and Jerk, he would have used the same logic process to go home empty handed. And at that point, if he was going to use that reasoning process, he should have elected to Trust the Mob (which would have led to the correct answer by one person). Of course, if he still had his Ask the Mob, he could well have used it on the Hallmark card question and been led astray.

So, the guy's first instinct was wrong AND he used a faulty reasoning process as well AND he used the wrong lifeline but he still got the question right.

[dodgersteve182]

"So, the guy's first instinct was wrong AND he used a faulty reasoning process as well AND he used the wrong lifeline but he still got the question right."

More Remarkable was "Duel" where the winner earned $1.7M by not having a Clue as to what the right answer was! New tag line for a very doubtful second season of "Duel" "The game show where it Pays Not to Guess".

[lilclyde54]

Well, I certainly enjoyed the premier of Season 2 more than I did most of the shows in season 1. I thought the new levels system of advancing up the money won list was a great improvement.

[jarnon]

The PermaMob should be an improvement over the mobs made up of odd groups, like a bunch of Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders. I hope they still have some special mobs, like the one full of kids last year.

If they focus too much on the celebrity PermaMobsters, the show will become Hollywood Squares with a bigger board.

[MarleysGh0st]

I like the simplified prize structure. Now early softballs that everyone gets don't affect the payout at all, as they did in Season 1.

The PermaMob is easier for TPTB, I suppose, but since they seem to be casting many of them for their telegenic types, that just means less chance for the rest of us to ever get a shot.

This could still be a great show, if they made the changes we talked about before.

And as for last night's results, I was astounded!

One thing that was particularly odd in the final moments:

Spoiler

Bob reveals that all 15 of the mob have the answer wrong and they're letting the tension build. We see a shot of all the mobsters holding hands. Uhhh, what for, since we already know they all got it wrong? Did they suddenly change allegiances and start rooting for the One to win the money?

And what would have happened if the One had also been wrong on that question? There was nobody left to win the $500K already in the pot! Would it have just gone back to the bank?

[15QuestionsAway]

I like the simplified prize structure. Now early softballs that everyone gets don't affect the payout at all, as they did in Season 1.

The PermaMob is easier for TPTB, I suppose, but since they seem to be casting many of them for their telegenic types, that just means less chance for the rest of us to ever get a shot.

This could still be a great show, if they made the changes we talked about before.

And as for last night's results, I was astounded!

One thing that was particularly odd in the final moments:

Spoiler

Bob reveals that all 15 of the mob have the answer wrong and they're letting the tension build. We see a shot of all the mobsters holding hands. Uhhh, what for, since we already know they all got it wrong? Did they suddenly change allegiances and start rooting for the One to win the money?

And what would have happened if the One had also been wrong on that question? There was nobody left to win the $500K already in the pot! Would it have just gone back to the bank?

The casting criteria was a mixed bag because they're looking for diversity in the Mob. As with season 1, the original auditions were for the One and the Mob simultaneously.

I'm sure what drove the reduction of the first two mobs to the PermaMob was visible enthusiasm.

I asked the question you did about what happens if the One and everyone in the Mob gets the question wrong. The answer unfortunately is no one wins. I hoped they would throw the question out and play another.

The male Mob was really pumped in our out-of-studio location after what happened to the female Mob. We thought he'd be doomed when he didn't figure out the clean and jerk right away. Much hilarity ensued during this question, given the contestant hadn't had a girlfriend yet. He's a really nice guy - I was very happy to see him get his prize.

I was also hoping that if a One gets their question wrong, the prize level is moved to where it would be if only the remaining Mob members were counted. No dice there either.

As for me, $0 so far. Damn Marcia Brady. I didn't link the event in the question with "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia." I was in seat 32 that episode. Later, I'll mostly be in the 70s somewhere.

Oh, and seat 64 in the male mob didn't get any air time. The face familiar to oldschool Bored members is:

Spoiler

Mark Anthony DiBello.

He's one strange cat. He lingered around as an alternate for the later shows. I think he may make it into another Mob later in the season.

2008 word of the year: shiggles. Thanks, Bob.

[MarkBarrett]

As for me, $0 so far. Damn Marcia Brady. I didn't link the event in the question with "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia." I was in seat 32 that episode. Later, I'll mostly be in the 70s somewhere.

In the category of doesn't really matter, but for the sake of accuracy:

"Marcia, Marcia, Marcia" is from 11/19/71 "Her Sister's Shadow" when Jan is jealous of Marcia's awards. Jan fails to make the pom pom squad, but thinks she has won an award for an essay until she discovers a scoring error.

The football hitting Marcia's nose is from 2/9/73 "The Subject Was Noses" when Marcia breaks a date with the nice guy to go out with the BMOC Doug Simpson. After the nose accident Doug now isn't able to take Marcia out using the line "Something suddenly came up" which is the same thing Greg told Marcia to use to get out of her date with Charley.

Maureen McCormick's book "Here's The Story" that made news a few months back seems to have fallen off the radar for release in 2008 once the scandalous headline was debunked.

[MarleysGh0st]

Oh, and seat 64 in the male mob didn't get any air time. The face familiar to oldschool Bored members is:

Spoiler

Mark Anthony DiBello.

He's one strange cat. He lingered around as an alternate for the later shows. I think he may make it into another Mob later in the season.

OMG! I'm sorry I didn't know to look for him in advance!

I did notice that none of the mobsters got highlighted this time. Without the "seven of this, eight of that" hooks, you all got glossed overs.

[Shade]

I saw this new episode (I never watched season 1) it was great, I enjoyed it more than I thought I would.

Spoiler

It was so exciting how that cool nerdy guy won 1 Million dollars, but it felt a bit anti-climactic, it would of been nice if balloons or confetti feel from the ceiling, lol

[thguy65]

I'm very eager to hear 15QA's insights on this:

Spoiler

[PlacentiaSoccerMom]

I'm very eager to hear 15QA's insights on this:

Spoiler

[15QuestionsAway]

I'm very eager to hear 15QA's insights on this:

Spoiler

That's an awesome picture!

I can confirm that it is real, but unless they're airing episodes out of order, you won't see him in seat 1 tonight.

I have a hilarious story to tell after this episode airs, but I don't want to spoil it in advance. Well, maybe a tiny tease:

Spoiler

With Chimpy McMobster in seat 1, seat 2 is the last place one wants to be.