A fan-made Minnesota adaptation of Taskmaster which premiered on 2nd September 2021. Unlike other international adaptations, Taskmaster: Minnesota is a low-budget production in the University of Minnesota.
Follow the Taskmaster, Luke Peichel, and his assistant (who is also the show creator) David Ha as they set daunting tasks to six college students and mercilessly judge their performances in order to crown the champion (per season).
Full episodes can be viewed on the official playlist for season 1
and season 2.
This adaptation provides examples of:
- Abandoned Catchphrase: Carter had one of "Grape That" complete with its own cartoon graphic, but after two episodes, he had forgotten about it. The catchphrase was referenced again by Owen in "A Beautiful Last Day".
- British Brevity: The first season only lasted five episodes, like the earlier series of the UK original.
- The Cameo: Before any of the tasks began, Mark Watson made a cameo appearance, wishing the contestants good luck from a crowded bar, where Talking Heads was playing quite loudly, making it difficult for Mark to hear himself.
- Chromosome Casting: The Taskmaster, the assistant and all six contestants are male. This was unintentional as out of David's friend group, only two girls were actual fans of Taskmaster but neither wanted to participate or be seen on camera.YouTuber Comment: "Taskmaster: Oops All Men"
- Dark and Troubled Past: Carter invented one of these for Mr. Monopoly, depicting him as a refugee from Communist Cuba, where his parents were brutally murdered by capitalists, driving Mr. Monopoly to swear revenge against capitalism.
- Kung Fool: During the "martial arts demonstration" task in "Bereft of Drip", it's clear none of the contestants have much martial arts experience. Special mention goes to Ben, who was struggling more than usual with his "roundhouse kicks".Luke: "Well, the first thing I'd like to address is that I notice Ben was fighting the woodwork and losing."
- Loophole Abuse: There's at least one demonstration of the contestants employing the trope per episode, using Exact Words and/or Ambiguous Syntax to their advantage.
- "Surgery on a Grape" - The first task of the series asked contestants to "Get a grape into something smaller than this room from the furthest distance. You may only launch the grape by spitting it, headbutting it, hitting it with your shoulder, hitting it with your heel, or hitting it with this pool noodle." Henry and Max both realized they could simply hit the grape into the adjacent room, which was smaller than the room the grape started in. Owen took the Loophole Abuse one step further, as he noted the difference between "Get a grape" and "Launch a grape" meant that he could score the grape from a very far distance as long as he never launched the grape. He won the task by "running" the grape a total of 1.3 miles.
- "Chunky Leg Synergy" - In the task which had contestants putting a grape into as many cups as possible, Owen both realized that they could go inside and find more cups with the latter going the extra mile and found more grapes as well. While the other contestants (except for Carter, who suffered from an Epic Fail) all scored 10 cups, Ben scored 13 and Owen scored a whopping 59 cups, because he thought It's the Only Way to Be Sure.
- "Bereft of Drip" - One task has the contestants going around the Taskmaster's Barn, but they have to change their method of movement when they pass a corner. While Ben, Henry, Max, Owen and Parker all chose different methods every single time with varying results, Carter opted to alternate between hopping and skipping since the task never stated you couldn't pick the same method twice. Carter easily won the task with the fastest time of thirty-two seconds.
- "A Beautiful Last Day" - When contestants were asked to light a match, instead of solving the puzzles that would have led to opening the box in the center of the room which contained a matchbook, Ben and Owen both found alternate ways to fulfill the objective. Ben found a lighter hidden in the woodbox and Owen simply remembered that there was another matchbox hanging just on the other side of the doorframe.
- "I've Wanted That My Entire Life" - In a complex task where contestants had to flick a die into a cup from behind a line, Henry and Ben were both able to find a loophole. The task never stated that the line or the cup couldn't be moved. Henry moved the cup to be right next to the line and Ben moved the line to be right next to the cup. Despite this, Ben still managed to miss almost half of his shots.
- Mood Whiplash: Utilized comedically in Carter and Parker's birthday song, which abruptly turns from a bizarre and profanity-filled rap to a soothing ballad and back.
- Recurring Element: Grapes have appeared in almost every episode of season 1, either as part of a task, Carter's Catchphrase or in Max's attempts.
- Strange Minds Think Alike: Ben, Max and Owen all chose to roll on the ground in the "get around the house without walking or running" and instantly regret it.Ben: [Rolling on the ground] "This was the worst decision!"Max: [Rolling on the ground] "Why did I pick rolling?!"Owen: [Rolling on the ground] "This is such a slow method, why did I pick this?!"
- Tiebreaker Round: In the first series alone, three episodes and the overall series had all their winners decided by tiebreakers. This appeared to frazzle David, as he was not prepared for this number of tiebreakers to happen.
- Transatlantic Equivalent: There are slight format changes to accommodate the show's
production budget.- Because the contestants are college students and therefore too broke to bring in new prizes every episode, there's only one prize task to serve as the grand prize for the season finale. Episode prizes are provided by David.
- There are six contestants instead of five, which affected the scoring and team distribution with three pairs of two rather than the standard uneven teams of two and three.
- David, the Taskmaster's assistant, doesn't appear onscreen that often since he's also manning the camera with Megan Perera (The other cameraman).
