A fail on the Fox game show The Floor has left the internet floored, and an expertly timed camera pan was the very shady cherry on top.
The clip was shared on X (formerly Twitter) over the weekend, with two female contestants facing off in a 45-second round called the quiz duel under the category of sitcoms for the most points.
With full-screen cast photos behind them, they identified one sitcom after another with ease. Heather got Parks and Recreation (fitting since the show is hosted by Rob Lowe), Julie Anne got Golden Girls, and Heather got Will and Grace. Then came trouble.
– y’all please look at this! I’m screaming! pic.twitter.com/1yWK0mizon
— Rob Milton (@therobmilton) October 4, 2024
The last photo was of ABC’s Black-ish, and Anthony Anderson and Tracee Ellis Ross (Emmy nominated!) were displayed, neither of them buzzed in.
“Um, pass,” Julie Anne uttered and an incorrect buzzer sounded, the photo frame flashing red.
Insult to injury was that, in a moment of pure game show kismet, the camera cut to a disappointed contestant in the audience who stared knowingly into the lens right when the music crescendoed.
The irony of the blindspot mixed with the timing of the gentleman’s reaction made for instant virality. The clip was captioned by a user: “Y’all please look at this! I’m screaming!” and has amassed 40,000 likes.
In the comments, fans didn’t mince words about the fail, or how the gentleman’s deadpan look said it all.
“That’s how it be on Jeopardy! when the black topics come up,” one of the top comments read, referring to Jeopardy! contestants famously struggling with topics about Black culture.
“His reaction is also my reaction,” wrote another.
“He said ‘what a surprise,’” commented a third.
“They caught his reaction right on time,” wrote a fourth.
“Cameraman was ready!” wrote a fifth.
“I never watched Black-ish but come on…” penned a sixth.
“I screamed when I was watching it live,” wrote one more.
The Floor is a rather new entry in the game show-verse, with Season 2 premiering late last month. 100 contestants stand on an interactive LED game floor featuring 100 squares, each representing a different trivia category. The first challenger, selected at random, chooses a neighboring opponent to go head-to-head in an aforementioned quiz duel in the opponent’s category. The winner takes over the loser’s square, expanding their territory, while the loser exits the game.
The entire season has the same players, and the winner goes on to choose another challenger, so on and so forth. Whoever takes control of The Floor by the end of the season wins a grand prize of $250,000.
There is also a new feature to the game this year, the Time Boost. If a contestant wins three challenges in a row, they earn themselves a five-second bonus (though it didn’t seem like it would have helped in this case).
The Floor, Wednesdays at 9/8c, Fox