Other International Versions of the Masked Singer

[Gzh]

Has anyone seen video of other international versions of the show?  Saw videos of the German version which was amazing. Staging was far better, flashier, grittier,  than US version and anyone of the top 5 could have won though the winner deserved it. Even the costumes were more interesting. Germany must have less sensoring if songs likeKilling in the Name by Rage Against the Machine were performed. 
The Angel was so cool as were the Kudu, Panther, Grasshopper, and Astronaut.

[Gupwalla]

I enjoyed the clips of the German version I was able to see. The performers were very good, but also local celebs I hadn’t much heard of. Most of the performances were in English - and generally very good, at that.

I also loved the Angel, and I think he is a good reference for any US2 Leopard guesses. Angel was a feminine costume, but the singer was male and mostly sang hard metal. He turned out to be a big local comedian - totally straight/male but willing to go with a feminine costume just for the shock and laughs. And a part of me finds that very “2019” as far as evolving gender norms and attitude. Clothes are just clothes, and sometimes a boy just wants to feel pretty and get a little circulation down there. 🙂

I also saw a clip of the Dutch version, specifically a robot that was doing a tremendous job on a Spanish-language song. Supposedly the singer was thought to be female based on an earlier performance, though this song was in a male range, so it’s really causing some confusion. Could be a countertenor, or contra-alto, but in either case that robot has some vocal chords.

Sometimes the world seems like a crazy place, and a part of me loves that pop culture decided to appropriate the crazy and have some come-together fun out of it. Thanks, Korea!

Edited October 25, 2019 by Gupwalla

[SnideAsides]

Australia's version just finished its first season. It did feel a little bit like people who were there as big drawcards/to cross-promote something conveniently lasted longer than those who didn't, but also there were really only a couple of people who weren't good enough to be finalists so it didn't seem that egregious.

Also somehow Lindsay Lohan, who had never been to Australia before filming the season, wasn't the terrible judge.

[blackwing]

On 10/22/2019 at 8:39 PM, Gzh said:

Has anyone seen video of other international versions of the show?  Saw videos of the German version which was amazing. Staging was far better, flashier, grittier,  than US version and anyone of the top 5 could have won though the winner deserved it. Even the costumes were more interesting. Germany must have less sensoring if songs likeKilling in the Name by Rage Against the Machine were performed. 
The Angel was so cool as were the Kudu, Panther, Grasshopper, and Astronaut.

I've seen some of the clips of the German performers.  I particularly watched more of the Astronaut and the Grasshopper.  My understanding is that they are both professional singers?  I get that they are singing in English and it is not their first language, but I thought they were just adequate.  At times about the same as karaoke bar quality.  But YMMV.

I liked the Angel and the Panther much better than these two.  I particularly like the Panther's version of "Sucker" and would argue that it was better than the Flamingo's.

I enjoyed the Monster singing "Friends" and definitely noticed the lack of censorship... it was refreshing.

Edited October 29, 2019 by blackwing

[Was-MArsenault]

[The Crazed Spruce]

There are probably a few similarities, sure, but I don't think they've got a case. Just because someone else transcribes the same song into the same genre of music you do doesn't mean they copied you. It'd be like if Postmodern Jukebox sued somebody for making a smooth jazz version of the same song they did.

[blackwing]

They come across as very whiny and passive aggressive to me, with the sad sack eyes and the near crying.  Whatever.  "We're not complaining."  Sounds like that's exactly what they are doing.

I think in the end this is about money?  They're saying that Masked Singer Australia owes them royalties?  For a song that they themselves covered from someone else?

This kind of reminds me when people said Kris Allen on "American Idol" ripped off "his" version of Kanye's "Heartless" from somebody else.

[blackwing]

Any good place to see Australian performances?  YouTube has many of the German ones but the Australian ones all seem to be removed for copyright or whatever.  The show's official channel only has the unmaskings.

[SnideAsides]

UK version is a couple of episodes in. It'll be fascinating to see what calibre of celebrities they get, because there just isn't the "this is the end of your career" stigma around these shows in Britain the way there is in the US and to a lesser extent in Australia. Like, there still is a little bit of that, but where in America the joke is "these people aren't Stars any more", in the UK the joke is "yes, these people are Stars, but that doesn't mean we have to take this seriously" and literally everyone is in on it.

Like the person eliminated in episode two is essentially the UK's equivalent of Condoleezza Rice, and it doesn't seem too absurd that he's singing on television while dressed as a Pharaoh. Amazing.

[SnideAsides]

Holy shit, Masked Singer UK got KELIS.

[The Crazed Spruce]

Only started watching YouTube clips of TMSUK earlier this evening. Haven't even seen all of the performers yet, but their Fox is pretty damn good. But unless they bring in, say, Ringo Starr or Karen Gillam or somebody, I doubt I'll recognize many of 'em. Even after the reveal....

[SnideAsides]

That's part of the fun for me with the international versions of these kind of shows, finding out who other countries consider celebrities. Nothing will ever top New Zealand casting the CEO of their social security department on Dancing with the Stars, but there's always something quirky.

[The Crazed Spruce]

That's kinda why I'm dreading the inevitable Canadian version. 'Cause you just know that the judges would be guessing Jim Carrey, Geddy Lee, and Keifer Sutherland, while the best they'd probably be able to get would be Rick Mercer, Maestro Fresh Wes, and the bass player from The Tragically Hip.

[SnideAsides]

Oh yeah. It's like Lindsay Lohan trying to guess people on the Australian version despite never having been to Australia before filming the season. Like there was no way she was going to get everybody (though she did get a couple) but she just kept throwing out weird names like the director of Black Swan and it was kind of endearing in its insanity.

The only people on Masked Singer UK I'm reasonably confident I know are Unicorn (John Barrowman, who played Jack on Doctor Who and Torchwood and has also had a recurring role on Arrow) and Fox (Denise van Outen, actress and The Only Way is Essex narrator who did Chicago on Broadway but who I mostly picked up on because there was a bit of an Australian twang at one point in one of her clue packages and she'd literally just been in Melbourne filming a guest role on a local soap before this season was recorded). And Monster is Cee Lo Green, obviously. Everyone else, no fucking clue.

Edited January 28, 2020 by SnideAsides

[ouinason]

Well, Canada could get Ryan Reynolds.  I mean, he's done it before.... very badly.  lol

[dargosmydaddy]

And a few NHL or retired NHL players... I would enjoy that!

[SnideAsides]

"Wayne Gretzky is... The Beaver!"

[The Crazed Spruce]

I'd have said Jonathan Torrens, but let's face it, he'd probably wind up hosting it.

[Was-MArsenault]

If there was a Canadian version of the show, I would like to see someone from SCTV on it.

[The Crazed Spruce]

2 hours ago, MikaelaArsenault said:

If there was a Canadian version of the show, I would like to see someone from SCTV on it.

Since Martin Short would probably be the Ken Jeong of the panel, it would be interesting. 🙂

[Was-MArsenault]

1 minute ago, The Crazed Spruce said:

Since Martin Short would probably be the Ken Jeong of the panel, it would be interesting. 🙂

I can see him being a panelist. 🙂

[OtterMommy]

2 hours ago, The Crazed Spruce said:

Since Martin Short would probably be the Ken Jeong of the panel, it would be interesting. 🙂

And he'd probably insist that Ken Jeong was under every mask.

[Was-MArsenault]

I'm really enjoying the UK version of the show so far, but would really like to see the clue videos being posted on the YouTube channel.

[SnideAsides]

That is... not how I expected the double elimination to go. Or who I expected it to be.

[The Crazed Spruce]

The Masked Singer UK's official YouTube channel has started airing the clue packages as well as the performances. Now those of us across the pond are on even footing with the viewers in the UK! (Well, except for only knowing who maybe half these people are....)

[Was-MArsenault]

5 hours ago, The Crazed Spruce said:

The Masked Singer UK's official YouTube channel has started airing the clue packages as well as the performances. Now those of us across the pond are on even footing with the viewers in the UK! (Well, except for only knowing who maybe half these people are....)

Sweet!

[Miracle Maxie]

7 hours ago, The Crazed Spruce said:

The Masked Singer UK's official YouTube channel has started airing the clue packages as well as the performances. Now those of us across the pond are on even footing with the viewers in the UK! (Well, except for only knowing who maybe half these people are....)

Half? I'd be delighted if I even knew one! I'm a devotee of British television, but not so much with the UK top 40. None of the musicians have been familiar to me. I have some hopes for Monster and Hedgehog, though.

[The Crazed Spruce]

12 hours ago, Miracle Maxie said:

Half? I'd be delighted if I even knew one! I'm a devotee of British television, but not so much with the UK top 40. None of the musicians have been familiar to me. I have some hopes for Monster and Hedgehog, though.

Well, I'm totally lost with any footballer or British TV presenter, but I went back and recognized the lead singers of The Darkness and Scissor Sisters after the fact. And I'm convinced that the monster's Cee-Lo Green, and I'm getting some strong Elizabeth Hurley vibes from The Fox for some reason.

[SnideAsides]

Masked Singer Australia has announced the costumes for its next season. Very heavy on the Australian animal and "fancy human" costumes compared to last year.

 

Bushranger (basically this'll wind up being a Ned Kelly costume)

Cactus

Dragonfly

Echidna

Frillneck [lizard]

Goldfish

Hammerhead [shark]

Kitten

Puppet

Queen (Lindsay Lohan will guess Queen Latifah; the idiot male judge will guess Prince Charles)

Sloth

Wizard

[SnideAsides]

First two costume reveals for Masked Singer AU. Frillneck and Dragonfly:

Edited July 14, 2020 by SnideAsides

[SnideAsides]

Echidna and Wizard. Guessing they watched Masked Singer UK before making the masks:

[SnideAsides]

Cactus, Bushranger, Queen, Hammerhead, and Goldfish. Kitten has also been seen in a group photo but not officially revealed, leaving just Sloth and Puppet as unknowns.

 

Edited August 2, 2020 by SnideAsides

[SnideAsides]

Puppet and Kitten. They seem to be hiding Sloth's face for some reason, but we've seen the legs and it appears to be the annual "90% of the costume is the head" costume like all of the variations on Monster we keep getting around the world.

Puppet might be my favourite Masked Singer costume ever.

[SnideAsides]

Never mind, here is Sloth.

[SnideAsides]

Finally, a non-geoblocked promo. I hope.

 

 

[SnideAsides]

Not sure if they're geoblocked but this Youtube channel has all the performances and clue packages.

I thought I'd be missing Lindsay Lohan (who had to be replaced because of *gestures in 2020*) more than I am, but honestly her replacement Urzila Carlson is the best "funny" judge I've ever seen on any Masked Singer. I hope next season they can bring LiLo back and ditch one of the other judges (preferably Dave Hughes, but I'll gladly get rid of Jackie O too if they insist on having a man to identify the sports people, not that he ever has).

It was super weird how much easier it was to identify the people in episode 1 than it was in episode 2. Like in the first group, Queen has one of those Gladys/Patti-esque voices you can't disguise (it's Kate Miller-Heidke), and the clue packages for Goldfish and Puppet were basically beating people over the head with their identities, with the only real sticking points being "Is an Olympic taekwondo gold medallist from 20 years ago still famous enough to (1) be on this show and (2) open the season with?" and "What if we misdirect you by making it sound like Puppet is even older than you already thought?" respectively. Frillneck would be similarly obvious except there's a clue there that seems to only work if you assume this show is ignorant enough to use South Africa's flag for someone who was born in Zimbabwe (which honestly, given it's this show and on this channel, is definitely not out of the question). Dragonfly is the only real mystery in the first group, but if the groups stay the way they are next week she's easily the weakest singer there so we may not have to wait long.

The second group... like, Twitter seems to have worked out who Wizard is and it makes sense, but the other acts I was completely stumped on even before Bushranger started singing and we realised it's actually a woman under the costume.

Overall, the right two people went home, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed because they were basically two of the only three people who picked songs that aren't recent chart hits (and the third is most likely to be going next). But the thing that's interesting me the most so far is there were a LOT of flag clues in the packages (the aforementioned maybe-a-racist-fuckup South African flag and the gay pride flag for Frillneck, the Czech flag for Bushranger, Victoria's state flag for Wizard) and a LOT of puppet master references from people who aren't Puppet (which, if Puppet is a former Australian Idol judge as seems to be the case, may suggest the people with those references may be Idol finalists?).

[SnideAsides]

Production on The Masked Singer Australia has been suspended after a backup dancer caught the coronavirus. They only had the finale left to film, but it's unclear what will happen as TV productions in Melbourne were only allowed to continue through the city's current lockdown if they were already in production, and surely stopping production would force them to wait until the lockdown ends in the middle of September (when the episode should be airing) before resuming.

[Kromm]

On 8/11/2020 at 6:19 PM, SnideAsides said:

I thought I'd be missing Lindsay Lohan

I'd be surprised if you DID.  She was useless.

I don't hate her whole existence or career.  I love Mean Girls and even The Parent Trap.  I'll even give her Freaky Friday.  

But even giving all that, plus I'll even state I don't think it's impossible that someone as totally messed in the head as her might be able to launch a valid career comeback after being as far gone as she was (Amanda Bynes would be the one too far gone for that), she really came off as a dumb stunt on the episodes I saw of the Oz version.  I mean what's the point of someone who has no reasonable expectation to be able to guess ANY of the celebrities?  

[SnideAsides]

I feel like if you're going to subject is all to weeks of "I clearly know who this is but have been told to act dumb", it's way more fun to be so outlandish that nobody could possibly take you seriously. And Lindsay did somehow get a few right (including, of all people, a rugby player).

This current season though, I'm disappointed there's so many actual singers in the cast. I know they were hamstrung with the casting because 2020, but... like, we're six episodes in and so far we've lost an athlete, an athlete who previously did another reality show that was basically Singing With the Stars, and four actual singers. And if they're who everyone thinks they are, the remaining six are five actual singers and a comedian who previously won that same singing reality show. I mean, I don't really want people who absolutely can't sing, but given how many people apparently wanted to be on the show, it's a bit weird that there's so little diversity in the cast's backgrounds. I know they're getting a decent variety of singer (the remaining ones appear to be a Eurovision contestant, a musical theatre lady, a cabaret singer/playwright, the lady who sang the current version of the Neighbours theme, and a Wiggle), but still.

[SnideAsides]

I've been trying not to post all of the Masked Singer Australia performances in here after every episode, but here's two that really should be highlighted here for posterity:

(The judge reaction shots are a bit off in the latter, but it's understandable - production got shut down because a backup dancer got the coronavirus, and when they were eventually allowed to resume filming two of the judges had already returned to their home cities, so one sat in a replica studio in Sydney and another got Zoomed in via bad CGI from a New Zealand quarantine hotel.)

Edited September 14, 2020 by SnideAsides

[SnideAsides]

Masked Singer UK is back (minus Ken, thank fuck) and holy shit, the level of celebrity they seem to have gotten this season.

[seltzer3]

Okay, this is genius, lol.
The Voice UK, Viking Performs 'Take On Me' By A-Ha

 

[SnideAsides]

On 1/26/2021 at 4:13 PM, seltzer3 said:

Okay, this is genius, lol.
The Voice UK, Viking Performs 'Take On Me' By A-Ha

Yes, it is. For so SO many reasons.

[Nanny777]

I think Car Wash is Ashley Banjo....probably the best Dancer in the UK...thoughts?

[SnideAsides]

Masked Singer Australia is back September 13. Costumes include Baby, Kebab, Pinata, and Toilet Brush.

[SnideAsides]

Wow, Australia's first reveal.

Also, Vampire sang way better than I expected from the "would have gotten mocked by Ve Neill on Face Off" costume.

[SnideAsides]

Meanwhile, in Australia: 

I have no clue how they could afford (apparently) Anastacia, especially considering they've already had Macy Fucking Gray this season as well: 

Also just for camp goodness, here is a toilet doll singing It's Raining Men: