Blackbeard's Treasure Map: Why do Some Call it a Pilot Ep.?

[nicklegends]

The consensus in this topic seems to be that "Blackbeard's Treasure Map" was the first episode of Legends. I am not convinced. Pilot episodes are usually simple demonstrations of a show's fundamental concept intended to prove that the concept is viable. As a result, these episodes are taped under a very low budget with a very simplistic set, with mechanics that might differ from the real show when it is picked up. If there was a pilot episode of Legends--which I don't think there was--then we haven't seen it: the set and format in Blackbeard's Treasure Map was just the same as every other Season 1 episode. A pilot episode for Legends would be nearly impossible with its high production value.

So, I don't think there was a pilot episode. Thoughts?

[The Bamboo Forest]

I wouldn't see why else they would air it as the first episode when Nick GaS put the loop in production order. Unless it was so bad that Nick wanted people to think it was the very first episode.

[The Mandarin Hand]

Pilots aren't always aired.  I feel that while it wasn't the pilot, it was the first real episode of production.

[rjaguar3]

I believe the show never taped a pilot.  The show was picked up on a very tight time schedule (around a month and a half)

[The Ancient Warrior]

I think it was a pilot because of the way it was produced and such.  The episode was in Layout V from start to finish, unlike "The Golden Cup of Belshazzar," which only became Layout V for the Temple Run.  It seems more logical that that one episode was done a few months beforehand, and the setup was later reused for later in the season, but that's just me.

[Notundercovercop327]

Theory I've always had speculates that they made a pilot called "Blackbeards Treasure Map" and due to some wierd technichality they had to make another episode with the same title and claim it was the first. There is no way Blackbeards Treasure map was the first episode ever made.

[rjaguar3]

Guys, taping was in a two-week period in August 1993.  Kirk was selected as host two weeks before in July 1993.  HMM, the shell production company, wasn't incorporated in California until June 24, 1993.

Kirk has said in his interviews that the show was picked up at the last minute and rushed to production.  There was no pilot that I'm aware of*--hence why the first episode took 18 hours to film.

*Although there certainly were runthroughs, such as Kirk Fogg's running of the temple before each season (as per the WCDB interview).

ETA:  From Fogg himself: "The reason I was a bad host was because I was inexperience and was hired just two weeks before the show went up and the producers had never done a pilot for this show."

(source: http://www.dailyping.com/archive/2001/05/04/ , see http://phantomsden.6.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?p=21086&highlight=#21086 for why I think it's legitimate)

[The Bamboo Forest]

Like I've said, why else would Nick GaS put it as the first episode in the production-order loop which started in 2007?

[Red Jaguars Fan]

Blackbeard's Treasure Map could have been intended for the Galileo's Cannonball's production day, but because it was the first day of production, they might have thought 4 episodes were ridiculous, so they postponed and that's why it's #1 episode produced.

Also, maybe contestants or prodution crew members were late and they had to postpone it.

Note that this is a theory.

[The Bamboo Forest]

I just find it amazing for it not to be the first, if not one of the first, episodes recorded. The atrocity of the temple run just gets me, somehow...

[The Ancient Warrior]

*BUMP*

Here's a theory that I don't understand at all:

This was the second episode to begin production, but since taping ran late, the Temple Run was filmed on a day that featured Layout V of the Temple; this was the same result as the first episode, Blackbeard's Treasure Map.

The main issue with that claim would be screencaps throughout the episode:

The Treasure Room combined with the Swamp, proving that this was either Layout IV or Layout V during the Temple Games.


The Pit of Despair rather than the Wall Climb, confirming that this was Layout V.

The Moat crossing was also the same one used in "The Oracle Bowl of Delphi" and those episodes (I know the show had a tendency to use some Moat crossings for multiple production days, but my point still stands).  From the beginning of the episode to the end, it was Layout V.

[The Bamboo Forest]

I wouldn't see why else they would air it as the first episode when Nick GaS put the loop in production order. Unless it was so bad that Nick wanted people to think it was the very first episode.

Crossing back to this quote; I did this for silliness, but I'm beginning to think that this might really have been the reason that Nick GaS put it as the first episode. The only thing that I would think make this the very first episode recorded was the atrocious temple run, and possibly GaS wanted us to think that way too. After all, the rest of the episode is filmed "normally" - on the same day as the other four "normal" S1L5 episodes, excluding Belshazzar - and that proves that it could obviously not be a pilot episode or the first episode.

[The Mandarin Hand]

It's possible that the Moat/Steps were filmed way before the day of the Games.

[PhantomBPR]

Pilots aren't always aired.  I feel that while it wasn't the pilot, it was the first real episode of production.

This

[The Bamboo Forest]

You know, like how the Double Dare pilot was done by creator Geoffrey Darby himself? Maybe either Stone or Stanley did their own pilot before they collaborated with Nickelodeon, or something like that. I think that Legends could even be derived from an earlier Stone Stanley Production, Fun House. I don't think the pilot had to do with Nickelodeon, and even if it did, it was probably too crude to show. Game show pilots aren't like sitcom pilots: they use extremely simplistic sets, and especially with such a complex set design like Legends', it would be far too unprofessional to be aired as a regular episode.

Back to Blackbeard, I really now don't think that it would be a pilot or some sort, let alone the first episode of regular production. Think about it: it shares temple game props and a Moat crossing with the other four episodes taped completely in S1L5, and of course temple layout.

TMH, could you clarify what you mean by your last statement? Do you mean Blackbeard or Belshazzar, because I know for a fact that if it was Blackbeard, then why were the soapy slope, the peanut-filled shaft, and the pulley-pole were all used later in the other S1L5 episodes?