
No more five o'clock shadow reviewers allowed
It’s been a surprising week down here in Australia for viewer’s of the ABC’s gaming show Good Game. Monday’s episode broke the news that long time co-presenter Junglist has been given the boot and replaced with a new female presenter: Hex. Almost no explanation was given to the viewership, other than that Junglist had taken a “behind the scenes” role on the show.
The show’s management has been rather tight-lipped about the whole affair all week, weathering a viewer backlash of monumental proportions, until today when an official statement was issued on the Good Game forums. Here’s a sample:
For all sorts of reasons we are unable to tell you things that have happened over many months inside Team Good Game which have impacted on the production. That’s just real life folks. We know it leaves many questions unanswered but we have reached that point where we really can’t say any more than that.
But we can tell you this much…
The decision to take Junglist off air was not forced upon us by ABC Management and it’s one that is fully supported by all the GG team. We are gutted that it has come to this but in our opinion it absolutely had to happen.
Understandably upset with the whole situation, this would apparently be the straw that broke the camel’s back for Junglist, who up until today had honoured his confidentiality clause to the letter. Further on in the same forum post, however, Junglist dropped a little hard knowledge:
I feel now as if I’m being professionally attacked, so here’s a truth bomb. In the meeting where I was told I would be replaced, the reason given was they wanted a girl on the show. “Mass appeal” was a direct quote from that meeting. After a half-hour of explaining how they’ll lose their hardcore following, they responded that yes, they knew this, but expected to make up the numbers with a new following. “A show can grow beyond its hardcore base”, is another direct quote.
The decision was forced by ABC management, for a mass appeal direction, and will naturally be dumbed down for the loss of experience. Case in point: Monday night’s show. Both Forza 3 and Kingdom Hearts clearly written by people with no idea about those franchises. Hell, no one on the team even thought to correct the presenters on how to pronounce “Forza” correctly? Expect a lot more of that…
Both the show’s producer and co-presenter have different versions of events, but it’s obvious that this is something that has come down from high up in the ABC’s management. To this effect, Junglist is hoping that irate viewers lay off new presenter Hex, as “all she ever did was accept a cool job”. For those interested, you can join the Save Junglist movement, even if all evidence points to it being irreconcilable.
Hitler isn’t happy, people.