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Leave it to Nickelodeon to develop a show that fulfilled the childhood fantasy of totally trashing your room.  Finders Keepers was inspired by their other popular program, Double Dare, and featured “Harvey,” the same announcer, and just a little less glop and slop – but with Nick, things are always going to get a little messy.

 

Two teams, the red and the blue in boy/girl pairs, start off with host Wesley Eure giving them a clue regarding some object drawn on a large picture. The team that found the object buzzed in and had ten seconds to circle it with their electronic pen. If they got it, they won $25 and the chance to search a room during the next round. This went on for four chances, and then round two comes up – where the trashing begins.

 

Each team has to run around a cutaway two-story house. For each picture they located in round one, they went into one of eight rooms and got a clue about a hidden object. The kids had thirty seconds to find the object. If they found it, they won $50. If they didn’t, the opposing team won the money. But the rooms got really complicated, changing daily, and featuring names like Dungeon, Frankenstein's Lab, the Egyptian Tomb Room, the Sewer, Dracula's Den, and the Princess and the Pea Room (as in look under the mattress like the Princess and the Pea.)   There were more normal rooms too like the Attic, Bathroom and Living Room, but these also had hidden distractions that would catch the kids off guard, like flying ping pong balls, floating feathers, and the requisite Nickelodeon green slime.

 

The stakes were raised in rounds three and four with $75 to be won with each picture found and $100 for each object. Also in the mix was the “Instant Prize Room,” where the team who found the hidden object won a bonus gift. At the end, the points were added up, and the team with the most went on to the Room-To-Room Romp. The team would have ninety seconds to run through six rooms, getting clues in each room that would lead them to the next. They were still waylayed by distractions and it was a real challenge to win the grand prize, but as with Double Dare, it was exciting to win smaller prizes along the way as well.

 

The show lasted one season and then was moved into syndication with host Larry Toffler. The only other difference was that the electronic pen was replaced with a colorform that had to be placed on top of the hidden object on the big board. After a season of syndication, the show moved back to Nick, but they didn’t shoot any new episodes and the show was cancelled a year later. In 1998, a British version started airing in the U.K., but American kids still can only dream of trashing their rooms to win prizes.