Do you think your kid is just so smart? Don't you just love it when you have company over and you get to show off your chid's smarts? "She can say all the state capitals!" you shout, over your guests' objections, "No, she loves doing this. Get in here, Porter, and recite all the state capitals. Start with Alabama."
Well, now there's (finally) a game show where you can force your lil' idiot savant or child prodigy to do just that but for money!
From Reuters:
Fox has ordered a new game show from producer Mark Burnett that puts child geniuses to the test.
In "Our Little Genius," ultra-smart kids ages 6-12 will get a chance to prove their expertise for a shot at hundreds of thousands of dollars.
"It's shining a bright warm light on kids (who), due to their genius, get ridiculed by their peer group. Here we give them a chance to shine," Burnett said.
Aww. Isn't it sweet of Mark Burnett to save these baby geniuses from the ridicule of a small group of their peers by exposing them to the possible ridicule of an entire nation? After all, everyone loves a smart aleck. Clearly Mark Burnett is the king of young nerd outreach.
So how will this game work, exactly?
The young contestants will answer a series of questions on subjects in which they're well versed. Their parents will watch from an isolated area and can opt to end the contest at any time and walk away with however much money their child has earned. Parents also get to observe a panel of grown-up experts trying to answer each question before their child is asked, giving them a sense of the question's difficulty.
Sounds great. So basically the parents get to drop their kids into the arena while they watch safely from the stands, giving the thumbs up or thumbs down for their tiny mental gladiators. Then, the parents get to claim their child's winnings as their own—and since the kids are ages 6-12, it'll be years before they can be legally emancipated! Parents get their child's money, the child gets to make various adults feel intellectually inadequate, and Mark Burnett gets to carve out an even bigger slice of American television. It's a win-win-win!
Still, why should all of Mark Burnett's vague thoughts be made into (probably) successful game shows? I have a vague thought: Dogs answering multiple choice trivia questions. I see a panel of three dogs placed in front of a low wall with three buttons (A, B, and C). The the dogs would be asked a series of trivia questions, while their owners would try to coax them to push the correct answer button. It could be called See Spot Win. You're welcome, television.