Students can’t go wrong with daytime classic 'The Price Is Right'

Although its loyal fan base generally consists of retired grandparents and sick kids spending the day home from school, I find myself hopelessly drawn to the bright colors, bright lights, and bright T-shirts that color CBS’s classic game show “The Price is Right.”

Best watched in pajamas and without qualms about yelling the estimated retail values of over-the-counter drugs and mahogany furniture at the television set, “The Price is Right” is shameless about its flashy charms—making it the guiltiest of pleasures, and one of the most widely held, at that.

The game show has defended its daily time slot despite its status as a program that’s lost in time. Few shows, especially game shows, have so successfully clung to their antiquities—just think of the set upgrades, the reboots, and the cancellations of programs that are simply too steeped in the culture of the moment to survive beyond their 15 fanatical minutes (RIP “American Juniors” and “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy”).

Though it was once a poster child for wholesome, sunny family fun, today’s game show today is dark, cold, and detached, epitomized by NBC’s overtly businesslike “Deal or No Deal.” “The Price is Right,” however, skillfully banks on the implicit romance of game shows and their callbacks to an idyllic yesterday.

New host Drew Carey radiates the same old-timey warmth as the legendary Bob Barker, and honors the show’s traditional character by toting around Barker’s trademark oversized microphone. Funnyman Carey is perhaps even more lovable as he goofily chuckles his way through encounters with contestants who grow crazier by the minute.

But “The Price is Right” is grounded in such giddiness. What other emotion could a Plinko chip teetering on the peg separating zero and $1000 evoke aside from nail-biting, seat-gripping, (and thankfully fleeting) madness? And when the prize curtains draw to reveal a poofy-haired model gesturing towards that brand new car, glee is but an emotional knee jerk.

At its best, “The Price is Right” is an accessible program that uses the figurative and literal bells and whistles of the American game show in a most addictive manner. At its worst, it gives viewers little else beyond a reminder to control the pet population and get their dogs spayed or neutered. In game show terms, that still sounds like a win-win.

“The Price is Right” airs at 11 a.m. weekdays on CBS.