Game Changer Recap: Factory Settings

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Sometimes I wish Dropout shows weren’t edited so heavily for laughs. This is especially true of Crowd Control, a spin-off of Game Changer where comedians talk to people with interesting lives. The editing often cuts the conversations down to quick jokes, making it feel unnatural and preventing any real discussion. We rarely get to hear audience members finish their thoughts, and it seems like the comedians aren’t truly listening – just waiting for a chance to make fun of what they say.

Usually, Game Changer episodes flow well and keep you engaged. However, “Night Shift” feels different – it’s obvious a lot of footage was cut out. While the episode is funny, it’s been edited so aggressively to only include quick jokes and funny moments that important parts of the story and action are missing.

The participants included Rekha Shankar with Katie Marovitch, Siobhan Thompson with Grant O’Brien, and Lily Du with Raphael Chestang.

The game pits two teams against each other in a quirky factory challenge. One team – Rekha, Siobhan, and Lily (the ‘day shift’) – works for three minutes to complete silly assignments. Then, the second team – Katie, Grant, and Raph (the ‘night shift’) – takes over, trying to figure out what the first team was doing based on clues left at their workspaces.

I haven’t played any games quite like this before, but the factory environment and strange jobs remind me of the show “The Everything Factory” (specifically season 2, episode 5). The addition of a nighttime setting makes things even more challenging.

Okay, so “Night Shift” was a lot. Honestly, it felt really packed with stuff happening. The way they structured the challenges was interesting – everything revolved around these numbered job sheets at each contestant’s station, kind of like a countdown. It made things visually busy, but also helped keep track of what everyone was tackling, though it did feel a little chaotic.

Task 10: Given a laundry hamper full of socks in mismatched balls, reball them into matched pairs.

The sketch begins calmly, with Rekha Shankar, Siobhan, and Lily attempting to create the signature, chaotic humor of Dropout while doing laundry. Siobhan jokingly questions if the scene is working, asking if anyone is enjoying watching them. Lily then playfully points out that the setup feels like an excuse to make the women perform housework, implying they’re being tested on how ‘domesticated’ they are.

The characters immediately understand the situation when they’re told their time is limited. Rekha jokes that a chaotic group of people is on their way, while Siobhan worries she’s been assigned a particularly difficult client named Grant, unknowingly foreshadowing a later joke.

Things get much busier during the night shift. Katie, Grant (working with Siobhan), and Raph are quickly told they have only three minutes to start, so each of them immediately jumps into a different assignment. When the day shift returns – signaled by rooster sounds, a sunrise animation, and the familiar music of Edvard Grieg’s “Morning Mood” – Rekha swiftly completes her sock-matching thanks to Katie understanding what needed to be done and lending a hand. Producer Paul Robalino, dressed in a hard hat and safety vest, playfully introduces himself as “Paul Foremanlino” to check Rekha’s work and approve her progress.

Task 9: Reball the same socks into mismatched triplets.

As soon as Rekha begins work on task nine, things become intensely competitive. Siobhan and Lily loudly complain about how the previous shift messed things up. The day crew starts playfully teasing each other like factory workers, with Rekha acting overly enthusiastic to please their supervisor, and Lily taking on a rebellious role, pushing for better benefits and trying to rally everyone against management. Siobhan generally goes along with Lily’s actions while also noticing that the night shift didn’t receive clear directions, and attempts to fix this.

Task 8: Remove all the rubber bands wrapped around a watermelon.

With task eight underway, Chris Grace started a nighttime shop filled with quirky items like a Sam Reich bobblehead, newspapers, and cacti. The catch? Buying these things took time away from the day shift workers’ scheduled hours. Since none of the initial items were helpful or necessary, Grant and Katie were essentially costing their coworkers work time for no good reason. Raph pointed out they had negatively impacted their colleagues, and he was right. Siobhan then wondered if they could intentionally cause problems for the other team.

Soon after, the day shift began requesting a pizza party. Rekha explained to Sam that while production numbers were increasing, employee happiness seemed to be declining. She suggested a party could help boost morale and turn those frowns upside down.

Task 7: Blow up 25 balloons.

A decorative element during the balloon challenge briefly throws the show off track. When each contestant arrives at this party-themed part of the competition, a piñata hangs above their workspace. Despite Sam’s repeated attempts to tell them otherwise, nearly everyone assumes they’re supposed to break it.

Sam: “I should mention again that these piñatas are merely decorative.”

Rekha: [furiously whacks piñata over and over]

Sam: “Rekha, you were my star!”

Rekha: “I do not feel appreciated!”

Lily: “Maybe if she got that pizza party?”

Rekha and Lily: [continue viciously beating the piñatas]

Sam: “And that’s from players who knew the task!”

Lily: [menaces Sam with a piñata stick]

Rekha: “Wait… he’s the piñata!”

The day shift suddenly turns on Sam, attacking him with piñata sticks. The scene immediately cuts to the night shift, where Katie and Raph are aggressively hitting their own piñatas, set to a fast-paced piece of music. Grant asks Chris about boxing gloves now being sold in the store, but Katie quickly grabs them, almost knocking Chris over. Chris points out he also has a dog cone collar available, and Katie snatches that up as well.

Task 6: Sort a mixed pile of Oreos by mint and wasabi flavor

The editing in this episode starts to feel disjointed here. The quick cut between Katie eagerly showing off the gloves and collar at night, and Rekha already wearing them and struggling with balloons during the day is amusing. However, the mood noticeably shifts between shots. Rekha suddenly appears subdued and quiet, and the playful, competitive atmosphere of the day shift is gone. The quirky factory workers are nowhere to be seen, balloons are finished everywhere, and everyone is working together. Also, Siobhan’s shark piñata is just…gone. (Did someone finally win, and we missed it?) It feels like important events happened without us seeing them.

One of the funniest parts of the episode is the Oreo challenge. Siobhan and Rekha work together to sort the cookies, while Grant repeatedly makes silly mistakes and suffers the consequences, mostly embarrassment. He messes up their careful sorting by separating the Oreos based on the color of the cream—red versus green. When that doesn’t work, he starts frantically twisting open cookies, trying to match red and green cream fillings.

The next morning, Lily was shocked by the enormous mess and jumped to the conclusion that the night shift team had also been involved. She declared, “There’s no way one person did all this!” (Everyone on the day shift was completely stunned.) They then turned their anger onto Paul Foremanlino, playfully teasing him about a nonexistent family he should be rushing home to. The joking quickly escalated into inappropriate behavior – they flirted with him, and then falsely accused him of sexual harassment, claiming unwanted physical contact and lewd messages.

For the first time, the team manages to leave a message for the next shift: “Wasabi vs. mint, not color,” written in messy red Oreo filling on a workstation. Grant is confused when he reads it. “Wait, are they saying we have to taste—” he begins, before taking a large bite of a wasabi Oreo and instantly regretting it. “You’re not actually making us try all of these, are you?” Raph asks Sam. Sam, who hasn’t been the focus much during this challenge, simply raises an eyebrow at the camera – a perfect reaction for future memes from Game Changer.

Raph and Grant are repeatedly trying wasabi Oreos, with Raph reacting dramatically and Grant looking uncomfortable. When Grant finishes sorting the cookies, Katie jokingly assumes Paul will have to taste-test them all again. One of the funniest moments is Raph’s expression – a mix of frustration and amusement – when Paul simply smells the Oreos instead of eating them. It’s a scene ripe for becoming a popular meme.

For Task 5, participants need to photograph people forming the letters “YMCA” with their bodies. Each person can only submit one photo during their assigned time slot.

This is the simplest part of the process, as capturing a single photo is very quick. Because of this, the editing becomes quite disjointed and difficult to follow. It’s hard to tell how much time elapses or how many teams worked on the photos, especially since the daytime photos aren’t well-composed and the nighttime team has to make sense of them.

Okay, so Chris was working the night shift and brought in these things to help us communicate better between shifts – stickers, wooden alphabet blocks, and those magnetic poem sets. Grant, though? He totally wrote them off as junk. Chris, being Chris, pointed out what they were for with a little sarcasm, and Grant’s face… seriously, it was the same look he gets when he tries a wasabi Oreo – pure shock and discomfort!

Grant tries using magnetic poetry, but it only results in strange and unclear messages from the daytime team. Lily responds by leaving Raph another messy Oreo-based clue, and Rekha decorates her area with yellow streamers spelling out “YMCA.” Grant grumbles about receiving a confusing message we don’t get to see. It’s hard to tell what the night shift is even doing! They seem to finally understand the challenge only when Siobhan asks a cameraman to give the nighttime team instructions – which feels like an unfair advantage. Meanwhile, the day shift suddenly all start wearing eye-black makeup for no apparent reason. I’m hoping the behind-the-scenes footage will explain this, or what happened to the piñata that vanished earlier.

The night shift now has a strange new addition: Demi Adejuyigbe plays a mysterious, shadowy figure who resembles a character from The X-Files. The night shift crew can ask him yes-or-no questions, but each question costs their day-shift partners a minute of work time. Demi delivers some witty lines and funny physical comedy throughout the episode. However, only Grant interacts with him, and he quickly wastes all his questions, starting with the obvious “Only yes or no?”, which results in a cheerful “Yes!” and costs Siobhan a minute of her work time. Meanwhile, the day shift begins taking group photos, quickly finishes their letters, and all move on to task 4 at the same time.

Task 4: Make a mixtape, with the day shift curating side A and the night shift curating side B.

This challenge is always done under pressure. The teams write their song lists on a cassette-shaped dry-erase board, and the night shift tries to guess the themes based on the titles. Rekha and Katie need songs that mention specific times. Siobhan and Grant can only use one-syllable words in their titles, while Lily and Raph have to phrase theirs as commands. Unfortunately, Siobhan adds little curved symbols above the words in her song titles, which confuses Grant and wastes a valuable clue. Chris barely manages to say “Oh no!” before Demi excitedly—and unhelpfully—answers “Yes!”, leaving Grant frustrated again.

Rehka and Katie are quickly making progress on the challenge, but Grant and Raph are still working to understand the rules. The next part of the competition has already begun.

Task 3: Don’t acknowledge Ron Perlman.

Ron Perlman really plays the role of the challenging host, deliberately trying to throw the contestants off track. He does this by maintaining intense eye contact, asking seemingly friendly questions, politely pointing out their rudeness when they don’t acknowledge him, and even invading their personal space. At one point, contestant Rehka actually ducks under a table to escape his attention.

I wish we hadn’t had to cut a few things from this episode, especially the scene where Rekha and Siobhan tried—and failed—to explain the Ron Perlman task to the night shift using magnetic poetry. They only managed to arrange the words to say “no get across name knowledge” before thankfully remembering they could just write it out on the whiteboard!

Grant notices the store Chris is working at now has free hair clippers. He tries to trick Demi into giving him some kind of advantage – he asks if cutting his own hair will earn him points, even though no one has talked about points yet! Demi tells him no, but Grant stubbornly cuts a bit of hair anyway and wildly shouts, hoping it’ll get him something.

Task 2: Give a colleague a haircut of their choice.

The editing is at its weakest point here. For the first time, the show’s jumps between different times are jarring and confusing, rather than flowing smoothly. Three customers – Charlotte, Miguel, and Claire – arrive for haircuts, but only Siobhan has the necessary clippers, which Grant provided. We then see the night shift reading instructions that the day shift had previously sprayed onto the floor with hair product. It’s unclear if we’re simply watching the same few minutes of activity from both shifts, and it’s difficult to follow what’s happening.

There are several details we overlook, like what kind of haircut Miguel asks for and the message Siobhan leaves for Grant. It’s funny because Miguel is bald, but if you listen closely, he actually requests a handlebar mustache—though he never gets it! Meanwhile, Grant easily trims his beard while Lily and Raph struggle to give Claire a mullet. This is even more confusing when Grant finishes Miguel’s trim before anyone else, securing the win for Miguel and Siobhan.

Task 1: There is no task 1. That’s not how the numbering system works.

One strange detail in the “Night Shift” episode involves the task numbering: it begins at 10, despite there only being nine tasks. If you look carefully, you can spot Paul Foremanlino subtly removing the number “2” from Grant and Siobhan’s workspace, leaving them at “1” – seemingly to indicate success – but the moment isn’t clearly shown. We do see Siobhan telling Grant she always believed in him, and asking him to disregard anything he might see her say when he re-watches the episode.

While this episode has its funny moments, it feels rushed and a bit messy. The editing is choppy, things don’t always flow logically, the timeline jumps around, and some details about Demi and Chris’ characters – like their hats – aren’t well thought out. However, at least the factory workers get to enjoy a pizza party in the end credits!

The winners: Siobhan and Grant

The prize: Matching “Employee of the Show” mugs

The prize is fairly basic, earning a 2 out of 5. However, it’s a good thing it’s useful, something you can actually use, and has a bit of humor to it.

A few just-for-fans callbacks

Lily was upset about having to pretend not to notice Ron Perlman. She wondered why the contestants weren’t given a “pig in a hat” – a reference to a memorable challenge from Season 6, Episode 3 (“Sam Says 3”), and another time they had to ignore a special guest.

Rekha’s opening line, “Playing a game on a topic of my choice,” is a nod to her Dropout series Smartypants. In that show, comedians deliver a lecture on whatever subject they choose.

Siobhan’s opening line, “Trapped her twice, shame on me,” is a nod to two past episodes of Game Changer. In “Escape Room,” she was locked in the performers’ green room, and in “Deja Vu,” she found herself stuck in a time loop.

As a big fan, I immediately loved Lily’s intro, “Start the spin cycle!” It’s a clever little pun referencing her Dropout show, Dirty Laundry. Just like the show’s title, “spin cycle” makes you think of both a washing machine and a whirlwind of gossip and scandal – it’s a really neat connection!

Katie’s introduction, where she’s called “Knight Katie,” is a play on words. It references both her character of the same name from the show “Samalamadingdong” and the fact that she works the night shift.

Grant’s playful introduction, where he jokes about being a ‘Try Guy’ but actually identifying as bisexual, is a nod to his striking similarity to Keith Habersberger and a lighthearted acknowledgment of his sexuality, which he often discusses.

Raph jokingly mentioned his overwhelming inbox during the “The Newlyweb Game” segment on the Game Changer podcast, referencing the fact that he has over 11,000 unread emails.

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2026-06-16 06:08