What Would You Do?

My recent look back at Legends of the Hidden Temple forced me to instantly remember other great 90s Nick game shows, and here's one that definitely made me go, "Oh man! I totally forgot about this and now I totally remember it!" Of course you know what I'm talking about, because you're feeling it too. It was called What Would You Do? or if you prefer: "wha-wha-wha-would you... wha-wha-wha-would you... wha-wha-wah would you do?" 

This show was basically "pies and eyes." It had a lot of pies, and for some reason, a lot of creepy eyes. They were everywhere: googly eyes with lashes blinking, popping out of walls, spinning around here or there... even the title had a couple eyes in it. Very strange. After that, every episode started off with Marc Summers looking something like a Ken doll in a hypnotic dress-shirt and standing against a set looking something like a pastel comic book with splatter paint and leopard skin patterns and random shapes. He'd tell us where the heck we were, and then we'd enter the "bouncing-ovaly-eyes-against-neon-green-polygons" dimension (what they normally call an "acid trip"), and we'd see shots of Marc gargling the air, dressing as a banana, and painting a French mustache on his face all screwed up. "You're doing it wrong!" 

The audience was a pool of funky neon, tucked-in bulky shirts, pink scrunchies, white shorts, and bare legs, and you'd spend so much time looking at them in the running time that you'd actually begin to tell them apart from one another. Who was wearing the weird costumes and who was wearing the normal clothes? It's impossible to know these days. The people back there were just a stack of colors, stripes, and poka dots, with fanny packs and plastic visor hats as far as the eye could see. Blinding to look at, but always eager to stand up, accept a challenge, and get a pie to the face. Seriously, at this point, what planet was this show beamed in from?

Step on up to the Wall O' Stuff!

As to what it was actually about... I'll fill you in as soon as I know (controlled substances may be needed). But from what I can piece together, it seemed to be about kids torturing their parents in various ways that usually involved humiliating tasks and every possible way to put a cream pie into someone's face. And I really mean that. This show started a pie-face contraption industry. It had the "Pie Pod," the "Pie Slide," the "Pie Pendulum," the "Pie in the Sky," the "Pie Roulette," the "Pie Wash," AND the "Pie Coaster." But you could only take one of these things for a spin by picking a number and retrieving a card out of the trippy and colorful doors on the "Wall O' Stuff." Afterwards, those cream pies probably tasted pretty good, especially pasted to your shoulders and dripping off your chin.

Simply put, this show was idiot TV as high art, but sure fun enough if you were the kid who got to see his dad dress as a bee, strap a stinger to his can, and try to sit on a series of balloons to pop them. You know if he makes ten in 60 seconds, he'll look like an idiot, and if he doesn't, he'll get to go sit in the Pie Pod and have a pie launched at his face. Sounds radical doesn't it? And I guess the show gets its name from the segment where kids had to decide whether to get a pie to the face or do what was written on a card strapped to their head... or maybe it had something to do with what number door you'd open in the Wall O' Stuff, but who really knows? Usually getting the pie to the face was the better option because half the time the card had them eating the sauerkraut and jelly bean sandwich. Yuck.

Still don't get it? What can I say, it was the 90s!