Irish Examiner January 16th - After The Floor is Lava, they should remake Kick the can

It’s that time of year isn’t it? When you kind of watch any old thing that’s on, slumped indoors, an Irish human bear scratching around in the den in mid-Hibernia-nation.  In the old days when there was less telly to watch, so it could be anything from Mart and Market to The Sullivans. (An Australian soap opera set during World War 2 that travelled at the same pace in time as World War 2)

Now with streaming, the choice is infinite, but impulses are the same. This is a longwinded way of saying I’m watching “The Floor Is Lava.” with the children. They are making the transition from cartoons to “real life programmes” which means more cake-based stuff (‘Is It Cake?’) and home makeover shows. (‘Dream Home Makeover’ where the main point is that everyone should be joy-crying by the end of it.)

And a show about people trying to avoid falling into fake lava. It comes from the game played by children (and a surprising amount of adults) where you try and cross a room by jumping from furniture to furniture without touching the floor. You don’t want to touch the floor because the floor is lava and no one wants incineration.

There are three series of it but obviously we went back to season 1. You can’t just jump into the middle of The Floor Is Lava. You need to carefully pick a path through the episodes.

It’s not the only obstacle game of course on telly. There is Ireland’s Fittest Families where families take the most awkward way imaginable to travel around a bog and their coaches try to find 110 different ways to say “You have to give it 110%” without saying “Cmontaf*ck wouldjee!”.

Ireland’s Fittest Families contestants mightn’t make it through the screening process for TFIL. There’s no space for ”shurlookit” and “I spose”. Many The Floor Is Lava contestants are some of the most U! S! A! people you’ll ever see, whooping and hollering like they’ve just insurrected at Congress. But by and large the ones you dislike the most are the most likely to fail ignominiously, biffing their bonce off the corner of a slippery dressing table and sliding into the syrupy goop.

It does beg the question: what other children’s games could make it into TV? Kiss-chase, with its loose definition of consent, is a no-no but a good old fashioned tip-hunt must be an option. Complete with referees weighing into disputes about whether you actually did “get me” or not. Also the rules around who is “on” first will need to be cleared up.

Red Rover is a natural choice but a bit more jeopardy will probably need to be added. Teams of MMA athletes trying to break through the line and they lose a significant amount of money if they get captured.  ‘In and out the Dusty Bluebells’ in the playground is a charming little game where a child weaves in and out of a circle of handholding classmates. But what if there’s an Irish Ranger shouting foul mouthed abuse at them while they do so?

The ultimate would be Kick the Can – a slightly confusing game we played in Deerpark CBS where you kicked the empty coke can on the ground and then got the shite kicked out of you. I don’t know the exact details but if they can make Bridge of Lies with Ross Kemp, they can make Kick The Can.

There was also a game where someone took the easi singles out of my cheese sandwiches and through them at someone, but I’ve heard TV execs are nervous about the food-waste implications of that.

So who knows, next year when you’re in your cave scratching your bits, next year an old favourite may be on your screens.