PIX! PIX! PIX! PIX!! PIX!!!!!

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Now here's one that will separate the pop culture boys from the men! Well, okay, not really (actually, it will demonstrate which of us are really over-the-hill).

Does anyone here remember the WPIX (TV station around/about New York) afternoon game contest, where the lucky contestant would get to compete against a modified Intellivision set (usually the Space Invaders game, or, for the really cool people, the Football game), and their sole command in hopes of controlling the game was to shout "PIX" over and over again?

I was trying to remember more about this strangely ingratiating afternoon ritual. What did they have to do to get on? Wasn't there some kind of "Secret Password of the Day"? Also, what would they win, if they got enough points? Wasn't it some free pass to a roller derby (or maybe a free Intellivision set)?

― Joe, Friday, 19 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I remember this well but always thot Chnl 11 sucked for having lame stuff like Family Affair and the Yankees. Channel 5 was the shit with all kinds of cool stuff like What's Happening, Love American Style and kung fu on Sat. Plus Bob McAlister gave away a Ross Apollo 3 spd=rocked. wockadoo wockadoo wockadoo.

Mitigating WPIX factor: yule log, Courtship of Eddie's Father.

― Hunter, Friday, 19 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

San Francisco station did this as well, late seventies. You had to shout "POW!" there instead.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 19 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

PIX on the East Coast, with a parallel POW on the West. That's very David Lynch.

― Joe, Saturday, 20 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah, I remember all that. I don't remember what the prizes were, either.

I don't think it involved a "modified" sound-activated Intellivision game at all, though. It was probably some dorky station-hand trying to press the joystick button whenever the kids shouted "PIX", and since most kids went for the splatter approach, accuracy really matter much.

― Michael Daddino, Saturday, 20 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah, I remember "Pix! Pix! Pix!" too. I think that one of my grade- school classmates even played on it one day. Don't think he won anything doing it, but it made him King of the Playground for a long time.

And yeah, WNEW had better cartoons than WPIX -- Channel 5 had Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, and Battle of the Planets. Then again, Channel 11 had Courageous Cat and Minute Mouse and Tom and Jerry. And Chiller Theater (chiiilller!!!!).

― Tadeusz Suchodolski, Saturday, 20 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

WOR had The Magic Garden. Don't forget that.

― Michael Daddino, Saturday, 20 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Ooh, good point about Courageous Cat but ESPECIALLY _Chiller Theater_ which as a 5 year old I would beg on hands and knees just to see the intro. "CHIIILLLERRR", with that f'ed up hand coming out of the ground sent my little brain into paroxysms of ecstatic terror. Ecstatic terror? Yes, ecstatic TERROR!

― Hunter, Saturday, 20 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yes, but WLVI (Channel 56) In MA had the "Creattture Double Feattture" (echo echo echo).

― Joe, Monday, 22 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

one year passes...

Glad to see other people remember this too. TV PIX was a simulated Intelevision game. Prizes included Tote bags and cameras. Channel 11 was known for 2 big things Tom and Jerry and THE YANKEES!!!!

― Steven Starrow, Saturday, 29 November 2003 16:45 (twenty-one years ago)

hah! Omigod, Pix, I had forgotten. I used to watch it and be entraced by the bad graphics videogames. And then I moved upstate, and there was a classic rock (well, they didn't call it that at the time, it was just contemporary rock then) station called WPYX, which I thought was very wrong.

― THAT Kate (kate), Monday, 8 December 2003 12:44 (twenty-one years ago)

it was very funny to little suburbanites like myself and my friends when spanish kids from NYC were the ones saying PIX! PIX! PIX! PIX! PIX!!!!!!

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Monday, 8 December 2003 23:50 (twenty-one years ago)

three months pass...

What the hell was that PIX!!! PIX!!!! PIX!!!! thing? It confused the hell out of me when I was a kid. No wonder we're all wacked out of our skulls. What was the point of it, for that matter?Fortunately, I lived in an area where not only did I get NYC stations but Philly stations as well, so I could watch all the cool cartoons and What's Happenin'? on Channel 29.

Those were the good old days when the Mets were the better New York team. Oh well, the Evil Pinstripe Empire always seems to prevail, but at least they lost the last 2 world series they've been in. Mind you, it sounds schizophrenic but I actually like both the Mets and the Yankees. It must have something to do with living in Jersey.

― Jereme L, Friday, 12 March 2004 03:15 (twenty-one years ago)

Who could forget the Crazy Eddie commercials, though? Too bad he went to jail and had to be extradited from Israel. Those commercials were the best right along with Carvel advertising for Fudgie the Whale and Cookiepuss.

New York loves San Georgio, Great Spaghetti in a great spaghetti town!

― Jereme L, Friday, 12 March 2004 03:22 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh My God, TV PIX!!!!

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 12 March 2004 03:29 (twenty-one years ago)

Wasn't there some kind of "Secret Password of the Day"?

In order to play, you had to name the "TV Pix Pal" of the day (like Tony Randall or Magilla Gorilla or someone).

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 12 March 2004 03:30 (twenty-one years ago)

When I lived in upstate NY I used to watch Full House and Saved by the Bell reruns on WPIX.

― latebloomer (latebloomer), Friday, 12 March 2004 03:38 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.quartzcity.net/albums/nyc2004/IMG_0966.jpg

― Elvis Telecom (Chris Barrus), Friday, 12 March 2004 03:43 (twenty-one years ago)

which is to say, on xmas eve in nyc, we found a station running an all-new yule log! we were so happy.

― stockholm cindy (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 12 March 2004 03:44 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.theyulelog.net/

― stockholm cindy (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 12 March 2004 03:46 (twenty-one years ago)

eight years pass...

I wanna talk to that Lou Reed about that WPIX malware.

― Stranded In the Jungle Groove (James Redd and the Blecchs), Saturday, 16 February 2013 14:02 (twelve years ago)

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