Shark Tank Fans Shared Some Brutally Honest Opinions On The Live Show
ABC's popular reality show about entrepreneurs trying to persuade business moguls to invest in their companies kicked off Season 14 with a brand new format. For its season premiere, "Shark Tank" broadcast a live, unedited episode shot in front of a live studio audience for the first time ever. During a normal episode of "Shark Tank", about five entrepreneurs will come on the show and pitch their products or ideas in front of the panel of 'sharks' who will then provide offers to the entrepreneurs for a stake in their company. With the live show, however, the "Shark Tank" producers had to throw that established pace out of the window for the sake of keeping the show on time — and a lot of fans took note of that.
Throughout the hour-long live season premiere, fans were taking to Reddit to voice their opinions on the show, and the general consensus among many viewers is that the format needs some serious work. Like user Lower_Alternative770 said, "There's a lot to be said for editing."
Fans say this isn't something that should be attempted again
The live show kicked off with an audience-fueled, arena-style entry for the sharks, with the live announcer getting the crowd pumped up for each of the panel members. Then it was on to the first pitch. A couple selling compostable underwear entered the stage and their backstory was given through a pre-produced video that showed off their company and family.
The audience would cheer wildly for sharks and entrepreneurs throughout the episode, which many considered to be distracting. "The cheering for everything is so annoying," said Redditor u/wakematt. The live audience wasn't the only distraction to the normally formulaic show; the sharks would also be guilty of talking over one another on a fairly frequent basis. So, with the combination of the sharks talking over one another and the audience making noise, things get hard to follow quickly. "This yelling over each other is so messy. The audience is making it worse," complained u/la_58.
There wasn't much good to be said about the live episode, with the only person receiving any praise being someone you've probably never heard of or seen before: the announcer Phil Crowley. "At least the announcer was really good live lol," noted u/Firebird12301. Redditor u/__SerenitybyJan__ agreed, writing, "He was the best, and arguably the only redeemable part of the episode."
But even though Crowley had a good showing on the live premiere, it wasn't enough to win fans over. "What the f*** am I watching," u/Uehm asked, to which u/No2reddituser cleverly replied, "The shark jumping itself." It's probably safe to say that this experiment shouldn't be repeated.