Variety Review: Running Man Episode 555

**Note: News came out that Kwangsoo will be retiring from the show. I don’t know when they’ll film his last episodes, but it wasn’t yet mentioned in the show. Prepare your hearts for a whole new dynamic.**


Guests: None


My Entertainment Score: 8 out 10 laughs


This was a pretty good episode. The flow worked nicely and the games were generally entertaining. I was a little sad that they skipped over some of them, but overall no big complaints. It was nice to return (in a small way) to the original escape room concept of the show. *Sigh* Anyone else miss the early years of the show?


What Happened


Theme: Escape Empty Head Land


Entrance Exam (start of episode- 27:40)


The members enter a large room with doors numbered 1-8. Each member goes into a room and the staff locks them in, much to their surprise. They are instructed to get on the computers and take an exam to determine who is the smartest. They have to earn 100 total points to escape. Each wrong answer is -10 points. Correct answers are valued based on their difficulty. An elementary school level problem would be worth 10. middle grades questions would be worth 15. high school level questions would be worth 25. A college or bar exam level question would be worth 70 points. After 30 minutes, the point values were doubled.


This proceeds much as you would expect with a couple surprises.


MY RACE EXPLANATION


This wasn’t laid out in a time-stamp easy way in the episode. The episode had a great flow and it wasn’t confusing at all to watch, but for the purposes of the article, it wasn’t super helpful. The game explanation happened during both the first 2 segments and there is a twist I’ll add in a separate section at the same point that it's revealed in the show.


They have to escape Empty Head Land in 6 hours. The first 6 members to get through the entrance exam are “Geniuses of Running Man.” They are given separate instructions that they will be working to beat the 2 ‘dunces’ at escaping. There is a prize for the winning team in the form of cash and a punishment for the losing team. The geniuses are told that the dunces are going to be unaware of this split and so they should act as if they are all one team.


After a round (one game), the geniuses will enter an ‘escape room’ where they will have 5 minutes to solve problems that will give them one digit on one of three locks. The locks each have 4 digits, so with 3 correct questions, they can easily work through the 10 numbers to unlock the lock. With those locks open, they can presumably escape and win the prize money. The difficulty of the questions will be determined by the results of the missions the dunces carry out.


First Round (27:40- 43:15)


Game (27:40- 36:16)

The first game was an intelligence test. For the test, 35 color words are written in other colors. So the word “blue” might be written in the color red. They must read out the colors of the words, not the words themselves, so in my example, they would say ‘red’. They have 30 seconds to accurately say the color of all 35 words to start. A second is added for every 2 members that are wrong. They have to take turns playing until 3 members succeed.


I laughed so hard, but then I had my family try it out and they couldn’t pass with any speed either, so I guess I’m the weird one here. Lol


Escape Room Missions (36:16- 43:15)

The geniuses have to put historical things in chronological order, accurately identify big cats by their pictures and other things. It’s a struggle.


The dunces are tasked with bouncing a ping pong ball down a staircase of boxes and have it land in a cup. That is also a struggle.


Second Round (43:15- 52:50)

Game (43:15- 48:41)

The second game is general knowledge. A picture of the world is put on a roulette. The members will take turns guessing the name of a country that they choose by poking the roulette with painted fingers. The difficulty level is increased by making the members do 7 elephant spins before they walk up to the roulette. Three people needed to pass. The members got increasingly ridiculous with their paint.


Escape Room Missions (48:41- 52:50)

The geniuses continue to struggle to answer various questions and they begin to get suspicious of the dunces having a mission of their own.


Third Round (51:54- 1:13:30)


Game (51:54- 59:35)

For the third game, the members roll dice numbered 3-8 to determine how many of the group must match. They are given a proverb and all have to make a gesture to describe the proverb. If enough of them match (depending on the dice roll) they will move on to the escape room mission.


Escape Room Missions (59:35- 1:07:15)

The geniuses express their suspicions about the dunces and redouble their efforts to get through the locks.


The twist for the game is revealed! 


While the geniuses are in the escape room, the dunces are actually entering the 8 rooms from the entrance exam and trying to answer 1 question in each to get the 8-digit code that will unlock the real exit door that is hidden in the main room. When the geniuses open the escape room, they will receive the rules about the real exit.



Final Results (1:07:15- end of show)

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Game Montage and Seventh Round Game (1:07:15- 1:08:52)

They showed that several more rounds were played in short clips until the geniuses were close to opening the escape room door.


The game is to kneel on one knee. Holding the ankle of the leg flat to the floor, stand without using your other hand. Four people needed to succeed to get to the escape room missions. I found this completely impossible to do. I tried for about 15 minutes. 


Escape Room Games (1:08:52- 1:12:51)

The geniuses are certain that the dunces are up to something so they work extremely hard to beat the escape room locks. After learning the truth, they rush out to try to beat the dunces to the code out of the true door.

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Mad Scramble and Results (1:12:51- 1:19:00)

There is a mad scramble to solve problems and the 6 hour time limit is almost up: 7 minutes to go. Does anyone manage to get out and get the prize?


Punishment (1:19:00- end of show)

The losers for the day had to wear wigs and make up to make themselves look stupid and then create a new version of a “airhead” meme (of Sechan) that had gotten popular in Korea recently. This may have been my favorite part of the show...its top 3 for sure.


Preview: We Will Find Spring For You...I’m not so sure about that. Next week, the ladies are going to be ‘clients’ looking for a man in a dating service atmosphere-Running Man Style. I am scared for them. You can do it, Jihyo! You can do it, Somin!

















!!!Spoilers!!!


Entrance Exam

1st- Jaesuk

2nd- Jongkook

3rd- Jihyo!!!

4th- Kwangsoo

5th- Somin

6th- Sechan

Failed to finish- Haha and Seokjin


Final Results

Jaesuk figures out that there is another option for opening the real exit. He simply knocks. The language that had been used throughout the show to mean “air head” is ‘tok tok’ which can be used to imply a person is empty-headed (like the knock-knock, nobody is home insult in English) but it is also how you say “knock knock” or “knocking” in Korean. Jaesuk realizes that the ‘tok tok’ is written on signs all over the place and, without any confidence, tries knocking. He wins in for the geniuses and the dunces face the punishment.

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