Crashbox

About the Show

Crashbox is a show that aired on HBO Family in 1999. There are many of brain teasers for kids. I love this show because it has lots of fun puzzles to solve. I watched this alot in the afternoons.

Games Played

• Radio Scramble-A talking microphone DJ nicknamed Jumpin' Johnnie Jumble (based on Wolfman Jack) has the viewers unscramble a word that is the title of the song that he plays at the KBOX radio station. He will sometimes also deliver traffic (as Captain Copter), commercials, sports (as Billy Bull), or weather reports (as April Showers) that also are anagram puzzles.
• Mug Shots-Detective Verity Wisenheimer has the viewers look at the interrogated testimony from four photographed suspects of a crime where they must find out who is telling the truth and which three of them are lying as they each state where they were when the crime was happening. The viewer solves the puzzle by spotting the contradictions or factual inaccuracies in each suspect's testimonies. Each of the suspects are played by live-action people. When the innocent suspect is identified, the game ends.
• Think Tank-Inside a fish tank, a Jamaican submarine captain named Cap'n Bob (loosely based on Bob Marley) tells the viewers to figure out what each set of three things that appears have in common before the water in his tank drains.
• Sketch Pad-A beatnik named Sketch Pad draws pictures of scenarios where something seemingly doesn't make sense. The goal of the game is to try to guess the event or outcome that would make the story make sense.
• Distraction News-A cardboard-cutout, blonde-haired anchorwoman named Dora Smarmy provides informative news segments while distractive images (some of which from other games) appear during the broadcast. The object is to see how well the viewers were able to remember key facts from the broadcast without being distracted.
• Revolting Slob-A documentary-esque puppet sketch where a polite female voice uses the Revolting Slob (a slovenly manchild with several disgusting habits) to describe three three-choice answer vocabulary questions. The sketch ends with a word, typically related to destruction or explosions, resulting in the Revolting Slob exploding, followed by the polite voice mentioning "No slobs were harmed in the filming of this show." Each segment revolves around a revolting or strange event performed by the Revolting Slob.
• Dirty Pictures-In an art museum that is closed for cleaning, a maid dusts off a picture with a wooden "Old Fossil" guard holding up cards that give the hints of the person in the dusty painting. Once the main painting and name plate are dusted off, one last comment is shown by the Old Fossil before the museum doors close, ending the game.
• Poop or Scoop-A purple carnival ringmaster gives four facts about animals, and the viewers must guess whether they are true or false.
• Eddie Bull-Eddie Bull (anthro rodent) gives viewers a number of hints to what animal at the Walla Walla Washington Zoo ate him. Once the animal is identified, Eddie is regurgitated, and the game then ends.
• Captain Bones-A pirate skeleton named Captain Bones has the viewers solve math problems, picture puzzles, and math riddles by having his bones form the equation or picture, often having the viewers move a limited number of his bones to pull it off. Throughout the game, Captain Bones will openly mock and demean the viewers using several pirate-esque insults, eventually becoming so irate that he blurts out the answer in rage.
• Ten Seconds-A supercomputer gives the viewers ten seconds to solve each of four or five rebus puzzles (depending on the season) and guess the answer. At the end of the game, the announcer signs off, ending the game.
• Riddle Snake-An unseen Asian raj reads the riddles from the pungi-playing Riddlesnake that the viewers must solve. The Riddlesnake charms a man, who blows a kazoo, revealing the answer to the riddle. This segment is typically played as the final game in most episodes.
• Psycho Math-A hot-headed robot named Professor Rocket gives the viewers long math problems for them to solve with countable pictures or descriptions of numbered things.
• Haunted House Party-A haunted house party hosted by the unseen Horrid One has ghosts attend as the viewer must identify the mystery guest of honor by listening to clues said about them, often accompanied by the butler or other party guests. When all the clues have been said, the Horrid One recaps them to the viewers before the historical figure is revealed in cardboard cutout form after a bright flash of lightning.
• Ear We Are-Two ears describe sounds to each other for the viewers to guess the event or place to which they are flying travelling.
• Paige and Sage-Paige and Sage are two identical twins, represented by Mattel doll-lookalikes (similar to Barbie). The game features the girls hanging out at two versions of a given location, with the player being asked to spot 10 differences between Paige (left) and Sage's (right) side of the screen in the span of 60 seconds. A valley girl narrates the segment, and recaps the differences while poking fun at the twins, or pointing out strange characters and scenarios in the pictures.
• Lens McCracken-A noir comic-styled segment features the titular near-sighted detective, Lens McCracken, develop pictures for a case he's working on. His camera lens is broken, however, resulting in zoomed-in and blurry pictures that the viewers must figure out what they're supposed to be. A stumped Lens then feeds the photos to his dark-room contraption, the Solutionator, and ends the segment by piecing together a nonsensical story from the zoomed-out photos.
• Word Shake-Chef Pierre, an artificially intelligent French-American chef (as shown in a nickelodeon machine modeled like a Chef), demonstrates two-to-four letters, words or phrases that are to be used by the viewers to combine into one word or phrase, such as the letters "D" and "K" to form "decay" and the words "disturb" and "honey" to make "the Easter Bunny". The sketch usually ends with Chef Pierre racing across the kitchen as it explodes with flour, before falling over.

My Top 5 Games

1. Radio Scramble
2. Mug Shots
3. Think Tank
4. Ear We Are
5. Word Shake