I’ve been waiting patiently for Amazon’s new gaming anthology Secret Level to drop since I first covered the news on the series back in August. A series that has Mega Man, Pac-Man, God of War, Dungeons & Dragons, and many more famous gaming titles in it sounds like a dream come true, and with the success of Fallout still resonating strongly with viewers everywhere, the general consensus has been that this could well be the ultimate show for gamers.
Having said that, I’m very much aware of how Amazon has completely butchered Lord of the Rings with The Rings of Power, and after looking at the Pac-Man episode trailer below, I’m now starting to wonder whether they’re going to do the same with some of our beloved characters.
I’ve watched the trailer three times now and there’s only one frame with what I know as Pac-Man in it, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little intrigued. Who is the character we see wandering around? Is this an origin story for Pac-Man, and are we about to see how our dot-munching hero was born? But at the same time, there’s one thing ringing out in my head that I can’t ignore – this doesn’t seem to have anything to do with PAC-MAN whatsoever.
First teaser for the ‘PAC MAN’ episode of the video game anthology series ‘SECRET LEVEL’
— DiscussingFilm (@DiscussingFilm) December 4, 2024
Releasing December 10 on Prime Video pic.twitter.com/udPGgo5eeg
It’s an opinion shared by many of the fans on X too, with some people stating ‘Where is Pac-Man’, ‘Not my Pac-Man,’ and lots of other general confusion as to what on earth they’re looking at. We see a hooded stranger and a floating orb that look like they should have come straight out of a Star Wars game destroying evil monsters that look nothing like the ghosts from the arcade game.
‘Eat or be eaten’ is about the only reference to the game we’ve all spent too many hours playing. There’s the shot of the sun behind the tower that looks like a giant version of Pac-Man and a split-second shot where we actually see Pac-Man as we know him, but apart from that, the trailer feels about as un-Pac-Man-like as you could possibly get.
I’m going to hold out judgement until I’ve actually watched it; I don’t like Rings of Power at all as I’ve already mentioned, and I know that Amazon could just put Pac-Man’s name on this episode to draw us in, but surely with something as big as Pac-Man they have to get it right. Still, they made Sauron a pile of flubber on a cartwheel and got away with it, so who knows?
In other Pac-Man news, there’s a new live event coming our way that actually gives you the chance to be Pac-Man, running around in an interactive visual experience that feels like you’ve fallen into a video game. It’s set to launch in multiple cities around the world, though there are no details as to when the first event will be yet. Still, depending on how this Pac-Man episode goes on Secret Level and if viewers end up disowning the show, then they might cancel it altogether!
What do you think of the trailer? Let us know in the comments!
