Friend or Foe

Very rarely does a game show offer you one epiphanous experience equivalent to the Divine Revelation of St. John, but the game show "Friend Or Foe" has the benefit of not one, but four dramatic insights into human nature. They are as follows:

1. When mankind works together in a spirit of harmony, the mutual reward produces not only material gain, but the feeling of trusting your fellow man.

2. That the world is made for the cunning, and in the wake of those who would deceive, the innocent are caught in their snares and left to languish with the dull-eyed feeling of their own stupidity to warm them. Soon, they return hardened with the lessons of life to make them wiser.

3. Ultimately mutual destruction will beset those who seek to destroy each other, leaving a void of broken dreams to punish those who would do harm to their brother for mutual betrayal leads only to a burden for the wicked.

But the fourth and most important revelation. No matter how much time Viacom (owner of Game Show Network) has to burn off on a back-dated contract from MTV that they acquired in the merger, the only people who will suffer a torment as of being subjugated to horrors of hell are those who have to watch Kennedy in what is the single worst game show of the last 10 years. That includes STUDS.

So the only question you have to ask, probably about twenty minutes into this train wreck, is the following: Would the seas running red with blood really be that bad right about now?

It's not that good either. It doesn't hurt to watch it really. But it's nothing great. It passes for okay viewing. I can watch this show but I don't go out my way to see it. It's something I'd watch if there's nothing else on.

I noticed there is a way to tell who is going "foe." Oh yes, it's right in the contestant's eyes. They say. "I am trying to take all the money, ha ha!" rather easily. There are some contestants who do have good poker faces, but overall, these contestants should learn to better read their teammates' faces. Then the final decision wouldn't be so much of a shock.

It's rare when both members of a team vote "friend" though. Too many greedy people out there. I have seen it happen, but not that often at all.

Ex-MTV vee-jay, Kennedy hosts this awful trash where three groups of two contestants battle it out over multiple choice trivia questions to put money into their pot, its fate decided over whether the two contestants wish to share the money with each other or keep it all for themselves.

At the beginning of the show, each contestant is introduced with a sordid tale involving a particularly low moment of their lives (ie. she skipped paying the check at a restaurant or he stole the neighbor's newspaper) which is the basis for judgment on their character and morale given by the other contestant. Each contestant must decide if their 'partner' is a 'friend' or a 'foe'.

The key to winning is that if each contestant chooses to share the money with each other (friend and friend), the pot is halved and each player goes home with at least some money. If one of the contestants chooses to share the money (the friend) but the other chooses to keep it for himself (the foe), then the foe gets to keep all of the money and the friend goes home with nothing. If both players choose to keep the money for themselves and not share it (foe and foe), then they both leave with nothing.

That fate is decided when each contestant 'states' their case as to why their partner should 'trust' them that they'll share the money with each other before pushing a button underneath the challenging pedestal in total secrecy that will be revealed subsequently in order to hold suspense, in this case, mainly yawns.

For the most part, you as the viewer will be able to pick out who the weasels are who have no intention of sharing the money and who the nice people are who will most likely go home empty handed because the other player decided to keep all the money for himself. The personalities become painstakingly obvious once you are introduced to the contestants and their motives become quite transparent.

The questions on "FRIEND OR FOE" are extremely easy. The thing that irked me most about this show was the host. I found her to be quite obnoxious and irritating (just like she was when she was on MTV). Her prying into the contestants' pasts and ulterior motives are a notch below embarrassing and whoever told her that she'd be the right person to host a game show should have had their priorities checked!

The only enjoyment I got out of watching this game show was seeing one contestant fume with anger after he penultimately chose to share the final jackpot while his 'partner' decided to double cross him and keep the money, thus winning the entire jackpot for himself. Life sucks and the world is supposed to enjoy it right down to the finest details.

Thank the Game Show Network for bringing this gem into our lives. Now whatever happened to "HOLLYWOOD SHOWDOWN"?

The people in charge of Game Show Network must be almost as dumb as those in charge at CBS when "Match Game '79" was canceled. What were they thinking? This show is horrible! First, the hostess...who told this girl that she was capable of hosting a game show? She comes across as a cold, uncomfortable emcee. Her "funny" comments seemed forced and rehearsed. Plus, who could ever trust a Republican with the name KENNEDY?!

Now, for the show itself...worse than Kennedy! The questions are bad, and the answers are questionable. The concept is original, but still uninteresting. Any contestant who knows anything about competition would vote "Foe" all the way. There is no chance whatsoever for your "friend" to win a dime.

Save your time and watch a decent show. This isn't worth 30 minutes.

This game show starts with the host literally SHRIEKING terrible jokes at us which were obviously written and given to her before the show. Stuff that doesn't even make sense, like the one I just watched as a refresher on YouTube has her say "Michelle likes putting her foot down on the gas pedal and push old ladies into the brick wall!" What the hell does that even mean?

Yet somehow the show manages to get even worse. The trivia questions are the easiest ever, and on top of that it is multiple choice. "What bar does Homer Simpson like to go to? A) Moe's, B) Jobo's, C) Shabadabadoo's or D) Pigglefartdinklebee's?" The thing is, the contestants somehow manage to get a lot of these wrong, and the producers don't care anyway because even if they get everything right and rack up points and dollars, they're not going home with any money anyway, because...

The final round of this show makes the entire process pointless! Just like the also awful UK game show "Shafted" from 2001, which Friend or Foe either bought the format from or just completely and shamelessly stole, the two final contestants at the end of the show decide to A) Share/Friend or B) Shaft/Foe each other. If they both choose to share, they share. If they both choose to shaft, they get nothing. If they choose shaft and share, the shafter wins all the money. So it's not hard to see what ends up happening almost every time: they both decide to keep the money. Once in a while someone would take a chance on the other person also sharing, and in those few cases the other person would of course shaft them and keep all the money. Maybe one or two times (literally, as another reviewer said, you could count the times on one hand even if you're missing a few fingers) they would actually both decide to share.

So it's a very negative and sad show where 90% of the time both people would screw each other over and get nothing, and 9% of the time one person (a jerk) would screw over the nice person who was willing to share with them, and 1% of the time you somehow get two people actually willing to share and everyone (including the audience) wins!

This show is garbage, the host is terrible, all the jokes they gave her were terrible, and it never should have been made.