Everything Action Theater: RollerGames

If you watched the American Gladiators documentary on Netflix a few months ago, it might have been the first time you heard about the show RollerGames, which competed with American Gladiators during Gladiators’ first season.  An amped-up version of roller derby, the show was created by the owner of Roller Games, William Griffiths, Sr., which competed with Roller Derby in the 60s and 70s, and the TV production team of David Sams and Michael Miller.  The show was set in the Super Roller Dome and featured several teams competing to score points and avoid obstacles, like a pit of alligators or the Wall of Death.  There were also some wrestling-style behind-the-scenes storylines to amp up characters and drama between matches.  Despite getting good ratings and topping American Gladiators’ rocky first season, the show was canceled when its distributor, Qintex, went bankrupt.  A different distributor, LBS Communications, repackaged and redistributed the first season episodes but no new episodes were shot.  To promote the series, an NES game and arcade game were created by Konami and Williams created a RollerGames pinball machine.  There were also action figures and a soundtrack CD, featuring the show’s theme song and team-specific tracks.  You can watch the first episode of Rollergames below, thanks to YouTube.