| 1 | !!General trivia: |
| 2 | * On March 6, 1986, ''Series/WheelOfFortune'' became the first GameShow to have MediaNotes/ClosedCaptioning. |
| 3 | * The Wheel used since 1974 was designed by Ed Flesh and was originally built from cardboard, paint, and light bulbs. The current Wheel weighs 2,400 pounds, is made of stainless steel, and is framed with Plexiglas. (The 1973 Wheel, along with the rest of the ''Shopper's Bazaar'' set, was designed by Spencer Davies.) |
| 4 | * The puzzle board of the 1973 pilot originally consisted of 60 pull cards, only 45 of which were used for gameplay (the last set acted as a "Wrong Letter Board"). In 1974, this changed to 39 trilons on three rows and no "wrong letter" spaces. The board changed on December 21, 1981 to 48 trilons on four rows as part of the set's overhaul; four more trilons were added to the corners in 1982, which served as little more than decoration (the board's border blocked them from being turned). On February 24, 1997, the board changed to 52 touch-activated monitors, which themselves became flat-screen [=LCDs=] on September 10, 2007. The 2022-2023 season trades it in for an LED display with LIDAR sensors. |
| 5 | * The original game played with a blank Bonus Round puzzle that was usually simple and limited to one word, and contestants could call five consonants and a vowel, and had 15 seconds to solve the puzzle. However, a {{Metagame}} strategy emerged to call the letters "R", "S", "T", "L", "N", and "E", which soon took over almost every single Bonus Round and made the game feel broken. Finally, the producers [[ObviousRulePatch intervened and grandfathered these letters into the Bonus Round as freebies]], then modified the round, so that as a handicap, the puzzles would be more complicated and contestants only got ten seconds to solve the puzzles and a choice of three consonants and one vowel (which ironically tends to be "CDMA" a lot of the time, giving rise to another metagame), with the addition of the Wild Card mechanic allowing for a fourth consonant call. |
| 6 | * A contestant on the UK version accidentally spun the wheel the wrong way, ruining the mechanism (since the UK version's wheel had a gearing mechanism designed to regulate its speed) and causing the recording to be held up until the following day whilst the production crew tried to fix it. |
| 7 | ---- |
| 8 | !!Specific trivia: |
| 9 | * AdoredByTheNetwork: |
| 10 | ** ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'', the show's primetime debut, was very heavily promoted by ABC leading up to and during its first season, especially compared to their other game shows. It was even advertised on the score chyron during ABC and ESPN college football games, and the show took over the entire primetime lineup on February 4, 2021 with a [[MarathonRunning three-hour marathon]] of repeats, resulting in a week off for ''Series/TheChase'' and ''Series/TheHustler2021''. |
| 11 | ** Australian cable channel Arena airs American ''Wheel'' considerably more than America does. The network airs ten unique episodes per week, and runs them all several times throughout the week, including in marathons on weekends. They also air ''Celebrity Wheel'' occasionally; when they do, they air a two-hour block of ''Wheel'' weekdays consisting of two syndicated episodes and one ''Celebrity'' episode. |
| 12 | ** When NBC has a sporting event that pre-empts ''Wheel's'' time slot, Rhinelander, Wisconsin affiliate WJFW-TV will often still air ''Wheel'' and their 6:00 newscast, and bump that hour of network sports coverage to their subchannel. Notably, WJFW was the only "Big Four" network affiliate east of the Mountain Time Zone to air the Black Friday 2023 episode at its normal time, on its normal station, and in its entirety. In addition, when many NBC affiliates refused to air the ''Series/ThirtyRock'' reunion special due to potentially driving away linear television viewers by promoting Peacock, WJFW pre-empted it with additional airings of ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel''. It was the only NBC affiliate to fill its slot with either game show (it is not known whether they re-aired the same day's episodes or if they aired another day's episodes); most others filled it with local specials, infomercials, or sitcom reruns. |
| 13 | ** Green Bay, Wisconsin FOX affiliate WLUK-TV is one of the few stations that opts to air ''Wheel'' earlier instead of later or not at all when pre-empted by a sporting event. When FOX sporting events start at 7:00 PM Eastern/6:00 PM Central (pre-empting both ''Wheel'' and ''Jeopardy!''), WLUK will cut its 5:00 newscast in half to allow ''Wheel'' to move an hour early to 5:30 PM leading into the sport, while ''Jeopardy!'' airs after the game and a newscast, despite airing ''Jeopardy!'' first under normal scheduling. They also do this during the MLB All-Star Game, a time where ''Wheel'' is usually a repeat while ''Jeopardy!'' is still showing new episodes. |
| 14 | * AuthorsSavingThrow: |
| 15 | ** Prior to the premiere of Season 39, promos stated that the season would see ''Wheel's'' first tournament since the permanent retirement of Friday Finals in January 1999. After Mike Richards was fired as executive producer, this was scrapped, and Pat even dissed the concept of a tournament at the closing of an episode late in the season. When Bellamie Blackstone became executive producer in Season 40, she is finally reviving Friday Finals for the season's first-ever WWE Week, and the show is explicitly referring to the week as a tournament. |
| 16 | ** One of the biggest complaints from fans about the Prize Puzzle was that the puzzles were often poorly-written and appeared to be taken directly from travel brochures. By the 2020's, the majority of them were an arbitrary combination of a positive adjective and a travel or beach-related noun, or a "Phrase" that was merely a sentence related to being happy or being on vacation. Starting in Season 41, Prize Puzzles are no longer directly related to the trip, though puzzles that ''could'' very easily be (or have previously been) Prize Puzzles still show up frequently. |
| 17 | * BannedEpisode: |
| 18 | ** From Season 19 through Season 34, ''Wheel'' did the occasional Southern-themed week. All of them fell victim to this while the week of March 20, 2017 (episodes #S-6751 through 6755), designated as Southern Charm week, was being reran. ''Wheel'' failed to notice an image on its video wall depicting African Americans in slave-era clothing that appeared behind Pat and Vanna during the closing segments. This was only pointed out in the middle of a rerun of the week in June 2017, likely due to the original airings of the last two episodes being pre-empted on CBS affiliates by March Madness. Because the controversy only erupted on Thursday evening, there was only enough time to pull the Friday episode, and it was done in a rather unconventional manner. Since weekday episodes are distributed to affiliates one weekday in advance, meaning they already had it, ''Wheel'' instructed its affiliates not to air #S-6755 and instead air the week's Saturday repeat (episode #S-6363 from March 2, 2016), already sent to them earlier in the week, on Friday ''and'' Saturday. The last-minute pull allegedly did not apply to Canada. No episodes from this week, or any other Southern-themed weeks have since appeared in reruns or on streaming, nor has the theme been done since. In all, the banned weeks include: |
| 19 | *** April 1-5, 2002 (episodes #S-3661-3665): Southern Hospitality. |
| 20 | *** September 16-20, 2002 (#S-3716-3720): Southern Hospitality. |
| 21 | *** October 4-8, 2004 (#S-4116-4120): Southern Hospitality. |
| 22 | *** October 15-19, 2012 (#S-5676-5680): Southern Hospitality. |
| 23 | *** October 7-11, 2013 (#S-5866-5870): Southern Hospitality. This week was included in GSN's rotation at the time and did continue rerunning after the 2017 controversy. |
| 24 | *** December 22-26, 2014 (#S-6116-6120): Southern Hospitality. |
| 25 | *** March 20-24, 2017 (#S-6751-6755): Southern Charm. |
| 26 | ** The April 9, 2004 episode (#S-4055) may never see the light of day again, due to the blue contestant, Lori Ryan, later being found guilty of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Tylee_Ryan_and_J._J._Vallow murdering two of her children]], one of which she mentions in her interview (the other was not born until 2012). The case gained national attention and spawned multiple documentaries, some of which feature clips of her ''Wheel'' appearance, but only from home recordings. Prior to the surfacing of the ''Wheel'' episode, Sony Pictures did confirm Lori's appearance to the media, but did not provide any further details. |
| 27 | ** The closing chat from February 25, 2022 (#S-7545) was about Vanna's cat Stella. At the time of the episode's taping, Stella had just celebrated her sixteenth birthday. Vanna said that Stella "could live for a lot longer", to which Pat takes as "more material" for the RunningGag of him getting her name wrong. On an episode later in the season, Vanna announced that Stella had passed away. Likely to avoid insensitivity, #S-7545 was barred from its scheduled Saturday repeat in June 2023 and replaced with #S-7544. |
| 28 | ** In Singapore, any couples' episodes that feature same-sex couple teams are skipped (to date: #S-7734, #S-7827, and #S-7828, aired February 16, 2023 and February 13-14, 2024, respectively). Singaporean broadcast laws prohibit any depiction or mention of same-sex relationships on free television. |
| 29 | * BeamMeUpScotty: Most of the show's most-quoted catch phrases have been shortened or phased out over the years. |
| 30 | ** The only one that remains common today is, "I'd like to buy a vowel", but this is sometimes quoted as "Can I buy a vowel?", which is rarely said on the actual show. |
| 31 | ** Another derivative, "Would you like to buy a vowel?", has actually ''never'' been known to have been said verbatim by Pat or any of the other hosts. He will sometimes remind a contestant that they can only "buy a vowel or solve" when only vowels remain in the puzzle. Even Chuck Woolery wouldn't say more than, "You can buy a vowel" when they had enough to do so. The question ''was'' occasionally asked by the hosts on the Australian version, however. |
| 32 | ** From the shopping era, "I'll take the rest on a gift certificate" was usually not said by the contestants. When contestants could not afford any more prizes, the host would ask them if they wanted to put the remaining money "on account or on a gift certificate" before they declared such. |
| 33 | ** "Is there a(n) __, Pat?", "I'll take a(n) __, Pat", and similar phrasing when asking for letters has been mostly phased out since the 80's, mainly because the producers discourage anything more than simply the letter itself. This still happens on the laid-back ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'', however, with Vanna sometimes being the person asked instead. |
| 34 | ** Contestants today generally don't precede "I'd like to solve the puzzle" with Pat's name. This is probably why the show felt it was okay to make PAT I'D LIKE TO SOLVE THE PUZZLE an actual puzzle in 2011; in its previous appearance on the April 1, 1997 episode hosted by Alex Trebek, Pat said they could not use said puzzle if he were hosting because it would be too confusing. Many contestants also just say, "I'd like to solve" or "I'll solve." |
| 35 | * {{Blooper}}: |
| 36 | ** At least three times, a puzzle was thrown out but the blanks for said puzzle were still visible for a few seconds. One instance in 1988 had a Phrase puzzle suddenly change to a one-word Person puzzle before the first letter; a similar instance in 1997 had a Person puzzle change to Place and lose a few letters before the first turn. Similarly, a 1989 episode showed a smaller puzzle during the opening shot of the set than was used in actual gameplay. |
| 37 | ** Back when each round had its own Wheel template, the first episode of Season 7 accidentally kept the Round 3 template for Round 4, albeit with the Round 4 top dollar amount of $5,000 replacing $3,500. |
| 38 | ** Multiple instances of add-on wedges being placed on the wrong spots. This is a pretty major mistake to make, particularly with the Million-Dollar Wedge, as it has skinny Bankrupts on it[[note]]From Seasons 26-30, the wedge was normally over $800, but was sometimes over the adjacent $550 by mistake; one contestant hit one of the Bankrupts on its edge, and another hit the edge of the $800, when normally these would've resulted in $550 and Bankrupt respectively[[/note]]. At least twice, one was on the top dollar amount; the Surprise wedge on October 26, 1992, and the Free Spin on May 1, 1995 (which was picked up, but no cash was given with it as per the rules at the time). |
| 39 | *** On November 15, 1988, the Round 2 Wheel Prize was accidentally placed on Lose a Turn. This was corrected before the round began. |
| 40 | *** On January 9, 1997, they had the $10,000 Wedge's reverse used for Round 2. A contestant lands on the edge and calls a correct letter for $10,000 (treated as a cash wedge instead of a prize). However, the contestant does not solve the puzzle. |
| 41 | *** There are multiple known instances of the Jackpot Wedge and the adjacent additional Bankrupt being placed one space clockwise of their usual positions. One of these instances resulted in someone winning the Jackpot when they should not have. |
| 42 | *** In a November 2000 episode, the $10,000 wedge, which was exclusive to Round 3 as of that season, was accidentally placed on the Wheel for Round ''2'' (which was the case for the prior four seasons). It ended up getting won, so they put it back on the Wheel for Round 3, though it was not landed on again. |
| 43 | *** On a November 2008 episode, the $3,500 wedge and the adjacent additional Bankrupt were each placed one wedge clockwise, putting the Bankrupt where $3,500 should go. In Round 3, a contestant picks up the Million-Dollar Wedge...and on the next spin, lands on that Bankrupt that should have been the big money. Thankfully, he had a Free Spin, which he used...and hit Lose a Turn (meaning he could have eventually used the Free Spin on that had the wedges been placed correctly). However, he won anyway and did not land on the $100,000 that the million would have replaced. |
| 44 | *** On a November 2009 episode, the Million-Dollar Wedge was accidentally placed on the red $800 space next to Lose A Turn. This resulted in a contestant losing $11,350 and the prize wedge to Bankrupt in Round 1. In Round 2, another contestant landed on the edge of the orange $800, meaning she would have lost $27,600 to Bankrupt. |
| 45 | *** On a May 2011 episode, they somehow forgot to use the Million-Dollar Wedge. In Round 2, a contestant lands on the orange $800 and later fills in the puzzle entirely...''and wins the game by $400'', meaning that this error technically caused the wrong player to win. This was never caught or acknowledged by the show, despite one fan claiming he called the show's offices to report the error after the episode's airing, and receiving a letter in response thanking him for his feedback. |
| 46 | *** On January 13, 2014, the Mystery Wedge came loose from the blue $300, leaving 2/3 of that and only 1/3 of the red $700 exposed. A contestant landed on the blue $300 but did not land on the Mystery Wedge and thus could not flip it. Pat even noticed and went on to "correct" things by placing the wedge on the red $700. |
| 47 | *** On a November 2014 episode, the Gift Tag and Prize Wedge were accidentally switched. One contestant ended up winning the Gift Tag and finishing in second place. Despite the potential difference of several thousand dollars, the contestant still would have finished second had she won the Prize instead. |
| 48 | *** On October 12, 2017, the staff forgot to remove the Prize wedge after Round 2, so it stayed on for Round 3. It was actually won and, like the May 2011 incident, caused the wrong player to win, as the contestant with it won by less than $10,000 (its value). This was also never caught or acknowledged. |
| 49 | ** On a few occasions, the outer edge of the Wheel went out of alignment, leading to at least one spin that Pat incorrectly identified. |
| 50 | ** In the '80s and early '90s, a contestant in the Bonus Round might accidentally call a letter twice (or in the case of RSTLNE, call one of those six letters), but the chyron would display the letter again as part of their choices. Other times, the chyron would display a different letter from the one they called. |
| 51 | ** At least two Bonus Rounds where a letter was revealed that shouldn't have been: in 1996, a contestant called H G K I but the A in the answer THE KING AND I was also revealed; and in March 2005, the B was revealed in SUBWAY depsite the contestant calling M P D A (which was even shown correctly on the chyron). Both contestants solved their puzzles and were later told that they would retain their prizes due to the errors. |
| 52 | ** The 1996-97 season had many errors in placing the Wheel templates. For the first two weeks, they managed to have an entire round where the only Bankrupts on the Wheel were those on the $10,000 Wedge. (It should be noted that three weeks into the season, they gave up on the extra templates and just used the Round 3 template for the entire game, changing only the top dollar amount and adding a second Bankrupt in Round 2.) |
| 53 | ** After they changed the Wheel templates, the aforementioned second Bankrupt was OffModel for about a month afterward. This was likely because Bankrupt had not previously been an add-on. |
| 54 | ** Relatedly, when the Wheel wedges were redesigned halfway through Season 20, the second Bankrupt had smaller text than the permanent one, and Lose a Turn's text was placed much higher than normal. While the latter was fixed after a week, the former was not fixed until Season 24. |
| 55 | ** From about Season 30 onward, score miscalculations have been frequent. Sometimes, these are caught and corrected later in the show, but other times, they go unnoticed. Usually, this is due to the contestant being credited with the wrong number of consonants at some point, or the $250 for a vowel not being deducted. |
| 56 | *** A 2003 episode somehow gave a contestant a $3,000 head start, and she was able to buy a vowel after earning the Prize Wedge (which did not award cash at the time) on her first correct letter. This one also ended up not mattering, as she later hit Bankrupt. |
| 57 | *** One 2014 episode had a round thrown out due a contestant being credited with the $1,000 Same Letter bonus after finding the $10,000 Mystery Wedge (which, despite being cash, is a bonus and cannot be spent on vowels, though the Same Letter bonus can) then buying a vowel, even though the letter she called was not the Same Letter. The error was not noticed until after the vowel had been bought. Since she should not have been able to buy a vowel at that point in the first place, the round had to be discarded. |
| 58 | *** On a March 2021 episode, in an inverse of the above, a contestant calls a Same Letter on the Mystery Wedge, finds the $10,000, and is ''not'' awarded the $1,000 bonus, nor does Pat even mention that she called the Same Letter. She ends up being forced to spin again due to not being credited with any spendable cash, hits the Million Dollar Wedge, calls a wrong consonant, and loses the round. It probably wouldn't have mattered in the end, since she ended up placing a distant third. |
| 59 | ** Several graphic errors. These include: |
| 60 | *** A Prize Puzzle bug showing up in a round that wasn't a Prize Puzzle. |
| 61 | *** The "fireworks" effect (used for Jackpot wins) being used when the Jackpot wasn't won. |
| 62 | *** The Jackpot being totaled incorrectly. One 1996 episode strangely added an extra $20 mid-round. A 2012 episode added $300 when $350 was hit and $0 on another spin. |
| 63 | *** Spins from wrong rounds or even ''different episodes'' being dubbed in (most likely because the Wheel camera didn't catch the actual spin). In some particularly obvious cases, these dubbed-in spins give the impression of, say, a Prize Wedge suddenly reappearing on the Wheel. On one episode, the post-production "over the Wheel" shot was obviously a different Mystery Wedge than the one the contestant had just landed on; another post-production shot showed the red arrow despite the yellow contestant being in control at the time. |
| 64 | *** The puzzle category graphic disappearing, or the wrong one being put up. This even happened in a Bonus Round once. |
| 65 | *** There was a "Get Out of Town" week in October 2010. Except for the title card, it used the same opening animation as a later "Road Trip" week in April 2011. Two of the "Road Trip" episodes had the "Get Out of Town" title cards left in by mistake. |
| 66 | ** Sometimes, the electronic board has its problems: |
| 67 | *** On many occasions, a letter will fail to reveal after Vanna touches it. Sometimes it takes her a few tries to get it right. On an April 2017 episode, she had to run across the board to quickly reveal an unresponsive letter as the contestant took his next spin. |
| 68 | *** On an episode not long after its introduction, Vanna had trouble lighting up a letter in the puzzle, and even resorted to [[PercussiveMaintenance hitting it with her fist]] before it cooperated. Later on, the unsolved Bonus Round answer filled in very slowly. The former moment was replayed during the credits. |
| 69 | *** Unsolved bonus puzzles light up one letter at a time, whereas any puzzle that is solved will have the whole answer fill in at once and the board's border will flash. On several occasions, the opposite of both has happened. |
| 70 | *** On at least one episode, after a bonus puzzle was solved, one of the letters did not fill in until about two seconds after the others. |
| 71 | ** The lights went out after the BonusRound on April 20, 2012. Surprisingly, this was left in. |
| 72 | ** Several sound effect errors. These include: |
| 73 | *** Sounding the buzzer on a correct letter. |
| 74 | *** Failing to sound the buzzer on a wrong letter. |
| 75 | *** Sounding both the buzzer and "ding" on a correct letter. |
| 76 | *** Sounding the "ding" in the Speed-Up, which normally does not use any sounds other than the time's-up buzzer (except for ThinkMusic from the early 2000s onward). |
| 77 | *** On a 1978 episode, the "ding" sounded on a wrong letter, and later a buzzer sounded just as a contestant began to spin. |
| 78 | *** On a 1988 episode, with a puzzle where only vowels remained, the Bankrupt slide whistle accidentally sounded instead of the four beeps used to indicate that only vowels are left. |
| 79 | *** On several occasions in the late 90s and early noughties, the ThinkMusic and cues for solving puzzles went through multiple changes, resulting in several occasions where one of the older cues would be played by mistake. |
| 80 | *** Something similar happened in a 2017 episode: the show had changed music cues mid-season, but the week was taped before the changes were enacted, all of the music was edited in post-production. However, the editing was often very sloppy and obvious, and on at least one episode, one Toss-Up retained the old music entirely. |
| 81 | *** On a 2002 episode, the "ding" for a correct letter sounded when a contestant picked an envelope from the bonus wheel, instead of the separate ding normally used there. |
| 82 | *** On March 3, 2014, a contestant landed on a ½ car tag, but the Bankrupt slide whistle sounded instead of the car horn sound. It also happened in a March 2018 episode, but this time was corrected in post-production. |
| 83 | *** In a February 2018 episode, the Bankrupt slide whistle was accidentally played when Lose a Turn was hit. |
| 84 | ** There are at two known occasions where a letter call was misheard while the game proceeded as normal: |
| 85 | *** 1974 Pilot #2: Gary says "Edd, I'd like an F". Edd Byrnes echoes, "An F... Yes, there is an F", but two S's are revealed on the board instead. |
| 86 | *** February 14, 2014: The red team lands on $3,500 and they clearly call M (of which the puzzle had two), but Pat echoes "N, and there are three of them". Even the MediaNotes/ClosedCaptioning displayed the call as M. |
| 87 | ** October 4, 1997 (''Wheel 2000''): The blue player calls the last consonant in the Speed-Up puzzle GOOSE BUMPS. The red player is not told that only vowels remain, so she picks a (nonexistent) consonant. Before the yellow player can call a letter, Cyber Lucy says "There's only vowels left, I believe." That player picks the O's and solves for 550 points. Since this makes the final scores 1,550, 550, and 1,900, this error affects the outcome of the game. On a successful solve worth 750 points, the red contestant would've had enough to go to the Bonus Round. |
| 88 | ** On December 20, 2012, the blue contestant missolves the puzzle HICKORY-SMOKED COUNTRY HAM without enunciating the D. Neither the judges nor Pat notice this, and it is treated as a successful solve. Luckily, this doesn't affect the outcome as the final scores are $11,950, $1,500, and $8,000. The error got very little coverage because it happened the day after the SEVEN SWANS A-SWIMMING incident. |
| 89 | ** November 21, 2013: Rebecca buys I, which ''is'' in the puzzle, but all of a sudden, Jessica is spinning on the very next turn. Going by Rebecca's scoreboard later in the round, it appears that they accidentally edited out Rebecca losing her turn to a wrong vowel right after the I. |
| 90 | ** April 8, 2020: This episode was moved up over a month from its originally-scheduled air date of May 26 to replace [[DistancedFromCurrentEvents a cruise-themed episode that would have aired at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic]]. The episode featured a $10,000 Mystery Wedge win, but it was not realized until the last minute that the SPIN ID had not yet been inserted into the episode.[[note]]Since Season 35, any $10,000 Mystery Wedge wins are followed by a SPIN ID drawing, with the lucky home viewer also winning $10,000.[[/note]] Although ''Wheel'' did send out a print with the SPIN ID added, several stations did not fetch it in time and aired the unfinished version instead, resulting in a long, awkward shot of Pat and the contestants standing idle while Jim went through the SPIN ID spiel with a pause where the SPIN ID would go, and no graphics on the screen. |
| 91 | ** On a July 2020 rerun of a May 2016 episode, a contestant buys an incorrect E shortly into Round 2. As Pat says that there are none, due to an editing error, the shot of the board [[JumpCut jump cuts]] to a future shot of Vanna revealing a G (at which point more than half the puzzle is revealed) while the audio remains correct. The puzzle returns to normal after the next spin. |
| 92 | ** Some East Coast broadcasts of the December 5, 2021 episode of ''Celebrity Wheel'' accidentally inserted a brief commercial break in the middle of a round. |
| 93 | ** October 13, 2023: After the third Triple Toss-Up goes unsolved, Pat prompts the red contestant to start Round 4, even though the blue contestant started Round 1 and should have been the one to start Round 4 under this rule. The red contestant ends up doing the Final Spin at the start of the round, hits the $5,000 wedge, and wins $48,000 in that round alone. This error was never caught. On the episode that taped ''right after'' this one (aired November 3), the Triple Toss-Up was again unsolved, and the rule regarding who starts Round 4 was followed correctly. |
| 94 | ** The trilon board was prone to light errors: |
| 95 | *** On a 1985 episode, the first F in the puzzle FRANKFURTERS AND SAUERKRAUT lit up despite no one having called F yet, and it refused to turn off. Pat repeatedly told the contestants to ignore it until F was called later in the round. (It apparently was not fixed in time for the BonusRound, as the one-word bonus puzzle displayed on the third row instead of the second.) |
| 96 | *** A few 1980s episodes would have the letters fail to light up for a few seconds, and then all light up in rapid succession, usually very out of sync with the dings. |
| 97 | *** Sometimes, a letter would fail to light up at all, and given Vanna's insistence on not turning letters before they lit up, she would often wait for several seconds only to be prompted by Pat to turn it anyway. This was especially noticeable on a November 1996 episode in San Francisco, where the lights on the board completely froze; she turned the called letters anyway, and then when the contestant solved the puzzle one turn later, none of the lights (including the chase lights on the edge of the board, which would usually flash when the puzzle was solved) lit up at all. |
| 98 | * BreakingNewsInterruption: |
| 99 | ** May 13, 1981: Due to NBC News Special Reports on the shooting of Pope John Paul II, the show was interrupted during Round 2. It returned during Round 3, only to be interrupted a second time towards the end of Round 4. |
| 100 | ** September 29, 1988 (daytime): East Coast airings were interrupted towards the end of the main game by coverage of the launch of Space Shuttle ''Discovery'', the first NASA Space Shuttle mission since the Space Shuttle ''Challenger'' disaster. |
| 101 | ** March 28, 2011: Most 7:30 PM Eastern airings (the show's most popular time slot) were completely pre-empted by a speech from President Barack Obama regarding the military intervention in Libya. Since several affiliates actually start the show at around 7:28, some airings managed to at least show the $1,000 Toss-Up before being interrupted. |
| 102 | ** October 5, 2011: 7:30 PM Eastern airings on ABC affiliates were interrupted due to the death of Steve Jobs. The show returned around the time Pat was recapping the final scores. |
| 103 | ** April 19, 2013: In the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing, all 7:00 PM Eastern airings were interrupted after a manhunt for suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev resulted in the discovery of him hiding in a boat in a Watertown, Massachusetts backyard. Some affiliates had already been carrying breaking news coverage before the national break-in. |
| 104 | ** May 22, 2017: 7:30 PM Eastern airings were interrupted near the end due to the Manchester Arena bombing. On at least ABC airings, this did not happen until the closing segment, so no gameplay was lost. |
| 105 | ** April 17, 2018: 7:30 PM Eastern airings were interrupted near the end due to the death of Barbara Bush. ABC airings were cut off during the Speed-Up Round, but returned just before the winner spun the Bonus Wheel. CBS airings were cut off just before the winner called her Bonus Round letters. This episode was part of a special week in which the winner's winnings would be matched to a SPIN ID holder announced after the Bonus Round (similar to the Secret Santa Sweepstakes, but with only the winning contestant instead of all three). |
| 106 | ** July 13, 2019 (rerun of January 5, 2018): After most of New York City got hit with a power outage, flagship affiliate WABC-TV interrupted Wheel mid-Round 1 (just as a contestant was calling a letter on $2,500), then returned during the commercial break before Round 2. The blackout appeared to affect WABC's operations, as the footage became glitched in the middle of Round 2, with the lower third of the picture being moved to the top of the screen, and was not corrected until the end of the main game. More breaking news of the blackout later pre-empted most subsequent programming (most of ''[[Series/DragonsDen Shark Tank]]'' and the entirety of ''Series/PressYourLuck'' and ''Series/CardSharks'', all of which were repeats). |
| 107 | ** January 8, 2020: Due to the missile attack on the Al Asad Airbase in Iraq, 7:30 PM Eastern airings on NBC affiliates were cut off during the Bonus Round. 7:00 PM airings on that network and CBS were also affected by the news and did not start until mid-Round 2. ABC airings were not interrupted in either time slot. |
| 108 | ** September 18, 2020: 7:30 PM Eastern airings were cut off during Round 4 due to the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. |
| 109 | ** October 21, 2020: Some 7:30 PM Eastern airings on CBS affiliates were interrupted after Round 1 due to an FBI press conference on election security, and returned at the end of Round 3. |
| 110 | ** December 14, 2020 (Secret Santa): 7:30 PM Eastern airings were mostly pre-empted for an address from President Elect Joe Biden regarding the electoral college vote. WABC-TV's airing, which starts at 7:30 on the dot, was cut off after the "Wheel!" part of the opening chant. ABC and NBC airings returned during the Triple Toss-Up, while CBS and some FOX airings return during the Bonus Round (some FOX affiliates such as WBFF in Baltimore did not air the address, opting instead to run key points of Biden's speech on a ticker during ''Wheel''). |
| 111 | ** January 14, 2021: 7:00 PM Eastern airings on CBS affiliates were interrupted during Round 4 for Joe Biden's address regarding his COVID-19 relief proposal. This broadcast also resulted in 7:30 airings not starting until mid-Round 3. The other networks did not air the address live. |
| 112 | ** February 25, 2021: 7:30 PM Eastern airings on NBC affiliates were cut off before the Bonus Round due to the United States airstrike on Syria. |
| 113 | ** April 20, 2021: 7:00 PM Eastern airings on ABC and NBC affiliates were interrupted after Round 1 for President Joe Biden's comments on the Derek Chauvin trial, which had wrapped earlier that day. NBC airings returned the during the final tally, while ABC's coverage continued until 7:30. |
| 114 | ** February 23, 2022: 7:00 PM Pacific airings on ABC affiliates were interrupted during Round 2 to report Vladimir Putin's declaration of a military operation in Ukraine. NBC's coverage of this did not cut in until 7:28, which would have only cut off the credits if anything. CBS's coverage (which did not affect any airings of ''Wheel'', as no West Coast CBS affiliates carry ''Wheel'' at 7:00, only 7:30) signed off in time for 7:30 airings to begin uninterrupted, but the news continued on the other two networks. 7:30 airings began at Round 2 on ABC and mid-Round 3 on NBC. This affected all three contestants on this episode, who all lived in markets with 7:30 airings on ABC affiliates. |
| 115 | ** May 24, 2022: Following the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas, 7:30 PM Eastern airings on ABC and NBC affiliates were interrupted for updates from the Uvalde Police Department. The former cut in during Round 3 and returned shortly into Round 4, while the latter cut in during Round 4 and returned by the Bonus Round. Later, President Biden addressed the nation, which interrupted 6:30 PM Mountain airings on all networks during Round 2; they returned during Round 4. |
| 116 | ** July 4, 2022 (rerun of October 18, 2021): 7:30 PM Eastern airings on NBC affiliates were interrupted around the Final Spin for a special report announcing the apprehension of the perpetrator of a mass shooting at a Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Illinois earlier that day. They returned at the start of the Bonus Round, at which point ABC airings were interrupted for that network's special report; some returned during the credits. CBS did not do a special report until about 7:58, not impacting gameplay. |
| 117 | ** January 27, 2023: 7:30 PM Eastern airings on NBC affiliates were cut off around the end of the main game for a special report on the public release of video of five Memphis police officers beating Tyre Nichols to death during a traffic stop. Airings in the same time slot on ABC affiliates did not begin until Round 2 due to the same matter. CBS airings were already pre-empted by a PGA tournament. |
| 118 | ** March 2, 2023: Most 7:00 PM Eastern airings were interrupted during Round 1 for special reports on the verdict of the Alex Murdaugh double murder trial. They returned during Round 3. |
| 119 | ** June 8, 2023: Most East Coast airings were interrupted due to former President Donald Trump's indictment. On ABC, 7:00 PM airings were cut off around 7:28 (not impacting gameplay) while 7:30 airings were fully pre-empted. No 7:00 airings were affected on NBC or CBS, but 7:30 airings were cut off by the networks during Round 2 and the end of Round 3, respectively. The interruption affected the winning contestant's local affiliate, but not those of the other two. |
| 120 | ** October 25, 2023: The East Coast airing of ''Celebrity Wheel'' was interrupted for seven minutes by a special report of a mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine. The beginning of the second game up to mid-Round 1 was not seen, including a moment where Creator/GabrielIglesias gave a shout-out to a recent civilian contestant who mentioned him as his favorite comedian. |
| 121 | ** February 8, 2023: 7:30 PM Eastern airings on ABC affiliates were cut off during the Bonus Round due to President Joe Biden addressing the nation after the release of a report on his handling of classified documents. Some affiliates, including WABC, were able to show the entire outcome before the interruption, but others were cut off just as Vanna was revealing the contestant's letters. |
| 122 | * BuryYourArt: For decades, Sony refused to release any vintage full episodes of ''Wheel'' on television, DVD, or streaming services. Fan theories ranged from Pat Sajak refusing older seasons' release for vanity reasons, to Sony thinking that older decades of ''Wheel'' have drastically different gameplay compared to modern seasons and preferring to keep gameplay consistent. It was also believed by fans that ''Wheel'' is more stubborn on its pre-2017 episodes due to using different music cues, which are almost-always [[ClumsyCopyrightCensorship dubbed over]] with their modern equivalents on clip replays. However, Pluto's initial library did feature some episodes from 2016, which all retain the original music, debunking theories that rights to the 2007-2016 music package had been an obstacle in clearing these episodes for streaming. |
| 123 | ** On linear TV, the earliest episodes reran during the [[UsefulNotes/Covid19Pandemic COVID-19]] hiatus were from 2016, and the oldest that GSN has most recently aired were from 2013. The last time any episode prior to the 21st century aired on television was when GSN aired the 1994-95 season from 2008-10. The last time anything from the 1980s (or '70s) was seen was during GSN's Merv Griffin tribute marathon in 2007. In addition, the vintage clips that occasionally get replayed on the show are usually the same ones that have been seen many times since the [[ClipShow ceremonial 3,000th and 4,000th episodes]]. |
| 124 | ** As for streaming services, Netflix had featured a rotation of a total of 74 episodes (25 at a time, with one episode being featured in two batches) that only ranged from Seasons 34-37. The announcement of the launch of a 24/7 ''Wheel'' channel on Pluto TV was initially celebrated by fans. Then when streaming actually started, ''still'' nothing older than Season 34 was initially offered, and Pluto initially stated that this would not change. The Vulture journalist who originally reported the announcements, himself a fan of retro ''Wheel'', stated that he could not get an answer as to why ''Wheel'' did not go any earlier. Catering to demand, Pluto TV added 100 episodes ranging from Seasons 20-30 (2002-2012) in March 2023, and to everyone's surprise, 150 more episodes going as far back as Season 1, including Pat and Vanna's first shows from the ''daytime series'', were added later in the year. Many of these episodes had never been seen since their original broadcasts or syndication reruns, which are rarely more than one season old. |
| 125 | ** Kiddie spin-off ''Wheel 2000'' is largely forgotten and was barely acknowledged on the adult show even when it was running. Unlike what ''Jeopardy!'' did for its spin-off ''Jep!'', ''Wheel of Fortune's'' application form states that anyone who played on ''Wheel 2000'' is ineligible to be a contestant. |
| 126 | * CaliforniaDoubling: |
| 127 | ** The show is often themed after a major city or place (e.g., "Salute to New York", "Hawaii Week"), even if they're still filming in Culver City. Not that the show doesn't do, say, a Chicago week in Chicago; the show traveled often from 1988-2018. Trips to the theme city are often among the prizes during those weeks where they're still in their regular studios. |
| 128 | *** This became more prominent starting in Season 33 with "Great American Cities" weeks, replacing the show's formerly-annual remote tapings. These weeks are accompanied by locally-themed sets, all local contestants, and several on-location shoots of Pat and Vanna showing what the appropriate cities have to offer. Many casual viewers assume that these weeks are actually taped in said cities, though this is never the case. |
| 129 | ** Several times during the original NBC run, theme weeks (always [City] Week, including Portland and Philadelphia) were used, with contestants from the appropriate city flown to Burbank. |
| 130 | * CashCowFranchise: ''Wheel'' has made millions not just from the show, but from various licensed media, most notably a line of ''Wheel''-themed slot machines, the very first slot machine to be licensed from a TV show. ''Wheel'' slots have become a mainstay for most casinos, and ''Wheel of Fortune'' is almost as recognizable as a slot machine nowadays as it is a TV show. Various ''Wheel'' board and video games over the years have also become big sellers, with Merv Griffin himself being presented with the ten millionth copy of the ''Wheel'' board game. |
| 131 | * TheCastShowoff: |
| 132 | ** Vanna can sing, and she's shown off her chops several times, including a Christmas week in 1996 where she sang selections from her Christmas album and a 2002 episode where footage was shown during the credits of her singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" at Wrigley Field. |
| 133 | ** On a December 1994 episode, a contestant failed to solve the bonus puzzle ZORRO. Pat gave a somewhat hammy (if perfectly in-key) rendition of the 1957 ''Zorro'' TV theme, even writing a "Z" in the air with the Bonus Round envelope. |
| 134 | ** A promotional video for Christmas 2015 had Jim Thornton sing a "12 Days of Christmas" takeoff themed after the show. Turns out that he is a pretty good singer too. |
| 135 | * ChannelHop: The daytime version went from NBC to CBS and back again in just under 18 months. There was a time when both versions taped at CBS but didn't (necessarily) air on it. The show's comeback to network television almost two decades later was on ABC. |
| 136 | ** The current one has hopped around a lot in Canada too, having been on channels such as Creator/{{CBC}}, A-Channel (now CTV Two), CHCH, and now the smaller Yes TV. |
| 137 | ** In Canada, ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'' started on Yes TV for Season 1 (the same network that airs the syndicated version, and still does today), then moved to the larger CTV for Seasons 2 onward, with reruns airing on E! (both networks are owned by Bell Media; [=NBCUniversal=] does not have any ownership of E! Canada aside from licensing the E! brand). In Season 3, most episodes premiered on CTV 2. |
| 138 | ** The Australian version's original run from 1981-2006 was on the Seven Network. The brief 2008 revival, ''Million Dollar Wheel of Fortune'', was on the Nine Network. The 2024 version hosted by Graham Norton will air on Network 10. |
| 139 | * ChristmasRushed: The Wii U game, released in 2012. It was originally intended to be a launch title for the console (which released on November 18), but got delayed to December 14, just barely before Christmas. The game shows many signs of being rushed, the most of obvious of which is that the game's trailer and box imply online play, which the actual game lacks. The game's menu also has an off-putting gap where the "Leaderboards" button goes on the [=PS3=] and Xbox 360 versions. It is quite obvious that the developers were not able to completely grasp the Wii U's unique functionality in time, as the Wii U [=GamePad=] did not even play any sound. Nintendo gamers would have to wait until the Nintendo Switch game (released in 2018) to be able to play ''Wheel'' online. The Wii U game was one of the last releases by THQ, who filed for bankruptcy just five days later. |
| 140 | * {{Corpsing}}: Pat has been known to crack up at certain comments from contestants over the years (see the "Who said anything about a horse?!" incident). Likewise, he's gotten Charlie and Jim to laugh on several occasions. (For instance, on a 1996 episode, Pat started disrobing after the BonusRound was won, and then did the closing segment in a bathrobe.) |
| 141 | * CowboyBebopAtHisComputer: The Million-Dollar Wedge led to a couple of instances in Season 31. |
| 142 | ** On September 17, 2013, a contestant was penalized for improperly pronouncing the puzzle CORNER CURIO CABINET and could not keep the Million-Dollar Wedge. In the media firestorm that ensued, many news sources claimed that he was denied a million dollars since he had the Million-Dollar Wedge when he tried to solve although claiming said wedge is only the first step of many in getting that prize. Even ''The Today Show'' got this rule wrong when covering the round, even though they previously got it right when they did a story on the last million-dollar win. |
| 143 | ** Then on April 11, 2014, another contestant with the Million-Dollar Wedge was penalized for mispronouncing the ''fully revealed'' puzzle MYTHOLOGICAL HERO ACHILLES. Again the media still went on about how he "lost a million dollars" (some even stating he lost ''$4 million'' because he called four L's on the wedge), or made a big deal about losing the wedge despite it technically having no value at that point (he also lost out on the ½ Car and over $12,000 in another round, plus two trips). This did not affect the outcome, as the same contestant won the game anyway but did not solve the bonus puzzle, and he landed on a $30,000 envelope, meaning that he would not have had the million had he taken the Million-Dollar Wedge to the Bonus Round. |
| 144 | * CreatorBacklash: |
| 145 | ** Pat ''hated'' the "Megaword" category, and made this known when a 2014 contestant mentioned it in his interview. Even Vanna and ''Charlie'' snarked about Megaword on at least one occasion each. |
| 146 | ** When the show's iconic theme song, "Changing Keys", returned in 2021, Pat was quick to criticize the previous generic-sounding theme music, saying that nobody could ever remember it enough to hum it. |
| 147 | ** To a lesser extent, Pat has gone on record saying that [[https://twitter.com/PatOnWheel/status/1489718694880161800 the shopping element was a bad idea in retrospect]] and believes the only people who want it to come back are running squarely on the NostalgiaFilter. In fact, he even addressed it in the closing of the March 11, 2022 episode as well: |
| 148 | --> '''Pat:''' I still get people saying "You know, [shopping] was so entertaining," it was ''so boring!'' And there was no time to play the game because some woman was trying to decide between a lamp and an end table for like 20 seconds. It was dreadful! |
| 149 | --> '''Vanna:''' It's better now. |
| 150 | --> '''Pat:''' Yes, it is. Trust me. |
| 151 | * CreatorsFavorite: According to Alex Trebek, ''Wheel'' was Merv Griffin's "baby" out of the two game shows he's known for creating. Merv rarely visited the ''Series/{{Jeopardy}}'' set and never wrote clues for the show despite writing puzzles for ''Wheel''. |
| 152 | ** In the 2010s, fans of both shows noticed the opposite with executive producer Harry Friedman mostly getting recognized for his efforts on ''Jeopardy!'' rather than ''Wheel''. ''Wheel'' started to get more respect when Mike Richards replaced Friedman, and this continued after Bellamie Blackstone succeeded him. |
| 153 | * CreatorsPest: The Free Spin was treated as such the season after its retirement. On the Season 27 premiere, Pat threw a Free Spin token offstage before introducing the Free Play. Also, the Halloween week set from later in the season had the words "Free Spin" on a tombstone. |
| 154 | * DiedDuringProduction: |
| 155 | ** Jack Clark fell ill in mid-1988 and died of bone cancer in July, at which point the show was in reruns. Towards the end of Season 5, Charlie O'Donnell filled in for him; both he and Johnny Gilbert did likewise on daytime. Jack recorded a few PromotionalConsideration plugs for summer 1988 reruns, but clearly sounded unwell doing so; Pat and Vanna read these for the rest of the summer. M.G. Kelly was hired as the new announcer for the 1988-89 season, continuing until O'Donnell could return full-time. |
| 156 | ** Charlie O'Donnell died on November 1, 2010 with the season in mid-production. Although he taped episodes before his death, the show instead chose to [[SameLanguageDub dub his voice over with substitute announcers]]. This did not affect the Platform/NintendoWii video game as it was released one day after his death. |
| 157 | * DistancedFromCurrentEvents: Because the show tapes in advance, this has happened multiple times: |
| 158 | ** In 1992, Vanna White became pregnant and the production staff decided to acknowledge this by making VANNA'S PREGNANT the second puzzle of the day. She miscarried before the show aired, so the round was replaced with a behind the scenes look at the show's filming in San Francisco. |
| 159 | ** In 2001, one episode had the answer ROBERT BLAKE AS [[Series/{{Baretta}} BARETTA]]. Between taping and airing, Blake was accused of murdering his wife, so a clip was added of Pat explaining that the show was taped in advance. |
| 160 | ** December 28, 2004: Creator/DickClark was the answer to the Who Is It? puzzle AGELESS HOST OF ANNUAL NEW YEAR'S ROCKIN' EVE SPECIAL. Right before the show aired, Clark suffered a stroke, so a clip was inserted of Pat acknowledging the circumstances and giving him well wishes. |
| 161 | ** The show taped on-location in New Orleans right before Hurricane Katrina hit, canceling an entire week of episodes (the contestants appeared later in the season). Two puzzles were edited out due to their answers being deemed insensitive and replaced with clips of Pat and Vanna asking viewers to donate to relief funds; one of the puzzles, THE LOUISIANA SUPERDOME, was restored in reruns. |
| 162 | ** November 20, 2006: A Prize Puzzle whose solution was THE CROCODILE HUNTER was taped shortly before Steve Irwin's death which happened on September 4. Pat appeared in a post-production segment to say that the episode was taped in advance. |
| 163 | ** February 19, 2010: the puzzle THE TONIGHT SHOW WITH CONAN O'BRIEN was preceded by a clip of Pat acknowledging that the show taped before the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Tonight_Show_conflict conflicts between NBC and Conan]] which caused Conan to leave ''Series/TheTonightShow'' before this episode had aired. |
| 164 | ** December 2, 2013: THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS was used as a puzzle just two days after Paul Walker died. The production crew had no time to add an acknowledgement due to his death being on a Saturday and the show airing on Monday, but some affiliates ran a crawl during the round, while the show itself acknowledged the circumstances on social media. |
| 165 | ** November 13, 2015: On the same day that a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_2015_Paris_attacks series of terrorist attacks in Paris]] killed 130 people, ''Wheel's'' Prize Wedge was a trip to Paris (though it was not won). Some affiliates, including WABC-TV, pre-empted that day's ''Wheel'' with breaking news coverage (possibly intentionally due to the circumstances, as they did opt to air ''Jeopardy!'' that day), and ''Wheel's'' social media acknowledged the unfortunate coincidence and offered condolences to the victims. |
| 166 | ** "Salute to Texas" week in Season 35 was originally scheduled to air in September 2017, the same month as Hurricane Harvey. It ended up being delayed to October 2017, and Pat and Vanna acknowledged the disaster via clips at the top of the show. |
| 167 | ** Also in October 2017, the show offered a trip to Puerto Rico on an episode that aired right after hurricanes had devastated that area as well. A caption was added noting the show was taped beforehand. |
| 168 | ** The UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic caused two weeks intended to air in March and April 2020 to get delayed until August and September: the former was sponsored by Carnival Cruise Lines, and the latter offered trips to the United Kingdom from Collette Vacations. Both weeks were also supposed to have home viewer sweepstakes with their respective trips as prizes, but it was scrapped from the Collette week (though it remained on the Carnival week with emphasis that the trips could be taken until the end of 2022). For the rest of the season, any other new episodes and even some reruns were preceded by notices that they taped "prior to the national health emergency". |
| 169 | ** February 18, 2021 (''Celebrity Wheel''): An episode featuring Chris Harrison was delayed a week by swapping it with the following week's episode. This was in response to many ''Series/TheBachelor'' fans and contestants accusing Harrison of defending racism after his comments on photos of winner Rachael Kirkconnell attending a banned Antebellum South-themed ball, followed by Harrison's announcement that he would be leaving ''The Bachelor'' temporarily. When the episode aired, ABC gave it barely any promo, and they ran disclaimers stating that it was taped in December 2020. The disclaimers remain intact in international reruns. |
| 170 | ** May 10, 2023 (''Celebrity Wheel''): Mayim Bialik promoted her sitcom ''Series/CallMeKat'', whose cancellation was announced five days before the episode aired. |
| 171 | ** October 18, 2023 (''Celebrity Wheel''): An episode featuring Roy Wood Jr. was delayed twice, to October 25, then November 15, due to Wood quitting his role as ''Series/TheDailyShow'' correspondent less than two weeks prior. |
| 172 | ** Rerun periods have occasionally had to exclude, edit, or re-schedule certain episodes due to suddenly-problematic themes or puzzles: |
| 173 | *** August 25-29, 2008: Reruns of Season 25's College Week from Chicago excluded the Monday episode (#S-4846) due to the Round 3 puzzle being BERNIE MAC AND CHEESE (Before & After). Bernie Mac died of pneumonia on August 9. |
| 174 | *** September 8-12, 2014: The last week of Season 31's summer hiatus was scheduled as reruns of the celebratory "Wheel 6000" week, but the Friday episode (#S-6015) was excluded due to the Round 1 puzzle being ROBIN WILLIAMS AS MRS. DOUBTFIRE. Williams committed suicide the previous month. The episode ''was'' included in Game Show Network's rotation of Seasons 30-31. |
| 175 | *** June 29-July 3, 2020: Originally scheduled as reruns of "Great Northwest" week (featuring Fan Favorite contestant Blair Davis), it was changed to reruns of "Great American Cities: South Florida" week instead, due to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Floyd_protests_in_Seattle ongoing anti-police protests happening in Seattle at the time]]. This also impacted the Summer 2020 reruns of all the Great American Cities weeks from Seasons 33-37; the one for Seattle was scheduled last, by which point the protests had ended. "Great Northwest" week later saw some episodes rerun in the 2020-21 weekend run, and the full week is available on Pluto TV and airs on GSN. |
| 176 | *** September 18, 2021: The first Saturday repeat of Season 39 is of an October 2020 episode with a $100,000 win. This was originally the episode that introduced the CreditsGag of executive producer Mike Richards being credited as "Mike 'Confetti' Richards". On this airing, however, he was credited simply by his name. This was likely because of Richards' then-recent firing. No other $100,000+ win episodes from Richards' brief tenure reran after this point, despite such episodes normally being guaranteed to rerun (except if it's a Secret Santa episode). |
| 177 | * EarlyBirdRelease: |
| 178 | ** Although the show is not allowed to air earlier than 7:00 PM Eastern in the United States, there is a small station based in Newfoundland, Canada (CJON-TV, branded as "NTV") that airs the show at 3:30 PM Eastern. This station is accessible with IPTV, and recordings of these early broadcasts often show up on [=YouTube=] almost immediately, around 4:15 PM; many fans have resorted to watching the show this way rather than waiting for it to come on TV at least two and a half hours later. |
| 179 | ** During the short time it carried the show, CBC also aired the show hours before the U.S. Most Canadian networks have since carried it at the common 7:00 PM Eastern. |
| 180 | ** The December 9, 2013 episode aired four days early in Western Canada on CHEK, likely by accident. |
| 181 | ** Episodes #S-7477 through 7480 in November 2016 aired in Canada one day earlier than in the United States, due to the show's last-minute decision to delay those episodes not taking effect in the country, as Canadian networks were not affected by U.S. election coverage. |
| 182 | ** The November 13, 2022 episode of ''Celebrity Wheel'' aired on CTV Atlantic two hours before it aired on ABC, and three hours before the rest of the CTV network. |
| 183 | ** Season 4 of ''Celebrity Wheel'' airs on CTV one whole day before it airs on ABC. One episode (#PT-406) aired ''eight'' days early due to ABC delaying the episode's U.S. broadcast at the last minute for a ''20/20'' special on the Israel-Hamas war. |
| 184 | * EditedForSyndication: |
| 185 | ** Game Show Network's reruns of the show usually do this: |
| 186 | *** In 1989, the show held a contest where home viewers could win a chance to attend tapings at Walt Disney World later in the season. Participating stations had a special segment promoting the sweepstakes in the final segment, whereas other stations got "normal" endings. Game Show Network aired edited versions of the "contest" variants of these episodes. |
| 187 | *** The Olympics sweepstakes from spring 1996 had special puzzles that home viewers could submit to win prizes, along with Pat and Vanna plugging the sweepstakes. All of this was edited out of Game Show Network reruns (and most of the Olympic-themed episodes were excluded from said reruns entirely), thus leading to awkward cuts and abrupt endings. |
| 188 | ** In Singapore, recent episodes of the American version air on [=MediaCorp=] Channel 5. These airings remove two of the four commercial breaks, only retaining the ones after Round 2 and before the Bonus Round. Also, all promotional plugs are edited out, including plugs for the show's website. Round 1 is followed immediately by Pat announcing Round 2's category due to the removal of the first commercial break and the Mystery Round sponsor plug, although the tail end of the $10,000 wedge wipe is still sometimes intact. Since the episodes air several months after they do in North America, closing segments that discuss specific occasions such as holidays are completely omitted, cutting straight from the Bonus Round to the credits. They also air ''Celebrity Wheel'', with some banter for the celebrities edited for time or content. While SPIN ID's following $10,000 Mystery Wedge wins are edited out, they are left in on Secret Santa episodes with a disclaimer stating, "Open to U.S. Residents Only". |
| 189 | *** In accordance with Singapore broadcasting laws, almost any mention or depiction of same-sex relationships or LGBTQ+ culture in general is edited out. This has resulted in contestant interviews and Bonus Round win celebrations being butchered, and in some cases, the complete removal of a winning contestant introducing their same-sex significant other at the start of the Bonus Round. In at least one instance, this resulted in a $100,000 win being cut so short that it cut straight from Pat opening the envelope to the confetti already on the ground, and the winner's total being superimposed in a generic white Times New Roman font. Episode #PT-213 was rated [=PG13=] for "mature themes" due to featuring transgender celebrity Creator/LaverneCox. |
| 190 | ** A New York-themed week that aired the week of April 13, 2015 had different prints that aired exclusively on affiliates based in New York state, in partnership with the New York Lottery. Differences in these episodes included multiple New York Lottery logos and promos present throughout, a guaranteed New York-based SPIN ID being drawn, and an alternate closing segment preceded by a clip of then-spokeswoman Yolanda Vega promoting a then-current ''Wheel'' scratch-off game. All gameplay remained the same. A similar concept was done for a Texas-themed week that aired the week of October 9, 2017, in partnership with the Texas Lottery. |
| 191 | ** Starting in Season 35, winning the $10,000 Mystery Wedge resulted in a SPIN ID being drawn. On syndicated reruns, these are edited out usually seamlessly by cutting to alternate angles as Pat throws to commercial. Starting in Season 37, the drawings are now left intact on summer repeats (but are still edited out of Saturday repeats if applicable). A couple of episodes from Seasons 33 and 34 that reran in Summer 2020 actually ''added'' a drawing, and a 2020 episode that omitted the drawing during its original airing (blaming COVID-19) restored it during a later rerun. On Pluto TV, the drawings are cut out and masked with a white flash. |
| 192 | ** In Season 38, Pat Sajak made headlines for his "behavior" after jokingly scolding contestants on two episodes that aired closely together. When both of these episodes reran in Summer 2021, both of these moments were edited out of their respective episodes. |
| 193 | ** Reruns often replace various show plugs and bumpers with others in the same rotation. One of the most common bumpers in recent seasons is "Winners Circle", a brief segment following up on a previous contestant and what they did with their winnings. These often result in such segments involving episodes that originally aired ''after'' the episode that these were swapped into (e.g., a September 2021 rerun of an April 2020 episode had a segment on a winner from September 2020). |
| 194 | ** Reruns of 2010s and 2020s episodes on GSN, Netflix, and Pluto TV remove almost all promotional plugs, and the "Retro Bonus Round", a play-at-home feature shown after Round 2 on some of such episodes, is almost-always edited out (with only three exceptions), as well as the SPIN ID drawings and any throws to them from Pat. Anything related to home viewer sweepstakes are excised as well; one episode even removed an entire montage of an event featuring winners of a previous sweepstakes. The Secret Santa episodes in particular were very choppy, with abrupt cuts to commercial before Pat even finished bidding the losing contestants goodbye. |
| 195 | ** Hulu's copies of ''Celebrity Wheel'' in Season 1 were edited to remove any mention of entering each game's Round 2 puzzle online for a chance to win $10,000. Despite this, any reruns that air on TV (including reruns from previous seasons that air on Canadian network [=GameTV=]) still include the giveaways and all references to them, even though they expire a few days after the episode's original airing. Hulu left the episodes unedited in Season 2, but began editing them again in Season 3, with Vanna's $10,000 giveaway bumpers now removed entirely (Season 1's edits generally kept the tail end of them), and crossfades added to remove any references to the Prize Puzzle trip, including the entirety of the trip's copy, due to the trip going to a home viewer. However, they eventually gave up on this after three episodes and left them unedited again starting with the fourth. Starting in 2023, reruns on ABC have the giveaway information at the bottom of the screen replaced with a caption reading, "PREVIOUSLY BROADCAST; SWEEPSTAKES HAS ENDED", but the footage itself is still left intact. |
| 196 | ** In Seasons 38 and 39, most Tuesday episodes featured several plugs for T-Mobile, including their logo added to the Toss-Up wipes. Although these remain intact during summer reruns, Saturday repeats of these seasons generally avoid including Tuesday episodes at all. There were two exceptions to the latter; in both cases, the episode was edited to remove all T-Mobile plugs by changing the Toss-Up wipes to the regular ones, removing the logo on the left side of the category strip, and removing the verbal mention of the brand from Pat when introducing the "T-Mobile Triple Toss-Up" (one rerun edited out the name, while the other used a different take, but still retained the name in the closed captioning). A few Tuesday episodes that did not have T-Mobile plugs to begin with also managed to appear in the rerun rotation. |
| 197 | ** When Pluto TV added episodes from Seasons 20-30 (2002-2012), most of the plugs were left intact, along with the SPIN ID drawings, during which a banner was added reading: "PREVIOUSLY BROADCAST; SWEEPSTAKES HAS ENDED". Episodes from the 80's and 90's remove the fee plugs with a white flash transitioning from Pat and Vanna's signoff to the credits. Some of these copies appear to be GSN's prints, as they replace the [=KingWorld=] logo with that of Columbia Tristar Television. |
| 198 | ** On two episodes from Season 24 on Pluto TV, the "GET YOUR SPIN ID READY" graphic that appears during Prize Puzzles is blurred out. |
| 199 | * ExecutiveMeddling: |
| 200 | ** NBC president and CEO Fred Silverman rejected Pat Sajak's hiring. Although he was already employed by NBC as chief meteorologist for their Los Angeles station, KNBC-TV, Silverman was against it because he was "too local." In response, Merv Griffin imposed a moratorium on new episode tapings until Sajak was allowed to host, but Silverman refused to budge. Later on, however, Silverman was abruptly ousted at NBC for repeated instances of mismanaging the network and was replaced by Grant Tinker, who promptly permitted Sajak to host. Amusingly, Tinker previously knew Griffin when he worked at NBC as a junior programming executive in the mid-1960s and, in fact, had previously persuaded Mort Werner, NBC's then-senior vice president for programming and talent, to greenlight ''Jeopardy!'' in the first place. |
| 201 | ** Rolf Benirschke wanted to keep hosting after NBC cancelled ''Wheel'', and Merv fought for his best interests. CBS executives overruled them both; they wanted and got a new host, firing Rolf during the hiatus. |
| 202 | * FanCommunityNicknames: "Wheel Watchers". The term was coined in 1987 to go along with an ad campaign that Sajak supposedly disliked ("I'm a Wheel watcher!"), and the show created a "Wheel Watchers Club" in 2003 to make prizes and cash available to home viewers. |
| 203 | * HeAlsoDid: Just about everyone associated with the show: |
| 204 | ** Chuck Woolery was originally one-half of a psychedelic rock duo called The Avant-Garde, who hit Top 40 with "Naturally Stoned". He had a couple entries on the country music charts during his ''Wheel'' tenure. For a while he also had a series of pro-conservative videos on [=YouTube=]. |
| 205 | ** Pat Sajak has written for some conservative political blogs. He also owns two AM radio stations in Maryland. Sajak is also a fan of the [[UsefulNotes/NationalHockeyLeague NHL]]'s Washington Capitals. |
| 206 | ** Vanna White also has her own line of yarn, and recorded a Christmas CD titled ''Santa's Last Ride''. |
| 207 | ** Longtime announcer Charlie O'Donnell had previously been a sidekick to Creator/DickClark on ''Series/AmericanBandstand'' during its early years as a local series in UsefulNotes/{{Philadelphia}} and later worked in L.A. as a disc jockey and for a time was also a news anchor for KCOP-TV 13. |
| 208 | ** Jim Thornton can be heard voicing a commercial in ''WesternAnimation/MonstersInc1'' |
| 209 | * HeyItsThatSound: |
| 210 | ** The original Bonus Round timer beeps had previously been used on several unsold pilots (''Big Spenders'' in 1974, a ''Beat the Odds'' revival in '75, and ''Spell Binders'' in '78) and at least one series (the short-lived ''Series/GiveNTake'', also in '75). Of note, ''Spenders'', ''Odds'' and ''Take'' were all produced by [[Series/PressYourLuck Bill Carruthers]] (''Binders'' was instead a [[Creator/MarkGoodson Goodson-Todman]] pilot). |
| 211 | ** The original Final Spin bells were previously used as a time's-up bell on the Art Fleming version of ''Jeopardy!''. |
| 212 | ** The current "wrong letter" buzzer was recycled from ''Series/BumperStumpers''. |
| 213 | ** Any category that came with a bonus question (such as Clue, where the puzzle described an object that the contestant could then identify for a bonus) was accompanied by a set of chimes. This chime was previously used on the Wink Martindale version of ''Series/HighRollers'' when someone rolled doubles. |
| 214 | * HideYourPregnancy: A round with the puzzle VANNA'S PREGNANT had to be edited out of a 1992 episode due to her miscarriage shortly before the episode aired. |
| 215 | * InMemoriam: |
| 216 | ** Jack Clark was eulogized on both the daytime and nighttime versions. The September 2, 1988 daytime episode dedicated an entire segment to his memory, and the nighttime episode airing September 5 inserted a tribute after Round 2. |
| 217 | ** At the end of the November 5, 2010 show, Pat and Vanna paid tribute to announcer Charlie O'Donnell, who had died four days earlier. |
| 218 | ** Sadly not extended to the 40 episodes that Charlie had taped but which had yet to air, as he was overdubbed on all of them. The first of these shows aired ''the very next Monday'' after the tribute. |
| 219 | * KeepCirculatingTheTapes: |
| 220 | ** Almost all daytime episodes until sometime in 1985 were recorded over as per company policy. All three pilots and the premiere exist, as do various episodes in private collections, although Benirschke's and Goen's daytime runs haven't been rerun and are very rarely seen otherwise. An extensive, but likely not comprehensive, list of what's known to exist (and what's known to ''circulate'' from 1986-91) can be found [[http://wheeloffortunehistory.wikia.com/wiki/Daytime_episodes_known_to_exist here.]] |
| 221 | ** In 2020, one fan revealed that he recorded ''Wheel'' on VHS (and later, DVD) religiously from approximately 1997-2008, including GSN airings, and still had all of his tapes in storage. When quarantined, he began digitizing the recordings and gradually uploading them online, resulting in multiple seasons seeing the light of day again and uncovering many more bits of ''Wheel'' history that were not documented at the time. |
| 222 | ** As of now, this is no easy place to view reruns of episodes older than Season 34, nighttime or otherwise. It's clear the whole back catalog of nighttime shows remains in the hands of the producers given they show classic clips quite often, but if you actually want to watch the full episodes, your best choice tends to just be finding them on video-sharing sites, which has become increasingly difficult due to Sony taking action against such postings. |
| 223 | *** That being said, there ''are'' dozens of full episodes from the past few seasons that have managed to survive on [=YouTube=]. However, most of them are clearly posted by bots, as they are noticeably blurry and sometimes lag or skip several minutes, and often exclude the closing segment. Many of these uploads are also titled with incorrect dates, typically whatever day it was uploaded, despite being an episode from months or even years prior; some of them even include GSN reruns with the date they were recorded off that network. This makes it much harder for fans to find a particular episode. |
| 224 | ** Four episodes from Season 24 are in 4:3 standard definition on Pluto TV instead of their original 16:9 HD, suggesting their HD masters are lost. |
| 225 | ** Although ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'' can be streamed on Hulu, seasons get removed around the time the next season begins, keeping with the service's usual practice of removing previous seasons of unscripted ABC programming. |
| 226 | ** The UK version has been really bad at this in regards to this when Challenge airs it. |
| 227 | *** Originally, when Challenge acquired the rerun rights to the UK version in 2002, they only ever aired the John Leslie episodes from when the series was turned from a primetime into a daytime series, which they would air until around 2011, leaving the other episodes in limbo. |
| 228 | *** Around 2014 or 2015, Challenge acquired the Nicky Campbell-presented episodes, and later acquired Bradley Walsh's only season. However, the John Leslie seasons were not re-acquired, and are likely never going to air again after Leslie's rumoured drug issues and personal problems became true. |
| 229 | *** The Paul Hendy season (and in reality the final one) was lost for many years and hadn’t been rebroadcast since 2004, when ITV repeated that season during the Christmas period as daytime filler. That was until 2020, when out of the bloom, Challenge acquired it and rebroadcast it for the first time in many years. |
| 230 | * LiveOnStage: |
| 231 | ** A live ''Wheel'' stage show toured the United States from 1996-1999, mostly stopping at county and state fairs, and was later housed at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas from 1999-2000. It was hosted by the likes of Michael Burger, Bob Eubanks, and Creator/ErikEstrada. Contestants were picked randomly from the audience and the game was scored in points, with flat cash prizes for winners. |
| 232 | ** Another ''Wheel of Fortune Live!'' tour began in 2022, produced by Right Angle Entertainment (which also produces ''The Price is Right Live!''). Hosts include Mark L. Walberg, Music/ClayAiken, and former daytime ''Wheel'' host Bob Goen. This version of the tour follows a tournament format culminating in a championship game, which places all top point value wedges on the Wheel at once. The new tour also includes the Surprise wedge, which the actual show retired in 1998. |
| 233 | ** Norwegian Cruise Line introduced ''Wheel of Fortune Interactive'' in 2023. This is very similar to the concurrent traveling stage show, but audience members use a smartphone app to play the game from their seat and earn their way up on stage. This show also does not use a physical Wheel replica; contestants instead spin a computerized Wheel using a large lever (similar to ''Series/TheJokersWild''). Unlike ''Wheel of Fortune Live!'', the game is scored in dollars (obviously lower figures than the TV show). |
| 234 | ** Despite the show's short run, there was also a ''Wheel 2000'' tour in 1997, sponsored by now-defunct Bravo Card. As with the TV show, the game was scored in points. The highest scoring contestant of each stop earned a chance to appear as a contestant on the TV show. David Sidoni reprised his role as host, though Cyber Lucy was not involved due to the puzzle board being a physical trilon board. |
| 235 | * LongRunners: ''Wheel'', counting daytime and nighttime as one series, has run for over 40 years without interruption, placing it second behind only ''Series/ThePriceIsRight'' for the longest-running game show currently on the air. Even counting only the nighttime seasons, it's still second only to ''Price''. |
| 236 | ** The Wheel itself has racked up quite a lot of mileage: with 4,215 daytime shows and close to 8,000 nighttime shows, this comes out to a shade over '''12,000''' episodes. |
| 237 | * MarathonRunning: |
| 238 | ** On August 18, 2007, in tribute to Merv Griffin, Game Show Network ran a five-hour marathon of ''Wheel'', consisting of three episodes of the daytime show (the first and only time any episodes from that series have rerun since its cancellation), and seven from various years of the nighttime show, including its premiere. |
| 239 | ** On November 26, 2010, GSN aired a six-hour marathon of ''Wheel'', consisting of episodes from 2006-07. This was unusual, as the show's regular reruns had been dropped 10 months prior, and the reason or occasion for the marathon was never stated. However, some fans believe that it was done in tribute to Charlie O'Donnell, who passed away earlier in the month. |
| 240 | ** On January 1, 2018, GSN aired a six-hour ''Wheel'' marathon to celebrate New Year's, consisting of Season 31's New Year's-themed week and other winter-themed episodes from that season, all of which were already in the rotation airing regularly on the network at the time. |
| 241 | ** On February 4, 2021, ABC aired a "Wheel-a-Thon" of three episodes of ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune''. All of them were repeats, but the $10,000 giveaway was still valid for the night. In many markets, this was technically a three-and-a-half-hour marathon of ''Wheel'', as much of the country (including all but one of ABC's O&O stations) receives the syndicated ''Wheel'' on ABC affiliates at 7:30 PM Eastern/Pacific, leading into ABC primetime. |
| 242 | * MarketBasedTitle: Some of the exported versions do not follow the original name ''at all'', making them harder to find online. For example, Malaysia's version is known as ''Roda Impian'' (lit. ''Wheel of Desire'') instead. |
| 243 | * MissingEpisode: |
| 244 | ** Game Show Network excluded a small handful of episodes during its various leases of ''Wheel'', mostly for unknown reasons: |
| 245 | *** Season 2 (1984-85): About six episodes (air dates and production numbers unknown) were skipped. |
| 246 | *** Season 6 (1988-89): #S-1130 (air date unknown) and #S-1153 (May 17, College Week). |
| 247 | *** Season 7 (1989-90): June 11 and 13 (#S-1361 and 1363). |
| 248 | *** Season 13 (1995-96): April 22-26, May 3, June 3-7, and July 15-18 (#S-2496-2500, 2505, and 2526-2534). All but the June episodes were taped on location in Atlanta, leaving only 4 of the 14 episodes taped there in GSN's rotation at the time. |
| 249 | *** Season 14 (1996-97): September 9, November 12-14, and February 12 (#S-2541, 2587-2589, and 2648). The November episodes were taped on location in San Francisco, and the February one in Phoenix. #S-2541's puzzles are accounted for from an original airing recap, and an original recording of 2588 circulates among fans. One fan has a childhood photo of a TV showing either 2587 or 2589 with a seven-word Headline puzzle (likely ATLANTA BRAVES RETURN TO THE WORLD SERIES) not accounted for in the other San Francisco episodes. |
| 250 | *** Season 31 (2013-14): November 4 and March 10-14 (#S-5886 and 5976-5980). To allow for a full season's worth of episodes in this lease, these six episodes were replaced with the last six episodes of Season 30 (June 7-14, 2013; #S-5845-5850). No other portion of Season 30 has ever rerun on GSN to date. |
| 251 | ** Season 13 apparently only had 194 episodes instead of the customary 195, skipping production code #S-2535. The four-day season finale week comprised a tournament of Olympic athletes taped on location in Atlanta. Most tournaments at the time wrapped on Fridays, but this one is known to have wrapped on Thursday, July 18. Press material confirms that ''Wheel'' taped only 14 episodes in Atlanta instead of the expected 15 (or any multiple of five, making them full five-day weeks). Game Show Network never aired ''any'' July 1996 episodes in its Season 13 rotation. Not having a new episode for Friday, July 19 would have likely been due to expected pre-emptions for the 1996 Olympics opening ceremonies. Also supporting this is the fact that the most recent episode taped in Culver City featured a contestant winning her second day, and she returned for her third and final day in early Season 14 (being the final champion under the three-day rule). It is known that ''Jeopardy!'' also held a four-day tournament from July 15-18, and ''did'' air a new, regular episode (#2755) on Friday the 19th, serving as its season finale. Assuming Season 13 is only 194 episodes, it would mean ''Wheel's'' episode count has been off by at least 1 ever since, since the Season 14 premiere is known to be #S-2536 regardless of whether any episode for 2535 exists or not. As of 2022, the count is now off by 44, due to several production numbers being skipped following taping cancellations and rescheduled air dates during Pat's medical emergency and the COVID-19 pandemic, or by 43 if #S-2535 somehow does exist. |
| 252 | ** A home recording of a November 1996 episode of ''Jeopardy!'' as aired on San Francisco affiliate KGO-TV contains a snippet of a promo for "Celebrity ''Wheel of Fortune'' in San Francisco". While ''Wheel'' was airing episodes taped in that city at the time, none of them were celebrity episodes. According to one recollection, this was a special episode produced exclusively for KGO, with Creator/MelissaJoanHart as one of the contestants. Hart's recollections have somewhat supported this with her claims that she had competed ''Wheel'' long before her appearance on the ABC primetime series in 2021, but she could not remember what year it was. When she inquired about her supposed prior appearance while on set for her 2021 appearance, staff could not find any evidence of it. Regardless, assuming KGO aired exclusive episodes, they are not officially counted by the show itself. |
| 253 | ** The September 11, 2001 episode (#S-3517) was unable to be archived by fans for obvious reasons, and it is not known to have rerun anywhere in the United States (although it likely did air on [=MediaCorp=] Channel 5 in Singapore, which aired Season 19 delayed by a few months). It was even pre-empted on independent stations airing the show, such as WLNY-TV in New York, which simulcasted CNN's coverage of the attacks. One of the contestants from this episode stated years later that she never got to see it, but did receive her winnings. Many years later, it was discovered that WJLA-TV in Washington, DC aired this episode, followed immediately by #S-3518 and 3519, on the night of Saturday, September 15 at 11:30 PM, and is preserved on the Internet Archive's 9/11 TV Time Capsule in one-minute chunks, although the program titles are incorrect, likely because making up the episodes in this fashion was a last-minute decision. |
| 254 | ** On November 12, 2016, for the only time in show history, a new episode (#S-6480) aired on a Saturday due to a last-minute decision to slide back the Tuesday-Friday shows of the week in anticipation of Election Day pre-emptions, with Tuesday featuring memorable contestant Brenda Gallagher. On that Saturday, ABC, CBS, and NBC all had college football games scheduled until 7:00 PM Eastern, with ''Wheel'' mostly scheduled at its typical 7:00 or 7:30. NBC's game was the only one that ended on time, allowing ''Wheel'' to air in its entirety on most of its affiliates. Most East Coast CBS airings were joined in progress by Round 3, and many ABC airings didn't air at all because of their game running past 7:30 (many stations such as WABC-TV in New York ran local news after the game until 8:00 PM instead of a partial ''Wheel''), and any that ''did'' air were joined in progress around Round 2. FOX airings were pre-empted outright since their game ''began'' at 7:00, though some affiliates moved it to air before the game. Several other affiliates do not air ''Wheel'' on weekends at all during the college football season, or they air it on different stations, or in other time slots (mostly overnight) to accommodate local news after the games (e.g., WOIO in Cleveland aired the episode at 11:35 PM). It also didn't help that most program guides still listed the airing as the previous season rerun that would normally air on a Saturday, so many fans and archivists were unable to record the episode, or were unaware of it being new. It never reran, but the majority of it (minus the $1,000 Toss-Up and part of the interviews) was posted on [=YouTube=] by one of the contestants whose affiliate did air it, and in August 2022, it was among the first batch of episodes added to Pluto TV. |
| 255 | ** The February 4, 2020 episode (#S-7127) erroneously skips over Round 3 on streaming services. It was likely accidentally cut while editing out the commercial break placeholders, resulting in the episode running only about 15 minutes without ads. When aired on Pluto TV, the ad breaks are longer to compensate. GSN, whose 2023-24 rotation consists of episodes only from the streaming packages, skips this episode entirely. The only known circulating copy of the full episode is a recording of a June 2020 rerun from KETV with a severe weather crawl on top of the screen throughout. |
| 256 | ** Most of the episodes available on Netflix, Pluto TV, and GSN's 2023-24 rotation are packaged by their full theme week, though some weeks only have one or two episodes available. In the most egregious example, Season 37's College Week Spring Break week excludes its Tuesday episode (#S-7157) despite not only having the week's only Bonus Round win, but also featuring ''Wheel'' superfan Christian Dixie, who even returned for Fan Favorites week. The episode did rerun in syndication in March 2021, however. |
| 257 | ** Due to several episodes in Season 37 changing air dates, or being cancelled altogether due to a combination of Pat's emergency surgery and the COVID-19 pandemic, a total of 43 EpisodeCodeNumbers were skipped, with no actual episodes existing for them: #S-7096-7100, 7166-7170, 7176-7180, 7191-7206, 7208, and 7210-7220. The two August weeks mentioned above were given numbers 7221-7230, and Season 38 started with 7231. |
| 258 | ** The several weeks of reruns between Seasons 37 and 38 excluded some individual episodes from the rest of their weeks, including an episode from November 2018 that mentioned airing on Election Day, and a May 2016 episode that was pulled at the last minute to avoid having to add a SPIN ID following a $10,000 Mystery Wedge win. One of the excluded episodes (#S-6842 from Season 36) later appeared on Netflix, Pluto TV, and GSN along with the rest of its week. |
| 259 | ** The April 14, 2021 episode (#S-7383) is excluded from rerunning for unknown reasons. It was not included with the rest of its week when it appeared in summer reruns the following September. The episode was initially planned for a Saturday repeat in June 2022, but was pulled at the last minute and replaced with a third airing of #S-7385 from that same week. |
| 260 | ** While nearly all of the episodes that were available on Netflix carried over to Pluto TV, four did not: #S-6725 (January 19, 2018), #S-7136 and 7137 (February 17-18, 2020), and #S-7143 (February 26, 2020). The latter three also do not air on GSN, though #S-6725 does. |
| 261 | ** Several episodes from Season 40 were removed from their respective weeks during summer reruns: |
| 262 | *** September 16, 2022 (#S-7625) generated controversy over the Round 1 puzzle EENIE MEENIE MINY MOE CATCH A TIGER BY THE TOE, a rhyme with a once-popular variant that used a racial slur. |
| 263 | *** September 21, 2022 (#S-7628) saw the media get into a similar frenzy over the "inappropriate" Round 1 puzzle WARM WET & WILD (intended to tie into the week's theme, California Coast). This episode had the first appearance of contestant Tanino Privitera, who returned for Fan Favorites week. |
| 264 | *** March 9, 2023 (#S-7749) possibly due to the media shaming Pat for poking fun at a contestant's irrational fear of fish by pulling out a toy fish towards the end of the show. |
| 265 | *** March 16, 2023 (#S-7754) for unknown reasons. The original airing was pre-empted on CBS affiliates by March Madness, resulting in some viewers never seeing this episode. |
| 266 | *** April 28, 2023 (#S-7785) for unknown reasons. Similar to the above, the original and only airing of this episode was pre-empted on ABC affiliates by the NFL Draft. |
| 267 | *** May 4, 2023 (#S-7789) possibly due to a disappointing Round 3 where an incorrect U purchase resulted in the loss of over $25,000 and the Million Dollar Wedge. |
| 268 | ** At least three episodes had entire puzzles edited out despite being played: |
| 269 | *** On November 2, 1992, they edited out the Round 2 puzzle VANNA'S PREGNANT because she miscarried between taping and airing. Viewers instead saw a three-minute spiel on San Francisco (where they were taping at the time) narrated by Charlie. It ended with a post-production shot of Pat standing at the puzzle board, announcing that a contestant won $1,350 that round. |
| 270 | *** After Hurricane Katrina hit, two episodes that taped in New Orleans and aired in November 2005 each had one puzzle edited out because it was thought that the answers might be insensitive to hurricane survivors. In their place were clips of Pat and Vanna asking for Red Cross donations. When the episodes reran the next summer, one puzzle was restored, but the other was replaced with a clip of Pat and Vanna thanking those who donated. |
| 271 | *** Katrina also caused another type of missing episode. They were supposed to tape a family week in New Orleans, but had to cancel it because of the hurricane. The contestants who were supposed to show up on that week ended up appearing on a week of episodes taped in Culver City later in the season. |
| 272 | *** There are possibly other episodes where puzzles were edited out and replaced. These were usually due to technical glitches that happen during gameplay of that particular puzzle or an inadvertently revealed solution (partial or full). The announcer will give a disclaimer at the show's end if said incident occurred. |
| 273 | *** In TheNewTens, there are usually two giveaways as to a puzzle being replaced: 1.) if the first Toss-Up does not follow the pattern of matching the week's theme (for instance, THE SKY'S THE LIMIT was the first Toss-Up on an episode with the traveling theme of ''Wheel'' Across America in March 2014; this was because the original puzzle REST AREA, which more closely fit the theme, was thrown out due to none of the contestants ringing in before the last letter came up), or 2.) if a category is used twice within the main game. |
| 274 | ** In April 2012, between production of Seasons 29 and 30, the show taped a series of "Lottery Experience" episodes for people who had won the chance to be on the show through a special ''Wheel''-themed lottery ticket in certain states. Although never intended to air, DVD copies were given to the contestants, and the first episode, with production code #MDI-1, was uploaded on Website/YouTube in April 2014 by one of the contestants' relatives (although it was [[KeepCirculatingTheTapes later taken down]]). Four more lottery episodes were taped during Season 34, and all of them were quietly leaked online as well (though only fan-written recaps plus a highlight reel can be viewed publicly). |
| 275 | ** In Singapore, [=MediaCorp=] Channel 5 initially skipped over episode #PT-203 (October 10, 2021, featuring Donny Osmond, Creator/JeffGarlin, and Creator/AmberRiley) when airing Season 2 of ''Celebrity Wheel'', possibly due to Jeff Garlin's obnoxious LargeHam behavior throughout the episode in relation to his eventual firing from ''Series/TheGoldbergs'', which he promoted during the episode. They eventually burned it off in a late night time slot three months after the rest of the season had aired. |
| 276 | ** Australian streaming service Binge offers every episode of the first three seasons of ''Celebrity Wheel'' with the exception of episode #PT-311 (Vanna White vs. Mayim Bialik vs. Ken Jennings). It is not known why it is excluded, since the service also has Season 1 of ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' and Season 39 of the syndicated ''Jeopardy!'' |
| 277 | * NoBudget: Both daytime Wheel and the syndicated version have shown signs of budget problems. |
| 278 | ** Daytime ''Wheel'' became very cheap after moving to CBS in July 1989, abandoning shopping in favor of the "play for cash" format of the syndicated version. Rounds 1-2 had $50 and $75 return to the Wheel, and the top value in Round 4 was $1,250; the cost of vowels was lowered to $200 and then $100 to compensate. Bonus round prizes included subcompact cars and $5,000 cash, compared to nighttime prizes that rarely dipped below $20,000. To be fair, they got better: $50 and $75 were gone between August 24 and September 18, and larger prizes began to be offered. |
| 279 | ** An early Season 1 syndicated episode had a very paltry (announced) $55,000 prize budget, which was about in the upper range of normal for the daytime show in late Summer 1983. A puzzle solver named Cindy took the show for $25,100 after she landed on $5,000 three times and solved "THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA" with still a good portion of the puzzle unrevealed … and given her luck, had she continued (by landing on $5,000 again) she could easily have won virtually every prize available on that day's show. Although there was at least one llate- show that had just $66,000 available, the prize budget was never that low again, with – by early in Season 2 – a majority of shows topping $100,000, and just about every one of the rest topping $90,000. |
| 280 | ** In the syndicated version, the top-dollar value has been made harder to access over time. |
| 281 | *** In Season 20, the second Bankrupt wedge was placed beside $3,500 in Round 3 while room was made for the Mystery wedges. |
| 282 | *** In Season 25, the same applies to Round 2, although this was no longer the case for the Jackpot wedge, which was retired in Season 31. An inversion occurred where it was swapped out for the new Express wedge, which allows contestants to keep calling letters in rapid-fire sequence without spinning again to rack up a quick amount of money and accelerate gameplay. |
| 283 | *** In Season 27, the second Bankrupt became permanent, making the $2,500 and $5,000 wedges harder to access. |
| 284 | ** For roughly half its life, the Jackpot Wedge was adjacent to Bankrupt. In Season 27, the wedge was moved to Round 1, further reducing the value of potential wins. The Jackpot Round was finally retired in Season 31 after its high win rate the previous season. |
| 285 | ** The decline in road shows. Themed episodes, such as Vegas and Disney, were at one point taped on location but since the early 2010s, they have been produced at home base with stripped down sets. ''Wheel'' had produced road shows at least once a year since Season 9 but stopped after Season 32, with one exception in Season 35 that was mostly, if not entirely paid for by Disney. |
| 286 | ** In Season 33, the ½ Car tags were removed from Round 1 after the ½ Car had a high win rate the previous season. They also stopped appearing on weeks with married couples until Season 36. The tags were removed permanently in Season 37. |
| 287 | ** The show stopped giving out the $50,000 cash award to Sony Rewards card holders in Season 29. In Season 30, they switched to awarding a flat $5,000 to SPIN ID members, referred to as "$5K Every Day". |
| 288 | ** From about the mid-2000s onward, the bonus round has become increasingly contrived and often seems set up with an obscure answer that would be nearly impossible for anyone to figure out. Many have speculated that the tougher bonus puzzles are a means of budget control. |
| 289 | ** In Season 34, $5K Every Day was dropped, leaving SPIN ID drawings only for special occasions such as the annual Secret Santa Sweepstakes until Season 35 when the drawings were used for when the $10,000 Mystery Wedge is flipped during the Mystery Round. |
| 290 | ** Also in Season 34, the number of car envelopes in the Bonus Wheel majorly increased to counter the overabundance of the cash minimum envelopes. To balance this, the cars were much cheaper than previous seasons, most being lower in value than the cash minimum. Some of them were even less than $30,000, which was the cash minimum from Seasons 28-31, after which they began the "season number times $1,000" tradition. |
| 291 | ** After the first few weeks of a new season, the Bonus Round category list tends to mostly contain either Thing(s), Phrase, What Are You Doing?, and/or Living Thing(s), as all of these categories' puzzles are most likely to be lost. |
| 292 | ** Overall, it seems these budget problems go through cycles depending on how much money they give away prior. Interestingly, despite this, the Prize Puzzle is still a regular element on the show, and the minimum value of the prizes continues to increase every few seasons. Currently, the bare minimum is $7,000, although the trips offered through the Prize Puzzle are rarely this low. |
| 293 | ** Season 37 has several cases of budget-shaving measures, including: |
| 294 | *** The aforementioned removal of the ½ Car prize tags. |
| 295 | *** The Triple Toss-Up round played before Round 4, a measure responsible for greatly reducing the likelihood $5,000 spins. |
| 296 | * OneBookAuthor: The only TV role for Rolf Benirschke. |
| 297 | * OrphanedReference: Typically, the producers will edit out a cycle of turns if it had no effect on the score or puzzle (e.g., a cycle consisting of only wrong consonants, Lose A Turn, and/or Bankrupt if it doesn't take away any money or cardboard). These are usually termed "null cycles" by the fandom. However, reference to edited-out turns often stay in the episode, usually by Pat sounding annoyed after further aired lost turns or saying "There you go" when someone finally lights up a letter. Sometimes, promos will even showcase these lost turns despite them not airing in the final episode. After the fandom began to notice these edits, the show began occasionally leaving them intact if time permits. While many fans of the show have expressed desire of having an onscreen Used Letter Board to make playing at home easier, this practice makes it impractical. |
| 298 | ** This is more obvious when such a cycle starts off the round. In this case, the contestant will give the first actual spin of the round where they lost their cut turn and the overhead shot will JumpCut to a different part of the Wheel being landed on, where they will call their first aired letter, similar to the edits done when Pat lands on Bankrupt, Lose A Turn, or Free Play on the Final Spin. |
| 299 | ** Cycles also become evident if the puzzle does not contain popular consonants such as T, N, S, or R ''and'' most of said letters were not shown being called, hence why it seemed like the contestants were calling less popular consonants such as H, L, or C earlier than usual. |
| 300 | ** There have also been cases in which a cycles of turns was edited out despite it affecting the score (such as an incorrect vowel or a Bankrupt resulting in a loss). In both cases, Pat has made reference to such edited-out turns. |
| 301 | ** On at least one occasion, the turns were spliced incorrectly, resulting in the contestant spinning a regular cash wedge, then suddenly picking up the Wild Card after calling a letter on that same turn as aired. |
| 302 | ** A major discrepancy in score on the March 15, 2023 episode was the result of such an edit. During Round 3, the blue contestant started off with two consonants on $3,500 and a vowel, totaling $6,750, then lost her turn to a bad consonant. When control returned to her, her score was suddenly back to $0 and Pat mentioned that she "got some money back". She went on to win that round, then lost the game by $5,651. A fan who was present at the taping confirmed that she lost the $6,750 to a Bankrupt following two incorrect consonants from the red and yellow players. This was corrected on a rerun of the episode, where it was re-edited to instead edit out everyone's bad consonants and allow the Bankrupt to be aired without causing any discrepancy. |
| 303 | ** On at least two occasions, a correct letter call was edited out, either by mistake or with hope that [[ViewersAreMorons viewers wouldn't notice]]: |
| 304 | *** September 6, 2004: In the puzzle LATHER RINSE REPEAT, a contestant calls the P on one of the Gift Tags. This one was more obvious in that she ended up solving the puzzle, and was clearly seen holding both of the Gift Tags when she solved. |
| 305 | *** October 14, 2008: In the puzzle TORONTO'S SPECTACULAR SKYLINE, a contestant buys the U. The letter randomly appeared in the puzzle despite not being there on the previously-aired turn, and the contestant's score was $250 less than the aired turns would have indicated when control passed to the next contestant. |
| 306 | *** January 26, 2023: In the Speed-Up puzzle VICTORY PARADE, after a jump cut to Pat to mask the editing of three turns, the D is suddenly on the board and the blue contestant's score is higher by one consonant's value. |
| 307 | ** Sometimes, a cut cycle included a wrong letter that would be repeated in an aired turn, leading to Pat saying it was called even though by broadcast it was not: |
| 308 | *** September 11, 1997: A contestant's bad vowel purchase is edited out, resulting in a $250 discrepancy in her score. Later in the same round, she is said to have repeated an A despite it not being called on-air. |
| 309 | *** May 8, 2008: On the fourth aired turn of Round 1, the red team is said to have repeated a T with the only aired calls being N and M. |
| 310 | *** March 28, 2013: On the fifth aired turn of Round 1, the red contestant is said to have repeated an S with the only aired calls being A, T, and E. |
| 311 | *** October 15, 2013: A contestant's bad vowel purchase is edited out, as first seen by her scoreboard reading $950 after finding two consonants on $600. Later on, said contestant loses her turn by buying O at a point when I was the only vowel that was not revealed in the puzzle CRISP CHILLED CUCUMBERS. Pat references the lost turn indirectly by saying that the contestant had "two choices" upon buying O, even though home viewers never saw A get bought. |
| 312 | *** May 13, 2015: A contestant calls D in the Speed-Up. Pat tells her that it has already been called, even though the first call was edited out. |
| 313 | *** December 2, 2015: Two contestants in a row lose their turn by calling letters that were already called (L and N), even though the original calls were edited out. Bizarrely, the next turn was ''also'' an incorrect letter, meaning that this string of turns could itself have been edited out but was not. |
| 314 | ** Back when the Jackpot Wedge was around, sometimes sudden jumps in the Jackpot's total from cut spins would give away cycles, though most of the time, the total was adjusted in post-production to disregard any unaired turns, though if it ended up being won, the cycle was left in. |
| 315 | ** October 21, 2013: At the end of one round, Pat tells the contestants, "We'd like to make the Bankrupts disappear, right?" even though no one actually hit Bankrupt on-air. This is because the round started with three consecutive Bankrupts which were edited out as they did not affect the outcome. |
| 316 | ** March 6, 2014: Six consecutive wrong letters are called in Round 4, and all of them are edited out. However, two of them are wrong vowels from the same player. As a result, his scoreboard displays $500 less than what he should have from the aired turns. Also, another contestant says "Third time's the charm" even though it is only her first ''aired'' turn. |
| 317 | ** March 23, 2016: Round 2 is a stingy Same Letter puzzle of MOVIE & MUSIC MOGULS; of the seven unique consonants, only one is popular. The first spin looks like it's about to land on one of the Bankrupts on the Million Dollar Wedge, but lands elsewhere, and the contestant gasps in shock when the S she calls is in the puzzle. As aired, the only lost turn of the round was an incorrect A. In reality, there were ''six'' lost turns in a row before said S call. |
| 318 | ** June 30, 2021: A repeat of the November 25, 2020 episode, which became infamous for Pat yelling at an "ungrateful" contestant after he questioned a CrosswordPuzzle with the word combination "kitchen oven". This airing edited out Pat's yelling, but still left in Pat saying towards end of the show, "I'm sorry I yelled at you." |
| 319 | ** The MediaNotes/ClosedCaptioning is done before the final editing, sometimes resulting in the captions showing lines that ended up being edited out, such as one October 2020 contestant proclaiming, "I don't even need a car, but I'll take it." after winning one. |
| 320 | ** The Hulu edits of ''Celebrity Wheel'' still have Pat mentioning that the first game's Round 3 is a Prize Puzzle and that a trip will be awarded to a home viewer, but all other mentions of the trip are removed, meaning the episodes skip straight from the solved puzzle to Pat tallying the first game's final scores. |
| 321 | * TheOtherMarty: |
| 322 | ** 40 episodes of Charlie announcing aired after his death. They were dubbed over in favor of the rotating pool of guest announcers [[note]](Lora Cain, Joe Cipriano, John Cramer, Rich Fields, Johnny Gilbert, and Jim Thornton)[[/note]] because "it would have been too sad to hear Charlie's voice so close to his death". |
| 323 | ** Then it happened again when Jim Thornton was chosen as the permanent announcer. All reruns with the other guest announcers were dubbed over with his voice. |
| 324 | ** Throughout Season 30, most of the episodes opened with clips from previous episodes. One such outtake came from the opening of a March 2011 episode, done while John Cramer was still the guest announcer... but the clip overdubbed him with Jim, presumably to avoid paying royalties to him and/or to cover up the fact that the show had other announcers. |
| 325 | * OutOfHolidayEpisode: |
| 326 | ** When the show does Halloween week, the Halloween celebrations do not necessarily end after October 31. The theme will often continue through to Friday even if crossing into November. In Season 31, the sixth episode (see below) of the Halloween taping aired Monday, November 4, with Pat joking about the out-of-date decorations throughout the episode. |
| 327 | ** Season 31 had several weeks themed after holidays: Halloween week, several Christmas weeks, New Year's week, two Valentine's Day weeks, Mother's Day week, and Father's Day week. When Game Show Network acquired reruns of the majority of the season (which they aired from 2016-19), these weeks were often held to air during the appropriate holidays. By mid-2018, all of these weeks began airing out of season mixed in with the other episodes. |
| 328 | ** In Season 35, the week of December 25-29 reran the following summer due to its Hawaiian theme, despite several comments and puzzles about Christmas on the Monday show. |
| 329 | ** Season 36 did not have a Halloween week, but Vanna still donned an orange dress on the October 31 episode and wished viewers a Happy Halloween at the end of the show. This episode reran in September 2019, still with the Halloween references. |
| 330 | * OutOfOrder: Done since at least 1983. |
| 331 | ** Until returning champions were introduced in Season 7, the nighttime version often aired out of order, with air dates often undetermined at the time of taping. This was done so that consecutive episodes would not feature the same prizes. Game Show Network's reruns of episodes from the first six seasons were run in production order, and Pluto TV's catalogue solely labels the episodes by their production numbers, unlike episodes from the 21st century, which are also labeled with their original air dates. |
| 332 | ** Starting in 2001, the show extended taping sessions to six episodes, and compiled the sixth episodes into various weeks throughout the season. This often means that sixth-episode weeks will have different set pieces every day, and it formerly led to such oddities as a Teen Best Friends episode airing in the middle of the week. |
| 333 | ** The "sixth episode" variant became particularly obvious in Season 29 because the ½ Kia tags were introduced one week into the season, and the Mystery Round moved from Round 3 to Round 2 on the fifth week. However, a few episodes throughout the season were taped before one or both changes, resulting in a few episodes (including all six Halloween shows) where the Mystery Round reverted to Round 3, and a stray episode on December 5, 2011 without the ½ Kia tags. The Halloween week (the first taping session of the season) opted for ½ Car tags offering a Ford Fiesta, despite being taped only a day before the first ''aired'' week with the ½ Kia tags. Even more strangely, the first two episodes of the latter week didn't offer $500 per consonant along with the tag, even though Halloween Week did. |
| 334 | ** It was in full effect with ''Wheel 2000'' but in comparison to fellow "Think CBS Kids" series ''Series/TheWeirdAlShow'', it was a lot less noticeable. |
| 335 | ** ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'' quite obviously arranges its episodes such that the biggest wins, including any episodes in which both Bonus Rounds are won, air first, rather than airing them mostly in the order taped. Episodes where both Bonus Rounds are lost are often grouped to air in the second half of the season. In Season 1, only 5 out of 16 Bonus Rounds were won, with all but one of them airing in the first half of the season, and the only double-win episode was the series premiere. |
| 336 | ** In Pluto TV's rotation, Pat's first episode is placed under Season 10, and Vanna's debut under Season 11, due to the syndicated series' equivalents of their daytime production numbers (#1768 and #2016, respectively) falling during those seasons. These are currently the only daytime episodes in the rotation. |
| 337 | ** Any episodes added to Pluto TV starting in 2024 now have their episode numbers listed using a different numbering system of "XXYYY" (X being the season and Y being the episode within that season ranging from 001-195, making the Season 24 premiere, for example, being numbered Season 24, Episode 24001). Because of this, since these episodes have numbers that are much larger than their production numbers, which were used in previous batches, they are listed as the last episodes of their respective seasons, and they air in this order on the live channel as well. |
| 338 | ** Episodes #S-7186-7190 from Season 37 (Great American Cities: The San Francisco Bay Area, aired April 27-May 1, 2020) are erroneously listed on Pluto TV as episodes #S-6621-6625 from Season 34 (aired May 29-June 2, 2017), and are placed under that season. |
| 339 | * OutlivedItsCreator: The show has continued to run long after Merv Griffin's death in 2007 from prostate cancer. |
| 340 | * PermanentPlaceholder: [[https://twitter.com/PatOnWheel/status/1493666863212945410 According to Pat,]] the final round being called the "Bonus Round" is this. They initially intended to give it a "more clever name" in his words with that merely being a placeholder name, but they never came up with one and it has been called that ever since. |
| 341 | * ThePeteBest: Unless you're an older fan, you probably don't know that the show was originally hosted by Chuck Woolery and Susan Stafford. Chuck is a strange zig-zag of this trope, as he is well-known by even younger fans for hosting ''Series/{{Scrabble}}'', ''Series/LoveConnection'', and ''Series/{{Lingo}}'' among other shows, but his ''Wheel'' tenure is comparatively lesser-known. |
| 342 | * PopCultureUrbanLegends: |
| 343 | ** Fans have circulated rumors about the old trilon-based puzzle board finding a home at the Smithsonian Institution. The board was actually rejected due to its size and is now "gone" according to Pat. The only surviving prop from it is a "W" slide on display at the Sony Studios' Wheel Hall of Fame. |
| 344 | ** It was rumored that Creator/WilliamShatner left a CelebrityEdition mid-episode in the late 1990s due to throwing a temper tantrum over his poor performance. However, upon being asked about this by a fan on Twitter, Pat replied that Shatner had to leave because the taping had run unusually long and created a scheduling conflict. Furthermore, when the episode was uploaded online in 2021, Shatner was shown to be in a pleasant mood despite having no score at the time. |
| 345 | * PromotedFanboy: Vanna White was a huge fan of ''Wheel'' and, before being chosen to replace Susan Stafford, wrote in to be a contestant. |
| 346 | * PropRecycling: |
| 347 | ** At least one Hollywood-themed week in May 1998 used neon palm trees and a giant 'HOLLYWOOD' sign taken from the short-lived 1992 CBS game show ''The Hollywood Game'' |
| 348 | ** The Jackpot design introduced in Season 26 was recycled from the previous season's later Big Money Wedge. |
| 349 | ** In 2005, some shows taped on location in Las Vegas had a giant slot machine prop behind the contestants, with video walls for each tumbler. The prop was recycled in 2006 for an unsold revival {{pilot}} of ''Series/TheJokersWild''. |
| 350 | * RealSongThemeTune: |
| 351 | ** The 1973 pilot used an instrumental version of "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang", while the 1974 pilots used "Give It One" by Maynard Ferguson. |
| 352 | ** The Atlanta 1996 UsefulNotes/OlympicGames specials used pieces from Music/JohnWilliams' "Summon the Heroes", the official theme of the Games (and later one of NBC's sub-themes). |
| 353 | * ScheduleSlip: |
| 354 | ** The daytime version did not air at all for two weeks in 1989 while moving from NBC to CBS. |
| 355 | ** Season 37 resulted in the first instance of mid-season reruns in the 21st century for two reasons: |
| 356 | *** Due to Pat Sajak's emergency surgery, which took place on the scheduled taping day for the first of the two Disney Secret Santa weeks, said taping was delayed a few days, and the first scheduled taping after Secret Santa (for a holiday-themed week to air December 23-27, 2019) was cancelled entirely. Without a proper Christmas week taped for the season, reruns from Season 36's Christmas week were aired instead, with special introductions from Pat acknowledging that they're reruns (or "evergreen shows" in his words). |
| 357 | *** Two travel-themed weeks were pulled due to the COVID-19 Pandemic and, again, replaced with reruns from Season 36. The first was the week of March 30, 2020, designated "Carnival Week of Fun!", and the second was the week of April 13: "UK Getaway". The former did not air until the week of August 31, 2020 (with Carnival's operations still on hold at the time), and the latter not until the week of August 3. This resulted in the first instance of new syndicated episodes airing in the month of August. On ABC's O&O stations, both weeks' slots were pre-empted entirely with rebroadcasts of ''ABC World News Tonight''; according to WTVD, this decision was made specifically due to ''Wheel'' pulling the new episodes and scheduling repeats. |
| 358 | *** With Season 37's production being forced to end prematurely, the final America's Game week only had two episodes taped out of the planned five, one of which was from the set of Carnival Week of Fun! Both ended up not airing until September 8 and 10, 2020 (the week before Season 38 premiered), alternating with reruns of other America's Game episodes. No new episodes were aired between May 1 and August 3, 2020. |
| 359 | *** ''Celebrity Wheel'' saw this during its fourth season. On October 11, 2023, the show was bumped off ABC's schedule at the last minute and ''The $100,000 Pyramid'' was moved to its time slot to accommodate a special on the Israel-Hamas war. Since this series airs a day early in Canada, the week's episode (#PT-406) had already aired there, before ABC decided to bump it. The network ultimately delayed #PT-406 a week to October 18. Because Canada was now a week ahead, CTV and E! both pulled ''Wheel'' from their schedules the following week, replacing its time slots respectively with ''Series/TheVoice'' and a repeat of ''Pyramid's'' season premiere. On November 1, a repeat from Season 3 was arbitrarily scheduled, despite the other game shows that night still being new. |
| 360 | * ScrewedByTheNetwork: |
| 361 | ** Very nearly happened ''twice'' during Chuck's era alone, both in 1980. |
| 362 | *** The first ousting nearly came when NBC was trying to figure out what three games would be canned to make way for ''The Creator/DavidLetterman Show''. Mock schedules were drawn up, including ones which had ''Wheel'' ousted after six-and-a-half years. Slightly smarter heads prevailed, and the victims ended up being ''Series/ChainReaction'', ''Series/HighRollers'', and ''Series/TheHollywoodSquares''. Chuck and Susan went so far as to address the rumors on May 7, stating that the show was not canned. |
| 363 | *** The second ([[http://www.jrjgames.com/main/randy/charlie/index.html more info here]]) was even worse because NBC head honcho Fred Silverman had actually issued the order — this time to make room for an ''Series/AnotherWorld'' spinoff named ''Texas''. The intended farewell, featuring an appearance by Chuck's then-wife Jo Ann Pflug, was taped for air on August 1... but during the interim, Silverman took another look at the ratings and realized that the last third of ''The David Letterman Show'' was struggling, so he cut it to an hour and ''Wheel'' managed to progress unharmed (although Chuck had some fun about the situation on August 4). Charlie O'Donnell, by this point committed to the soon-to-debut ''Toni Tennille Show'', was replaced by Don Morrow for the following week and Jack Clark on August 11. |
| 364 | ** The syndicated version is likely the most pre-empted syndicated program on TV, due to its unique rule that it can only be aired in the prime access hour (7-8 PM Eastern/Pacific), which is when networks and local stations generally prefer to air sporting events, pregame shows, award shows, local debates, local NFL team shows, local news specials, delayed or extended newscasts, and even ''infomercials''. This is especially true in the Central Time Zone, where ''Wheel'' exclusively airs at 6:30 PM, due to most stations airing local news at 6:00, giving sister program ''Jeopardy!'' less restrictions for its time slotting (most air it at 3:30 or 4:30 PM preceding local and national news, meaning it rarely gets affected by sports or specials). ''Wheel's'' prime access time slot mandate was a result of [=KingWorld=], its former syndicator, not wanting affiliates to slot it too close to the daytime version, which would potentially cause confusion among viewers and unnecessary competition between two versions of the same program. Although the daytime version has been off the airwaves for more than three decades, the rule still stands today. ''Jeopardy!'' does not have this rule since the current version of the show has never run in both daytime and syndication at the same time. Affiliates are generally not allowed to move ''Wheel'' temporarily to a morning or afternoon time slot if a pre-emption is planned, instead having to move it overnight or to a sister station, if at all. Because of frequent pre-emptions, many fans have resorted to regularly watching unauthorized recordings of the show from Canada on [=YouTube=]. |
| 365 | ** One of the biggest obstacles for syndicated ''Wheel'' is ''Monday Night Football'' whenever it airs nationally on ABC. In terms of U.S. coverage, ABC is the largest network carrier of the show, including in all but one of the Nielsen markets with an owned-and-operated (O&O) station. When ''MNF'' aired on a weekly basis until 2005, the West Coast would air the show on a one-day delay (with a "new" episode on Saturday instead of a repeat) while the East Coast was unaffected. Starting in 2020 (Season 38 of ''Wheel''), ABC began airing some games nationally again, the first of which usually falls on the same day as the season premiere of ''Wheel''. Since ABC now airs college football on Saturdays, West Coast affiliates are now forced to schedule impacted Monday episodes shortly after the games, which can result in these episodes not airing in their entirety, if at all, depending on the length of the game. Starting in 2023 (Season 41), ABC began airing pregame coverage before some (not all) national games at 7:30 PM Eastern, ''Wheel's'' time slot on the O&O's and in most markets in general. This pre-empted the first two Monday episodes of Pat Sajak's final season, including the premiere, in '''three of the Top 4 Nielsen markets''' (fortunately, all six contestants on those episodes were from markets where ''Wheel'' airs on non-ABC affiliates), along with one Secret Santa episode. WRIC-TV in Richmond, which normally airs ''Wheel'' at 7:00 PM, announced that on all of these days, ''Jeopardy!'' would move up from 7:30 and ''Wheel'' would not air ''at all.'' The third Monday episode was pre-empted on ''all'' ABC affiliates due to a game that started at 7:00 PM instead of 8:00. Due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, ABC soon decided to air ''MNF'' nationally ''every week of the 2023 season'', followed by NBA games every Wednesday in January, impacting several more episodes on the West Coast. Pat posted an apology for the pre-emptions, but claimed the show was "powerless" in doing anything about it. |
| 366 | ** Another broadcast rule exclusive to ''Wheel'' is that it is only current daily syndicated program that does not offer a second daily airing at all (whether a different run like every other game show, or an encore of the same episode like talk shows and entertainment news shows). If you miss an episode on your local station and it is not made up, your only legal chance of seeing it again is if it shows up as a repeat the following summer, on a Saturday next season (if ''that'' doesn't get pre-empted by college football), or, even less likely, on streaming, and unlike ''Jeopardy!'', ''Wheel'' never posts full episodes on their [=YouTube=] channel, not even temporarily. Since there are only 65 weekday repeats and 52 weekend repeats a year, compared to a season's 195 episodes, several episodes only get to air one time. In TheNew20s, ''Jeopardy!'s'' second airing (known as ''Daytime Jeopardy!'' or ''Jeopardy! II'') is seeing more clearance as a replacement for ending LongRunners such as ''The Ellen [=DeGeneres=] Show'' and ''Series/DrPhil'', but affiliates that don't double-run it with the main airings are forced to find another program that isn't ''Wheel'' to pair it with; some have chosen another puzzle game show, ''Series/PeoplePuzzler''. Many fans view ''Daytime Jeopardy!'' as pointless since it is currently only a few weeks behind the main run, and for unknown reasons, CBS Media Ventures still refuses to offer an equivalent for ''Wheel''. |
| 367 | ** The episode scheduled for November 24, 2023 (#S-7870, Black Friday) ended up being at least partially pre-empted in about '''94% of the US''' due to college football and/or basketball on all Big Four networks. CBS's coverage was scheduled to end at 7:30 PM Eastern, with most affiliates leaving ''Wheel'' in said time slot. However, CBS always ends their broadcasts with a sponsored postgame show that lasts for multiple segments and runs at least 10 minutes, resulting in nearly all broadcasts running over the time slot even if the game ended well before, and this one was no exception. Since ''Wheel'' can only air at 7:00 or 7:30 Eastern/Pacific, the former slot was pre-empted outright, and most airings in the latter slot were joined in progress about halfway through; some filled what was left of the time slot with local news instead. ABC, NBC, and FOX airings were pre-empted in all time zones, though nearly all West Coast NBC affiliates aired ''Wheel'' in its entirety in primetime slots. ABC's coverage overran 33 minutes, cutting off or skipping some West Coast airings scheduled after the game. The only affiliates to air the episode on time and in its entirety were Mountain and Pacific CBS's, KTVK in Phoenix and KJZZ in Salt Lake City (both of which are independent), WJFW-TV in Wisconsin, and a few markets that moved ''Wheel'' to a sister station (including Atlanta, Boston, and Dallas). A few affiliates aired ''Wheel'' early on this day, or aired it over the weekend. With the pre-emptions impacting the "Fan Fridays" giveaway, ''Wheel'' didn't even bother showing the giveaway code word on screen and announced that any word at all would be accepted. The pre-emptions impacted all three contestants: one's affiliate (KSDK in St. Louis) outright refused to air the episode despite ''announcing the local contestant on their newscast'', another only saw the second half on KLST in San Angelo, Texas, and the third had to wait until 10:00 PM to see it on KGO-TV in San Francisco, but at least saw it in its entirety. |
| 368 | ** Affiliates that have a partnership with local major league sports teams tend to pre-empt ''Wheel'' frequently for specials or pregame shows on or close to game days (even when the game does not immediately follow ''Wheel's'' time slot), or even weekly programs discussing said team. The worst offender is WKRN-TV in Nashville, which pre-empts ''Wheel'' every Tuesday during NFL season for a local Titans show. Combined with the ''Monday Night Football'' pregame starting in 2023, Nashville only got '''9 out of 15 episodes''' during the first three weeks of Season 41. WIVB-TV in Buffalo and WROC-TV in Rochester also frequently pre-empt ''Wheel'' for Buffalo Bills specials, even when they don't actually air the games themselves. Despite being CBS affiliates, both stations also pre-empted the Season 41 premiere due to the Buffalo Bills competing in that night's ''Monday Night Football.'' ''Jeopardy!'' is unaffected in almost all of these instances. The one affiliate where ''Jeopardy!'' is pre-empted by the Bills specials is WETM in Elmira, New York, a market much smaller than Buffalo and Rochester. |
| 369 | ** WROC-TV is very eager to pre-empt ''Wheel'' for just about any kind of local special. Unlike WIVB and WETM, WROC does not have a sister station to move the show to, meaning ''Wheel'' frequently airs in overnight slots. Multiple notable episodes, including at least one $100,000 win, were pre-empted by specials dedicated to things as menial as '''Susan B. Anthony's birthday''' (and not even on the actual day). When a Buffalo Bills special is an hour long, WROC will sometimes opt out of the second half to allow ''Jeopardy!'' to air (even when the station airs ''Daytime Jeopardy!'' at 3:30 PM), but they have never done this for ''Wheel''. In May 2023, a sweeps month, they pre-empted ''Wheel'' for an ''entire week'' to air local specials on that year's PGA Championship which took place on a local course, despite the event itself only lasting two weekdays. Despite their partnership with the Buffalo Bills, they also pre-empted the finals of the February 2024 NFL Superfan Tournament for a Super Bowl special, Buffalo Bills fan Jill Price advancing to the finals and winning the tournament, all while ''Jeopardy!'' aired at its normal time. Fortunately, the contestant was from the Buffalo market, where WIVB aired the entire tournament without interruption and heavily promoted Price's appearance and win. |
| 370 | ** The ABC O&O's, all of which carry ''Wheel'' at 7:30/6:30 Central (with the exception of KTRK-TV in Houston, which does not carry ''Wheel'' due to opting for an hour-long 6:00 newscast), are fond of pre-empting ''Wheel'' (but never ''Jeopardy!'') with O&O-exclusive specials or events, the most of notorious of which is the CMA Awards' red carpet arrivals, which they began airing in 2019. When ''Wheel'' swapped out two travel-themed weeks for reruns at the height of the COVID-19 Pandemic (see DistancedFromCurrentEvents), all of the ABC O&O's pre-empted ''Wheel'' with the Mountain Time Zone feed of ''ABC World News Tonight'', despite airing only one hour after the East Coast feed in most cases. Although only reruns were affected, fans generally did not agree with this decision, as many considered the show a comforting distraction during the hard times. Two of the seven stations opted to restore ''Wheel'' for the second week. The Saturday repeats were not affected by this. |
| 371 | ** When a live sporting or political event happens in East Coast primetime, its West Coast broadcast pre-empts ''Wheel's'' regular time slot. Usually, West Coast affiliates move Wheel to primetime slots after the event, but before the late-night local news, most commonly in the 9:00 or 10:00 PM hours. However, this can still result in the show getting pre-empted in part or in full if the event runs long, especially if the affiliate has an additional local newscast or postgame program following the event that slides the programming after it. The premieres for Seasons 39 and 40 both got partially or entirely pre-empted in some West Coast markets on both their original ''and'' rerun airings due to being scheduled after NFL or NBA games both times, all of which ran long. |
| 372 | ** Despite still being one of the top-rated syndicated programs, ''Wheel'' is generally viewed as "disposable" by affiliates due to almost every episode being self-contained. When they have to choose to bump one of the two game shows in the prime access hour, they will almost-always choose to save ''Jeopardy!'' due to [[AlwaysSecondBest often having slightly higher ratings]] (partially as a result of frequent ''Wheel'' pre-emptions and having two runs) and continuity through its champions, which ''Wheel'' has not had on a regular basis since 1998 (and not at all from January 1999-March 2023). In some cases, if ''Jeopardy!'s'' time slot is pre-empted but ''Wheel's'' is not, stations will move ''Jeopardy!'' to '''replace''' ''Wheel'' for the day, even when ''Wheel'' has a contestant from the area. Some program directors claim that their affiliate's contract with CBS Media Ventures ''forces'' them to do this, even with the Saturday repeats. Similarly, if ''Jeopardy!'' is scheduled after an overrunning event, some stations will ensure airing the episode in its entirety, thereby cutting off part of ''Wheel'' or just skipping over it straight to the next show. |
| 373 | ** Even ''infomercials'' tend to get prioritized over ''Wheel''. Affiliates tend to pre-empt the show with paid programming on a random basis. Most of these only affect the Saturday repeats, but it does occasionally happen with first-run weekday episodes, and it rarely happens with ''Jeopardy!''. In one instance, three CBS O&O's (WBZ-TV Boston, WCCO-TV Minneapolis, and KTVT Dallas) all pre-empted ''Wheel'' with the same infomercial for nonprofit medical organization Operation Smile ''twice'' in a span of eight days. Portland ABC affiliate KATU is also notorious for slotting ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel'' at 10:00 and 10:30 PM following a newscast at 8:00 and two infomercials at 9:00 on days with sporting events. Any time the sporting event runs long (which is almost-always), every program after the game ''except Wheel'' (yes, that includes the infomercials) slides to air in its entirety, with ''Wheel'' getting joined in progress or skipped over to the 11:00 news. They briefly stopped sliding the shows after fans complained, but eventually reverted. |
| 374 | ** When Thursday Night Football began on network television in 2014, then-producer Harry Friedman was not pleased after learning that the event began at 7:30 PM Eastern, ''Wheel's'' most common time slot (and ''Jeopardy!'s'' slot in several markets). When he first expressed concern, representatives from the NFL and CBS outright '''lied''' to him that it would start at 8:00 and would not affect ''Wheel'' or ''Jeopardy!'' on the East Coast. Since an episode with a million dollar win was set for the Thursday of the season premiere week, Friedman had it rescheduled to air on Wednesday. Thursday Night Football originally aired interchangeably on CBS and NBC, then moved all games to FOX from 2018-21, before moving exclusively to Amazon Prime, NFL Network, FOX O&O's (none of which carry ''Wheel''), and select local affiliates starting in 2022. Fortunately for ''Wheel'', only 11 FOX affiliates were carrying the show in 2018 (decreasing to 10 a year later), and very few airings of ''Wheel'' are affected by local broadcasts of games since the deal with FOX expired. |
| 375 | ** The Summer and Winter Olympics on Creator/{{NBC}} pose a problem for most of its affiliates that air ''Wheel''. Starting in 2006, NBC began offering an optional pre-show, ''The Olympic Zone'', at 7:30 PM Eastern. Most affiliates carry this, and some that pre-empt ''Jeopardy!'' for this move that show to replace ''Wheel'' for the entirety of the Olympics, or pair it with an additional local pre-show at 7:00 to pre-empt both shows. In February 2022, the Beijing Winter Olympics conflicted with a historic and near-impossible streak of three $100,000 wins in a row. Despite news of this leaking in advance and the constant references to the wins throughout the week actually giving the show a sense of continuity (a common reason for program directors favoring ''Jeopardy!'' over ''Wheel''), many affiliates still refused to air these episodes in favor of ''The Olympic Zone'' or moving ''Jeopardy!''. Fortunately, these episodes were re-broadcast in July 2022 without conflict. |
| 376 | ** The April 24, 2020 episode (#S-7185), which was the highest-winning episode of its week and featured a rare $50,000 Bonus Round win, managed to get pre-empted nationwide on ABC affiliates ''twice''. Its original airing was the same day as Day 2 of the NFL Draft, where coverage starts at 7:00 PM Eastern. A repeat was scheduled over a year later on September 11, 2021, the final Saturday repeat of Season 37 and the second weekend of college football season. ''All three contestants'' lived in markets that air ''Wheel'' on ABC. The winning contestant watched on flagship affiliate WABC-TV, which slotted the episode on Saturday, April 25, immediately following Day 3 of NFL Draft coverage and a local newscast. The Draft overran and caused the newscast to run late, with ''Wheel'' getting joined in progress in the middle of Round 3. WABC did air the repeat airing in its entirety, but at 5:00 AM on a Sunday morning. Another contestant stated that her affiliate (KGUN) also joined the original airing in progress after the Draft (after airing the same day's ''Jeopardy!'' in its entirety), but did air the rerun after college football without issue. Several ABC affiliates did not air either of the two airings. Fortunately, the episode airs on Pluto TV and GSN. |
| 377 | ** The Season 37 finale (#S-7209) ended up being scheduled the same day as the NFL kickoff game, which begins pregame coverage at 7:00 PM Eastern (7:30 until 2019) on NBC and pre-empts ''Wheel'' (a rerun during most years) on all of its affiliates. Since it was the second of only two new episodes that week, some affiliates opted to air the episode the following day in place of that day's rerun. At least one opted to air it the following Saturday in place of the final Season 36 rerun. A few others aired the episode early; Michigan affiliate WPBN aired it at 11:00 AM. |
| 378 | ** Any time the Kansas City Chiefs make it to the Super Bowl (which they have done four times in the 2020s alone), local FOX affiliate WDAF-TV temporarily moves ''Wheel'' to a late-night slot for ''over a week'' consecutively in favor of specials hyping the big game, starting two Fridays prior. In 2024, this conflicted with the NFL Superfan Tournament (which even had a contestant representing the Chiefs that advanced to the Friday Finals, though she lived in New Jersey), resulting in all five episodes airing at 1:00 AM. |
| 379 | ** ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'', the show's first primetime venture, was a hit during its first season, being the top-rated show of the night on most nights it aired: Thursday nights at 8:00 PM, one of the most coveted primetime slots. Afterwards, however... |
| 380 | *** Starting in Season 2, the show was moved from Thursdays in winter to Sundays in fall, still at 8:00 PM Eastern/Pacific. This put the show up against ''Sunday Night Football'' on NBC. On CBS, it was against the majority of ''Series/SixtyMinutes'' whenever it followed NFL on that network. The premiere in particular also had to contend with the second-to-last episode of ''Series/BigBrother 23'', and the Las Vegas market pre-empted it with a Golden Knights NHL preseason game. Compared to the last season's premiere, the Season 2 premiere lost close to '''two-thirds''' of the 18-49 demo and more than half of its viewers overall. |
| 381 | *** For Season 3, the show remained on the Sunday lineup, still mostly during NFL season, and its success, along with ''Jeopardy!'''s AdoredByTheNetwork status at ABC, resulted in ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' joining it as a standalone series. Unsurprisingly, the latter was immediately given the better time slot and was promoted more often than ''Wheel''. ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' replaced ''Wheel'' in the 8:00 slot, sliding the latter to 9:00 and replacing ''Series/SupermarketSweep'' (which, like ''Wheel'', was originally Sundays at 8:00, but then slid to 9:00; it got cancelled soon after). By the second half of the season, ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' moved to Thursdays, with ''Wheel'' briefly returning to the 8:00 slot, but the rest of the season, a mix of new episodes and sporadic reruns, aired inconsistently on various days at either 8:00 or 9:00, and the season finale did not air until May 2023, four months after the previous new episode (and only to cross-promote yet another ''Jeopardy!'' primetime event). Furthermore, while reruns were planned to air every Tuesday for the entire summer up until Season 4's premiere (paired with reruns of both ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' and ''Jeopardy! Masters''), the reruns ceased a month earlier than planned, with the rest of them being replaced with ''Celebrity Series/FamilyFeud'' reruns, despite the primetime ''Jeopardy!'' reruns continuing. |
| 382 | *** For Season 4, ABC's original plan was to put ''Wheel'' back in its original time slot of Thursdays at 8:00, followed by ''Series/PressYourLuck'' and ''[[Series/{{Pyramid}} The $100,000 Pyramid]]'' (a lineup previously used for a special night of holiday-themed game show episodes, and with all three having considerable fandom overlap). ''Jeopardy!'' was to be on Tuesdays paired with ''[[Series/TheBachelor Bachelor in Paradise]]''. However, ABC later decided to move all ''Bachelor'' series to Thursdays and move both ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel'' to Wednesdays at 8:00 and 9:00, respectively (with ''Pyramid'' following them both at 10:00, and ''Press'' moving to Tuesdays at 10:00 with a delayed premiere), leaving ''Wheel'' once again "buried" by ''Jeopardy!'', which continues to see several more primetime specials on the network. ''Wheel's'' order was also reduced from 13 episodes to 10 for this season while ''Jeopardy!'''s was not, but ABC still managed to spread out the season with inconsistent airings. On October 11, 2023, ABC quickly produced a special edition of ''Series/TwentyTwenty'' on the Israel-Hamas war to air at 10:00. Rather than skip ''Pyramid'', the network decided to move that show to 9:00 and skip ''Wheel'', even though that week's episode had already aired the day prior in Canada, resulting in CTV needing to pull the show from its schedule the following week to allow ABC to catch up. The originally-planned ''Wheel/Press/Pyramid'' lineup did get one night with repeats on December 28, 2023 (with ''Wheel'' being the most-watched broadcast program that night). Once again, following the new year, ABC aired a few sporadic reruns (half of which were from Season 3), and waited until May 2024 to air the final two episodes (also the last two primetime episodes hosted by Pat Sajak) so they could be paired with episodes of ''Jeopardy! Masters''. |
| 383 | * ScullyBox: Contestants are placed on risers that may be raised or lowered in order to make reaching the Wheel easier relative to their height. |
| 384 | * ShrugOfGod: |
| 385 | ** When the show gets pre-empted in a significant number of markets during an episode with a SPIN ID drawing, such as the Secret Santa weeks, rather than announce the winning SPIN [=IDs=] online for viewers (or potential winners) who couldn't see them, ''Wheel's'' response is simply to go to the show's website and click the "Did My SPIN ID Win?" button. They also send this response to local stations to post should they get inquiries or complaints from viewers about missed SPIN [=IDs.=] This ended up being moot starting in Season 41, where the ID is no longer announced on the show proper and viewers must now go online to see the winning ID anyway. |
| 386 | ** In an interview shortly before his retirement, Harry Friedman was asked about the lack of same-sex couples during the show's couples' weeks. He simply said that the show has not yet done this because they "take very measured steps" and they're "not ready" for it. Team weeks soon went on hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Once they returned in Season 40, with Bellamie Blackstone as executive producer, the very first one (Sweethearts Week) featured a gay couple on February 16, 2023. |
| 387 | * SimilarlyNamedWorks: CBS had a game show in 1952-53 also called ''Wheel of Fortune'', but it awarded prizes to people who had done good deeds. |
| 388 | * SpinOffCookbook: In 2015, the show teamed up with Mr. Food to release a collectible cookbook. Some of the recipes have punny names inspired by the show. |
| 389 | * TechnologyMarchesOn: Even though ''Wheel'' switched to an electronic puzzle board in February 1997, people still refer to the letters being "turned" as if they were still trilons. |
| 390 | * ThrowItIn: |
| 391 | ** The mere presence of a letter-turner on the show. While Ed Flesh and Marty Pasetta were designing the 1974 set, they didn't have time to finish motorizing the puzzle board, so the finished parts were gutted out and Susan was hired to turn the letters. |
| 392 | ** On several occasions, a letter has refused to reveal after being lit up, leading to Vanna repeatedly touching it until it finally lights up. This rarely gets edited out. |
| 393 | ** In recent years, some episodes have sweepstakes that viewers can enter by submitting a certain puzzle on the show's website. If one of these episodes ends up getting pre-empted in a large number of markets by breaking news or a sporting event, ''Wheel'' will typically announce that one can enter anything at all in the puzzle's text box for a valid entry. |
| 394 | ** May 6, 1994: The Friday Finals of Music Stars Week, Music/LeeGreenwood, paired with non-finalist Music/MarilynHorne from earlier in the week just for the Bonus Round (played all week for $25,000 with no envelope pick), fails to solve the bonus puzzle. Instead of revealing the answer, Pat calls the other finalists (Music/WeirdAlYankovic, Music/JamesBrown, and Music/LittleRichard) back to the stage to try to solve the puzzle, with no time limit and apparently just for fun. Al solves the puzzle, and, even though it wasn't solved in 10 seconds, executive producer Nancy Jones decides to award them all the $25,000 by splitting it five ways amongst their charities. |
| 395 | ** January 14, 2002: On a New Orleans Salute Week, Pat drives Vanna onto the stage on a golf cart decorated like a Mardi Gras parade float. Pat hits the bottom edge of the puzzle board's platform, and it's left in the episode. After he makes his way to the contestant podiums, Pat jokes that he has to call his insurance agent to explain his little "fender-bender". |
| 396 | ** January 29, 2007 (Teen Best Friends): A team hits Bankrupt with a Wild Card in tow. Hitting Bankrupt means forfeiting the Wild Card, but Pat often forgot this rule for most of the card's first season. Somehow, nobody realized this team still had an undeserved Wild Card, and they even ''went to the Bonus Round'' with it... but then failed to solve the bonus puzzle even with the help of the fifth letter that the Wild Card gave. |
| 397 | ** January 31, 2007 (Teen Best Friends): During the Speed-Up round, one player on the yellow team accidentally says the answer while it's still the red team's turn. They end up solving it anyway immediately afterward, but Pat announces that both the red and yellow teams will keep their earnings from that round. This doesn't affect the outcome, since the yellow team would have won anyway. |
| 398 | ** November 20, 2018: The yellow contestant mispronounced the $3,000 Toss-Up puzzle PROVINCETOWN as "Provinceton", but it was given to her under the impression that it was a common alternate pronunciation. Before the Bonus Round, it was realized that this was not the case, and Pat acknowledged that the solve was not correct after all. Since the $3,000 wouldn't have changed who won the game, the Bonus Round proceeded as normal with the red contestant. Pat announced that an extra $3,000 would be awarded to him, and the blue contestant, who left with the $1,000 ConsolationPrize, would instead receive $3,000. |
| 399 | ** September 27, 2023 (''Celebrity Wheel''): The show starts with Creator/BrendanHunt at the red podium and Creator/MelissaVillasenor at the yellow podium. After the $1,000 Toss-Up, which Hunt won, Villaseñor asked to switch positions with him so she could be closer to Pat, who seemed confused by the whole thing, but allowed them to play the rest of the game this way. |
| 400 | * UnCanceled: The daytime version, three times. |
| 401 | * WhatCouldHaveBeen: |
| 402 | ** The letters on the puzzle board were originally planned to be mechanically turned for the 1974 pilots, but time ran out before the board could be motorized and Susan Stafford was hired to turn the letters. Would we have seen Susan or Vanna if the show was given extra time to complete the puzzle board's mechanisms? |
| 403 | ** If ''Wheel'' were indeed canceled (remember, it had escaped at least three attempts to cancel the show, in favor of a daytime talk show by David Letterman and an expanded one-hour ''Series/AnotherWorld'') ... would the show have even been proposed for syndication? The show's closest brush with death came in the ''Another World'' expansion, where Fred Silverman – stemming already hemorrhaging ratings of Letterman - cut back the overly long show to 60 minutes (from the original 90). |
| 404 | ** Reruns of the Woolery era were planned to be syndicated by 20th Century Fox in 1980. This did not happen, but if it did, perhaps there would be more episodes from this era in existence today. |
| 405 | ** If Chuck Woolery had accepted the modest raise Merv Griffin offered him in 1981, he likely would have presided over the syndicated version as well. Speculation abounds as to whether Susan Stafford would have stayed as well. |
| 406 | ** Pat Sajak almost didn't get the host's position. See ExecutiveMeddling for why he did. |
| 407 | ** If contestant Terri had been able to solve "THE THRILL OF VICTORY AND THE AGONY OF DEFEAT" for no less than a $63,000-plus jackpot, not only would she hold what would be still a one-round record, but would have led to the purchase of several large prizes (cars, trips, and so forth) and perhaps an entire showcase in addition, plus (along with hearing at least two prize cues in full) a six- or seven-minute prize copy. More than likely the episode would've had some very heavy editing. Furthermore, it is ''very'' unlikely that any player will ''ever'' reach that amount in one round again, especially without the help of a $6,000 Final Spin (the one-round record is $54,000, which was achieved through such a round), because the show currently has an unwritten rule that all puzzles from Round 4 onward (also all rounds with the $5,000 wedge on the Wheel) must fit on only two rows of the board (the above puzzle used all four rows), a total of only 28 monitors. |
| 408 | *** Several recollections (on various game show discussion boards) have also claimed a similar incident happened earlier in Fall 1985, when a contestant mis-solved "STAR LIGHT STAR BRIGHT FIRST STAR I SEE TONIGHT" - by forgetting the "I" - for another $60,000 jackpot in a nearly filled in puzzle. After the loud gasps and moans from the audience (and Pat explaining that the solution was incorrect), the next contestant immediately solved for the $200 house minimum, getting only polite applause. |
| 409 | ** The "Big Month of Cash" would lead to the play-for-cash format used today, but what if it never happened? |
| 410 | ** Among those who tried out for host after Pat left the daytime version were tennis players Jimmy Connors and John [=McEnroe=], actor John Gabriel, sportscaster Roger Twibell, and ESPN sports reporter [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7aufwkOVuQ Tim Brando]] (who reportedly did so well that Merv stated, "[Tim] could host the show tomorrow.") Then-announcer M.G. Kelly also [[http://www.mgkelly.com/archive-21.asp auditioned]], and Vanna herself was reportedly offered the job only to turn it down. |
| 411 | ** Rolf Benirschke was dismissed when the daytime version moved to CBS. [[Series/TheHollywoodSquares John]] [[Series/TimeMachine Davidson]], [[Series/CardSharks Bob]] [[Series/TriviaTrap Eubanks]], [[Series/TheJokersWild Pat]] [[Series/ShopTilYouDrop Finn]], [[Series/{{Blackout}} Bob Goen]], [[Series/NowYouSeeIt Chuck Henry]], and [[Series/DoubleDare1986 Marc]] [[Series/WhatWouldYouDoNickelodeon Summers]] auditioned to replace him before Goen was chosen. |
| 412 | ** Two episodes have had the Million-Dollar Wedge lost (one through a wrong letter, the other through a Bankrupt), only for the player(s) who had it to win the $100,000 in the Bonus Round, which is replaced with the $1,000,000 if the wedge survives the game after being claimed. Conversely, other contestants have ''lost'' the $100,000 after losing the wedge. |
| 413 | ** Sometime in the late 2010s, a special episode with a rematch between the three million-dollar winners was considered. This would have been the first time in nearly two decades that a contestant returned for any reason besides a technicality. The idea was ultimately scrapped after Michelle Loewenstein declined the opportunity. |
| 414 | ** There were plans for a tournament during Season 39. They were quietly abandoned after executive producer Mike Richards was fired. Starting in Season 40, the long-retired Friday Finals format was brought back for one week per season. |
| 415 | ** Michael Davies was reportedly supposed to replace Mike Richards as executive producer, as he did on ''Jeopardy!'' It is rumored that Davies was forced to step away from ''Wheel'' due to not getting along with Pat Sajak in their first meetings. Given the many ideas he's brought to ''Jeopardy!'', ''Wheel'' fans will never know if their show would have had any equivalents. |
| 416 | ** In a Season 3 episode of ''Celebrity Wheel'', Music/JoelMadden lost the $1,000,000 in the first half, then won $100,000 in the second half. However, a glimpse of the Bonus Wheel diagram on Pat's card showed that the spot on the Bonus Wheel he landed on would have been the one to hold the $1,000,000 envelope had he won the game with the Million Dollar Wedge a second time. Not only would this have been the series' second million dollar win (and the franchise's fifth overall), he would have been the only celebrity to played for the million in ''both games''. |
| 417 | *** Season 4 of ''Celebrity Wheel'' was originally scheduled to air in Season 1's time slot of Thursdays at 8:00 PM, followed by ''Press Your Luck'' and ''The $100,000 Pyramid''. This would have been the first season since the premiere of ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' that the two Merv Griffin games would not have aired together for most of the season, and ''Wheel'' likely would have seen more consistent airings (rather than multiple [[ScheduleSlip schedule slips]] and burning off the last episodes months later) and better ratings as a result. |
| 418 | ** For the first Fan Favorites week in Season 40, contestants that were asked to appear before declining included Brenda Gallagher (November 9, 2016, declined due to scheduling conflict with the taping) and Julian Batts (April 11, 2014). Rufus Cumberlander (February 17, 2015) and Taya Somes (February 26, 2020) were also known to be considered, but ultimately did not make the final cut. |
| 419 | ** As per [[https://vimeo.com/731404344 this interview]] (at 46:30) with electronics supervisor Bill Monk, an LED-based wheel with randomized amounts was considered in the past. |
| 420 | ** Vanna White stated in numerous interviews that she would retire together with Pat Sajak. This ended up not happening once Sajak announced his retirement, as she signed a new contract to stay with the show through 2026. |
| 421 | ** In late 1982, The Great Game Company (which would later become [=GameTek=]) announced plans to adapt seven game shows into video games for the Atari 2600, ''Wheel'' among them. They were being developed just as MediaNotes/TheGreatVideoGameCrashOf1983 started and the plans were put to an abrupt end. No prototypes of any of these games are known to exist. |
| 422 | ** Much later, [=GameTek=] planned on releasing adaptations for the Sega Saturn and Panasonic [=3DO=] in 1996 despite being in deep financial ruin by this time. They were officially canceled in early 1997, and [=GameTek=] folded a year later. |
| 423 | * WordOfGod: |
| 424 | ** Edd Byrnes said in his memoir ''Kookie No More'' that he was drunk when he hosted the 1974 pilots. '''It shows.''' [[note]](In fairness, he notes he was "scared to death" about doing ''Wheel'' as he hadn't hosted a game show before but had been suggested by NBC anyway. Further compounding matters is that this was during his bout with alcoholism, leading to a belief by fans that he only intended to drink a bit to calm his nerves {a common tactic in show business} but simply went overboard. To his credit, the available footage of Brynes' second pilot indicates that he managed to sober up a bit as the taping day progressed, most obviously that the disco-esque getup he wore in the first taping was replaced by a standard dark-colored suit-and-tie outfit.)[[/note]] |
| 425 | ** Pat's (now-defunct) website once had a [=Q&A=] section in which he explained several things about the show, including the reason they stopped having the Wheel spin automatically during the open and close in early 1997 (because he thought that it could give the false impression that they could rig the Wheel, even though the automatic spinning had been done for the past 22 years without incident). |
| 426 | * WorkingTitle: ''Shopper's Bazaar'' |
| 427 | * WrittenInInfirmity: |
| 428 | ** Pat and Vanna traded places for one Bonus Round due to Pat having laryngitis. The next day, Pat used hand signals throughout a round as a further means of resting his voice. |
| 429 | ** When announcer Jack Clark became too ill from bone cancer to do any more announcing, Pat and Vanna read the updated fee plugs for the Summer reruns and weekend feed. |
| 430 | ** On many occasions, contestants who are unable to spin due to a physical handicap (most commonly those with dwarfism, or those who are wheelchair-bound) are allowed to bring someone to spin for them. Unless it's a team week, the "designated spinner" may not otherwise assist in gameplay. (Interestingly, the first such contestant happened to play during a week where contestants were accompanied by soap opera stars; the star did all the spinning, but they played as a team per that week's rules.) More than one such contestant has made it to the bonus round and was able to spin the bonus wheel without assistance (although one wheelchair-bound contestant was accompanied by her husband just so that he could push her chair). |
| 431 | ** On at least two team weeks (one in 1997 and one in 2019), a deaf contestant competed during a team week, with their teammate doubling as an interpreter. |
| 432 | ** On a 2001 episode taped on-location in Hawaii, a contestant managed to injure her arm during a commercial break and wore it in a sling for the rest of the episode. |
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