‘Floor is Lava: Season 2’ Review (Netflix)
It’s crazy to think that this time last year we were going through one of the toughest periods of time in human history! We spent just under two years being forced to stay at home and being told that it was actually illegal to see more than one other household. Nightclubs, cinemas, restaurants etc., were closed down which meant that, as a society, we turned to the TV to provide the required entertainment to see people through this very difficult time. We saw an obsession with Netflix that was unlike anything we have ever seen before. People were looking for a sense of escapism from the terrible events that were occurring around the world and so turned to fictional worlds to help them cope. The almost cult-like following of shows such as Tiger King brought with it a chaotic and eccentric world that was a fantastic distraction from everything that was happening around the world!
Sometimes, however, it was not about viewers being transported to a time before COVID but sometimes about some light relief to help people get through those insanely tough few months! Season one of Floor is Lava brought with it some light comic relief and childlike fun that was produced at a time when we as a global community needed it the most! Based on the Tik Tok phenomenon of the same name, the show invited teams to try and complete a domesticated obstacle course that was partially submerged with lava! The idea of climbing on furniture and decorations really tapped into the silly and childish fun that helped everyone to forget (even for just a moment) that they were experiencing one of the most intense restrictions on the wider world!
This season of the Floor is Lava plays with many of the original ideas introduced during season one. The show has kept the idea of trios competing to clear the obstacle course as fast as possible, with the lava being a definitive end to any competitor who falls into it. The show also decided to bring back many of the more exciting theatrics with secret buttons, actions and traps that had associated alterations to the course which helped to inject even more excitement into the course.The course themselves were yet again modelled after domestic settings such as garages, living rooms, bedrooms etc with related objects providing a range of routes to the finish line.
This iteration of the show had three teams compete as they race against one another to complete the course with the top two teams going through to again compete against one another in race up of a volcano. From a logical standpoint, the volcano inclusion made sense as it provides an answer of where all the lava appeared from and provided another opportunity for a dramatic race to win the cash prize of $10,000. I do have to say however that the climax of this course saw the teams placing stones on the top of the volcano, which did fall a bit flat. Each person must scale the volcano and carry up a stone; which they individually place at the top of the erupting volcano, which did lead to many awkward and clumsy moments of people having to squeeze past one another at the top. While this new inclusion made sense narratively, I think it still needs some fine-tuning to really amp up the drama and intensity of scaling a volcano! What I thought was fairly clever this season, however, was the grouping of trios into a related theme for the episode. We saw categories such as comedy trips, sports enthusiasts (with martial arts black belts, ballet dancers and kickballers) as well as parents all being grouped together. This grouping allowed for a natural built narrative to the episode with an instant rivalry to be built between contestants before they had even met! It would have been be very special if the course were adapted to also play on these thematic groupings, and while I understand the cost implications of many unique courses, this would have really been a nice throughline across episodes.
Towards the end of the season, we saw the introduction of a series of semi-famous faces who competed to try and win the cash prize. We saw the return of the Virzi triplets who also competed on season one of the show, which was a nice nod to the previous season. We saw Tayler Holder, who is a Tik Tok megastar, try to scale the course; and we saw the team of social media stars including Lorray, Santea and Mario Selman but most surprisingly we saw Harry Jowsey from Too Hot to Handle try and complete the course! Harry is known for being very arrogant from his time on the show but he seems to have really matured in recent years. While very confident throughout, he didn’t appear to take himself too seriously as he was stuck upside on a dart board or slipped across a dance machine! Harry and his team made sure to congratulate the social media team they competed against which showed a much more respectable side to these young men!
Overall, season two of Floor is Lava is a very light-hearted show that may have slightly missed out on the necessity of season one but was still very entertaining in its own right. The new additions to the show helped to amp the tension and made sense narratively which was great to see but there are still some changes needed to help the show smoothly transition into their future seasons!
