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Axed: Wheel of Fortune

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Nine’s Million Dollar Wheel of Fortune has spun up a Bankrupt, axed after just five weeks.

This week’s celebrity edition didn’t come close to Deal or No Deal. It’s strongest faring was on Monday (616,000) but it was thumped by Seven (979,000). On Wednesday only 567,000 saw the $200,000 prize won by Rachel Beck.

A Channel Nine spokesperson said, “We are disappointed that Million Dollar Wheel of Fortune has not done as well as we had hoped. It is best in these circumstances to make the tough decisions and move on – so we have.”

Both Tim Campbell and Kelly Landry will remain with Nine. Campbell will soon be seen fronting Celebrity Singing Bee for Nine, a gig he is reportedly more than comfortable doing. Kelly Landry will join Getaway.

Nine is replacing it with one hour of Antiques Roadshow from 5pm. The UK show provided a much stronger lead in for National Nine News, which has taken a hit since Wheel debuted. When Antiques last aired it had 677,000 viewers.

But Nine is not alone in programming woes this week with Seven yesterday pulling Ugly Betty from future schedules.

The final episode of Wheel airs this evening.

The Axe.

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26 Responses

  1. Wheel of Fortune needs to be completely reintroduced as the terrific blockbuster it was when John Burgess and Adriana Xenides were doing it, im sure if nine could even persuade them to do it, as well as a completely non-cheaplooking set, and take a leaf from America and actually try to give money away and not piddly amounts but substantial amounts, which could be achieved if they multiplied the spun $ amount by the letter occurence, people might like the show. As for announcer why use the guy they did, why didn’t they stick with Cossie who was already doing audience warmups. Perhaps they could even travel around the country like Pat and Vanna do.

  2. Nine, Please bring back “Million Dollar Wheel” cause i’m not a fan of Deal Or No Deal because of the Andrew O’Keefe overkill, I remember when the screaming Larry Emdur hosted Wheel and it was horrible! Because Larry Emdur screams like Leigh Whannell at the end of the first Saw film. So, I hate Deal or No Deal!

  3. As far as flops by Nine go, Canal Road was a much bigger one than WoF. It cost millions of dollars to make for a whopping 13 episodes and it rated absolutely abysmally. WoF was cheap in comparison, and it wasn’t that bad a show by Nine’s standards

  5. hardly a shock, its only been a year since seven axed the larry emdur version, was way to early to revive the format, they neede to give the audience a chance to miss it, im sure another version of it will turn up in a few years..

  6. Could have told you it’d fizz out the second Nine announced it was bringing Wheel back. Tim is great, not sure if he’s host material, but hopefully CSB is more up his alley.

  7. I personally prefer it to DOND and am disappointed, but you have to think It was axed from channel 7 for good reason, it doesn’t rate anymore!

  10. I knew right from the start that this would be a flop it was canned by seven twice so I don’t know why nine wasted so much money on it they should try temptation in its timeslot that may give deal a run for its money

    Oh and by the way next week on 10 to 1 will count down the 10 biggest flops on channel 9 in 2008

  13. I personally loved the show & Tim hosting it and dissappointed they didn’t give it a longer run, I particulary enjoyed this weeks Celebrity Week. Maybe they should have started with the 7.00pm timeslot, to pick up the audience again. I can’t abide Deal and won’t be turning over to watch it, back to channel 10 news part two, it was also stated that Antiques Roadshow would be back in that 5.30pm slot.

    There was an announcement last week that Nine will not be bringing Temptation back.

    Best wishes to Tim & Kelly in their next ventures

  14. Nine was due to shoot more Wheel tomorrow. There will be no Bingo style scandal and Nine is also ensuring 1 v 100 and Temptation contestants are paid up.

  15. Since its last ep is tonight – is there extra episodes that won’t be aired? Meaning contestants that won’t get prizes? Another ‘bingo’ incident I’m guessing!

  18. Terrible effort by 9 and all involved, everything from the set, the horrible looking and sounding wheel just gave off a less than polished product.

    This is a simple format, yet they tried to over gimmick it, and paid the price.

  19. The “curse of the celebrity week” strikes again. The appearance of the “celebrity week” is turning into a very accurate indicator of the imminent death of a program.

    With that in mind, I look forward to the speedy demise of the execrable “Singing Bee” 🙂

    This version of Wheel was, sadly, doomed from the start. Anyone who’s watched the show in its various incarnations over the years would have known that right from episode one. Managing to completely screw up such a foolproof show says a lot about how little Nine knows about television these days.

  20. Temptation is usually aired on some states at 7pm-and still has not started showing new eps.

    At least it’s lasted a while, unlike Million Dollar Wheel.

  22. Well so much for building an audence hey?
    This is just another local-blunder for Nine in 2008….were it not for Ramsay saving the day then the networks fortunes would be quite different…

    This seemed like a lame-duck idea from the start, and turns out it was – Ugly Betty isnt as much of a disappointment to Seven as Fortune’s failure for Nine is….plus not to meantion the financial cost

    What’s going to replace it now? Temptation?

  23. That didn’t take long….I actually like Deal but Tim Campbell wasn’t the best of hosts, we was way too Jolly – and not a Jolly in a good way…..Don’t like him as host!

  24. I’m sorry to see it going. I like Tim. Well, I suppose that that game format is now outdated and the audience prefer more to see AOK antics in Deal or No deal than anything else.

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