History Series / Whammy

[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Whammy_The_All-New_Press_Your_Luck_3810.jpeg]]
[[caption-width-right:300:[[AdvertisingCampaigns "Watch out,]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBFeMsrmxwk it's back."]]]]

[[RuleOfThree Third]] version of Bill Carruthers' GameShow ''Series/SecondChance'', which became famous in its second iteration, ''Series/PressYourLuck''. ''Whammy!'', a revival of the latter, was hosted by Todd Newton on Creator/{{GSN}} from 2002-03.

The main difference between this and its predecessors was that Round 1 gave each contestant $1,000 and the opportunity to press or "freeze" before each of their spins. After each contestant had a turn, more Whammies were added to the board, and hitting a Whammy eliminated you from the rest of the round.

Round 2 was the Question Round, containing contestant interviews and five questions, while Round 3 was just like normal ''Press''.

Season 2 added a "Big Bank" to the game, which began at $3,000; every time a player hit a Whammy, his/her winnings were added to the total. Hitting a Big Bank space gave that player a chance to win the entire bonus by correctly answering a question.

''Whammy!'' ended after 26 weeks in a move by GSN to branch out past game shows into other fields, such as video games, although repeats have aired for most of the period since. Since 2003, all franchise-related merchandise, foreign versions, video games, etc. have been adaptations of this or ''Press Your Luck''.
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!!GameShowTropes in use:
* BonusSpace: "$x00 + One Spin" spaces, as before. There were none in Round 1, due to the format above. The board also had Pick-A-Prize (which usually had about 10-12 choices at any given time) and returning favorite $2,000 Or Lose-A-Whammy.
* ConsolationPrize: An Argus digital camera in Season 1, a Croton watch with a Whammy on it in Season 2.
* CoveredInGunge: The result of a Double Whammy, only present in the final Big Board round. Contestants who hit one of these were subjected to a physical element associated with the animation, such as being sprayed with water or having grass clippings dumped over their heads.
* ExtraTurn: The "$x00 + One Spin" spaces.
* GameShowWinningsCap: One-and-done, which didn't really work out too well when people were the "big winner" with less than $3,000. The only contestant to win with $0 due to her opponents Whammying-Out was invited back on a later episode, while 12 contestants were invited back for the very last week of shows.
* GoldenSnitch: The Big Bank. (See below.)
* Personnel:
** TheAnnouncer: Gary Kroeger.
** GameShowHost: Todd Newton.
** StudioAudience
* ProgressiveJackpot: The Big Bank, which started at $3,000 and grew by whatever was lost to the Whammy. If a player landed on a Big Bank space, s/he was asked one question. Answering it correctly (and it had to be exact) [[Series/BreakTheBank1976 broke the Bank]], which was usually enough to put them far ahead of everyone else.
* PromotionalConsideration
* UndesirablePrize:
** The GEM Car. Did anyone actually ''want'' that thing?
** Same could be said for a ''lot'' of the prizes. Who wanted a $300 year's supply of M&Ms when that was ''also'' the lowest cash amount on the board? The "His & Hers Roller Skates" were also a prime example, as well as every prize worth $300 or less on [[http://web.archive.org/web/20141013144949/http://gscentral.net/nprize.htm this list]] — all 100+ of them.
* {{Whammy}}: Same as before, but he's now a computer-animated character.
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!!This show provides examples of:
* AprilFoolsDay: In 2003, [[Series/{{Cram}} Graham Elwood]] guest-hosted as part of GSN's AprilFoolsDay host switcharound. For each of the first three spins in Round 1, the space landed on was turned into a "Newton" (represented by Todd making a face resembling that of the Big Tongue Whammy from ''Press''), which awarded the contestant an outlandish (and fake) prize before saying "April Fool's!" and giving them another turn.
* AscendedGlitch: The game board on the original ''Press Your Luck'' featured 18 screens with values that almost always changed at the same time, but would occasionally have half of the screens changing out of sync with the other half. ''Whammy'' actually implements - and even amplifies - this behavior in Round 2. Not only do each of the 18 screens change independently from each other, but their values also change at semi-random intervals.
* AudienceParticipation: It was common for the audience to boo when the Whammys were added to the big board.
* BalloonBelly: Happens to a hungry supermodel Whammy when she makes a meal out of a contestant's earnings.
* CallBack: Round 1's dollar values included [[ArcNumber $470 and $525]], both of which were present on ''Press Your Luck''.
* ADayInTheLimelight: Mostly the above, but on the last day of taping then-Fremantle employee Mandel Ilagan (probably best known for creating Half Off for ''Series/ThePriceIsRight'') [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtRbIvQnuzo hosted the final rehearsal game]], giving the rules '''from memory'''.
* CatchPhrase:
** "Big Bucks, no Whammies!"
** Todd Newton had a couple for questions and answers:
*** "Where's Whammy?"
*** "Time now for a Whammy Flashback... [[BrokenRecord Flashback Flashback Flashback Flashback]]."
* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Whammy's dog Fang is absent from the animations.
* DeadpanSnarker: Todd could be this when dealing with a Whammy's aftereffects.
* DoubleUnlock: Winning the car required contestants to collect both "pieces" ("Gem" and "Car" in Season 1, two halves of a key in Season 2) and win the game. In Season 1, hitting a Whammy at any point in the game took the car out of consideration [[note]](the Whammy would take the GEM/Car card(s) away from the player, and hitting a Whammy in Round 1 would also eliminate the player from further participation in that round, making it impossible for them to obtain the GEM card)[[/note]]. This was fixed with the Big Bank.
* DownerEnding: One episode had a contestant rack up over $25,000 with one passed spin left (meaning she had to take it). She hit a Double Whammy with that last spin and lost the game, but that memorable loss led to her return for the Tournament of Losers episode.
* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness:
** The first two taped episodes lacked the $1,000 rule at the start of Round 1.
** The first 12 taped episodes featured a smaller font for the Big Board, plus had different coloring on the contestant podium and no yellow background on the Whammy indicators that popped up in front of the players. Also, at least one of these episodes featured a regular Whammy that would later be repurposed for use as a ''Double'' Whammy. [[note]] For those wondering, it was the basketball Whammy [[/note]]
* FlawlessVictory: In Season 1, winning the GEM car (or any prizes in Round 1), required the player to win the game without hitting a ''single'' Whammy along the way due to the rules regarding participation in Round 1. Although this happened with regular prizes, [[spoiler:no GEM car was ever awarded. In fact, every single player who won the GEM card in Round 1 ended up hitting a Whammy later in the game, losing the card]].
* ForegoneVictory: At least once, two contestants Whammied-Out (eliminated themselves from the game), leaving one player to use their remaining spins playing against the house, as had been the case on ''Press'' (and, presumably, ''Chance'' before it). On that contestant's final spin, instead of the board showing an image of her versus the person in 2nd/1st place, it showed the image of the Whammy to indicate that she was indeed playing against the house and could still lose.
* GameShowAppearance: During the series' run, husband-and-wife voice acting duo Creator/SandyFox and Creator/LexLang appeared within a year of each other.
* InflationNegation: Premiered 16 years after ''Series/PressYourLuck'' ended, but retained the same nominal values in Square #4 despite inflation going up about 63% in America during that span. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]], in that a cable channel the caliber of Game Show Network would most definitely have a smaller budget than Creator/{{CBS}}.
* LivingCurrency: Some of the Whammy animations have the Whammy interact with sentient stacks of money, who would naturally play the ButtMonkey to the Whammy's antics (such as him stealing bills out of the stack).
* LuckBasedMission: Even going so far as to say it was "Larson-proof".
* MyGreatestSecondChance: Ed and Janie, Michael Larson's opponents when he broke the bank on ''Press'', were invited back to play ''Whammy!'' against his brother James, since Michael had died in 1999. [[note]](James won, continuing the Larson family legacy, and received a grand piano.)[[/note]]
* MythologyGag:
** Several of the Whammy animations, both regular and Double, were call backs to those of the original ''Press Your Luck'', most notably the "Lawnmower" Whammy.
** One regular Whammy had the creature in a boxing ring dressed in "wrestler"-type clothing, including a yellow mask around his eyes, harking back to the original Whammy's appearance.
* NintendoHard: This version of ''Press Your Luck'' is this trope due to new rules regarding participation plus additional Whammy squares and an even more random board pattern than the classic format.
* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Among the many new Whammies were [[{{Expy}} expies]] of George Foreman, Emeril Lagasse, Martha Stewart, Steve Irwin, Music/BritneySpears, Music/OzzyOsbourne, [[Series/TheWeakestLink Anne Robinson]], Series/JudgeJudy, Franchise/HarryPotter, and Music/{{NSYNC}}.
* NoIndoorVoice: Todd freakin' Newton. Justified, in that he actually had a likable personality and genuinely seemed to be enjoying himself rather than simply being the loud-voiced, robotic, only-here-for-the-paycheck, pretty-boy kind of emcee that became so common in the aughties (such as [[Series/MervGriffinsCrosswords Ty Treadway]]).
* NonIndicativeName: The "Double Whammy" only added one Whammy to the player's total. The "Double" came from the Whammy animation ending end with the player covered in something like confetti, Silly String, or [[CoveredInGunge something else]].
* {{Notzilla}}: One of the Double Whammies is "Whamzilla," a reptilian version of the Whammy who rampages across a city of money, complete with Godzilla's stock roar.
* ObviousBeta: The pilots had a "Whammy Guard", awarded to a player for earning the maximum 12 spins in the Question Round, that negated the next Whammy hit.
* ObviousRulePatch:
** The Big Bank, which made the car ''much'' more likely to be won. Kind of hard to miss the display below the contestants... [[spoiler:The only car given away in a regular game was won through the Big Bank, after several Whammies took the Key halves from other players.]]
** The show also had any player that hit a Whammy in Round 1 be eliminated from the rest of the round. This is to address a rare but serious problem from ''Series/PressYourLuck'' where it was possible for a player to Whammy-Out in Round 1 and be unable to play in Round 2 because of it (although this also made winning anything from Round 1, such as one half of the car, [[FlawlessVictory much more difficult]]).
* OpeningNarration:
** '''Season 1 (2002):''' "The game with big bucks and Whammies is back, bigger and better than ever! It's time to play ''Whammy! The All-New Press Your Luck!''"
** '''Season 2 (2003):''' "The game with big bucks and Whammies is even bigger and better than ever! It's time to press your luck and play ''Whammy!''"
* {{Pilot}}: Two of them were taped on February 13, 2002, and were respectively hosted by Peter Tomarken and Todd Newton. Clips from them made it to early GSN promos.
* ProductPlacement: One Double Whammy dove into a bowl of [=M&Ms=]; the resulting splash dumped a boatload of them on the player. A year’s supply of [=M&Ms=] also appeared on the board as a prize.
* PressXToDie: One of the options presented by two Move 1 Space squares in Round 2 could have been a Double Whammy.
* RogerRabbitEffect: Again, the Whammies.
* StockSoundEffects: The "WHAMZILLA!" Whammy used authentic ''Franchise/{{Godzilla}}'' sound effects, including the roar (a fusion of the classic Showa and early Heisei roars), and the iconic footstep sound from [[Film/Godzilla1954 the original]]. Exactly how GSN got away with this is unknown, since Creator/{{Toho}} is ''veeeery'' protective of their properties.
* TakeThat: One Double Whammy mocked Enron! This is one of the Double Whammies from Season 2: it had a Whammy in a blue business suit standing with a pile of bills and a box that says "Whamron" in his hands, and he says, "I better file these important financial documents!" He then "unwittingly" puts the cash and box into a shredder (with "Shred-O-Matic" written on it), which spews out the money from the top and over both the Whammy and the player (shards of green paper are dumped on the contestant).
* ThatCameOutWrong: "Mark if you could please remove your boxers so we can see the Whammy." Todd Newton immediately lampshaded this by saying "I mean that professionally." [[note]] Context: The contestant had previously gotten a Double Whammy when dirty clothes landed on him and they were covering the Whammy that just popped up. [[/note]]
* TrademarkFavoriteFood: One of the Whammy animations has a Whammy that loves M&M's and dives into a bowl of them, then starts swimming; Todd actually joked on one instance "the Whammy that melts in your mouth, not in your hands". This Whammy would be used even if the contestant didn't earn the [=M&Ms=] supply in Round 1 as a plug-in.
* ThisIsYourPremiseOnDrugs:[[invoked]] Early GSN commercials for the series began with "This is your Whammy" (the rollerskating Whammy from ''Press'' that slips and hits his head), followed by "This is your Whammy on the all-new ''Press Your Luck''" (clips from both of the 2002 pilots).
* [[TransatlanticEquivalent Transpacific Equivalent]]: The Philippines got ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whammy!_Push_Your_Luck Whammy! Push Your Luck]]'', which ran on the GMA Network from 2007-08. Hosted by Paolo Bediones and Rufa Mae Quinto, the show was virtually identical to the American version.
* UnexpectedGameplayChange: Big Bank. Although a decent idea ("Whammying the Whammy"), it was marred by some incredibly-hard questions (including one where the contestant's guess was ''The Godfather'' and the answer was ''The Godfather Part 2'') and the fact that it pretty much brought the excitement to a halt.
* VisualPun: The Double Whammy animations had the "W" symbol on the Whammy's chest divided into two - "double whammy", get it?
* WildlifeCommentarySpoof: One Whammy animation featured the Whammy commenting on and then fighting a feral stack of money in the style of ''Series/CrocodileHunter.''
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