I used to watch The Price is Right all the time with my grandparents. It came on and still comes on at 11am, right when they’d eat lunch. Plinko was my favorite game, of course; my least favorite: Blank Check. Today in the Canteen at work The Price is Right was on with Drew Carey and slightly modified production values. Barker’s Beauties are long gone, replaced by even more plasticky-looking vapidities; same old crappy merchandise though.
The main epiphany that I had is the genius of the show itself. It gets people to watch a full hour of commercials in the guise of a game show. The Price is Right is the epitome of American capitalism and consumerism. That it took a major change of cast to finally clue me into this fact is indicative of just how entrenched in that system I am. Yikes.
It might be a bit unfair to make the statement apply solely to America, as The Price is Right is internationally pandemic. America has always been good at exporting culture and entertainment.