Reality shows that are actually worth it

OK, I confess that I haven’t done anything vaguely review like on this blog for a number of months. (Cue: faux Italian/Brooklyn accent) I’m sorry, apologies all around, I mean no disrespect, badda bing badda boom.

Now for today’s topic: Reality television. I won’t bother going into the history of reality TV aside from noting that it spun out of the game show boom of the late 90s and that game shows are another post entirely. What I will say is that the genre of reality TV has produced some of the worst drek in the history of visual media. Stuff that makes you embarrassed to call yourself a TV watcher, an American, and a human being. For example, most of the reality shows on VH1 which have cutesy names like “Flavor of Love,” “I love New York,” “Charm School,” and other such innocent sounding titles that are only used because “Aging Rapper Flirts with 20 Prostitutes” didn’t focus well.

But I’m not here to talk about that today, I’m here to talk about the reality shows that are actually good, or at least OK, or just don’t make me want to go to confession for having watched them.

The Amazing Race: Starting off with the top of the heap, this is the best reality show around, full stop. The basic premise, for those of you not cool enough to already know, is that 16 or so teams of two who have a preexisting relationship of some sort (married, dating, family, etc.) race around the world. The race is basically a treasure hunt. Teams are given a clue that leads to a challenge to get the next clue and so on. At predetermined checkpoints (aka, the end of the episode) the team in last place is Philiminated by the host, who just so happens to be named Phil. First to the finish line wins a million dollars.

I love this game because it is a game. The drama is not player vs. player but player vs. game. And let me tell you, these challenge creators are some sick little bunnies. The first episode of the current season had teams in Tokyo where they had to consume what looked like half a pound of wasabi to get a clue. I’m fairly sure that much wasabi goes against the Geneva Conventions. After that, they had to WALK way the heck across town while guiding a group of 25 tourists, none of whom spoke English. I know people who have lived in that city for 10+ years and would never even THINK of trying this. They’d just do what the native Tokyoites do: Take the bloody train!

Amazing race is one of the most highly decorated reality shows out there. Having won every outstanding reality competition show Emmy award ever given and the host has won the first reality show host/judge Emmy.

Hell’s Kitchen: This one is highly subjective. I like to cook and this is a cooking competition reality show, so I’m going to like it. Premise: X number of professional cooks work at a soundstage restaurant run by Michelin star winning British stereotype Gordon Ramsey. Each episode consists of a cooking challenge with prizes (a free lunch at a top restaurant or free high quality cooking gear) and punishments (Clean the whole kitchen and dining room or do everyone else’s prep work). After that, they serve dinner to a restaurant full of photogenic people paid to act as if they actually want to be there. At the end of the episode, the producers Ramsey eliminates one of the players. Last cook standing wins.

The main source of entertainment on this show (as it is with most reality shows) is watching the contestants make unbelievably bone headed mistakes that a first year culinary student wouldn’t make. There is also the fun of watching Ramsey, who is legitimately good at this stuff, deal with the incompetence around him. If you liked the BBC comedy Chef! and don’t mind that Ramsey is far less eloquent (he swears a LOT) and a lot more Scottish than Lenny Henry then you might like this show.

America’s Got Talent: This is American Idol if American Idol didn’t suck so much, but more on that later. Premise: Talent show. That’s it. If you insist on the details, AGT is American Idol except any act can audition, not just singers. Acts perform on stage before a live audience and three judges, Piers Morgan (Simon Cowell knock off), Sharon Osborn, and David Hasselhoff. The acts have roughly one to two minutes to do their thing before the judges decide if they are good enough to advance to the next round. However, if the judges hate an act, they each have a button they can press that sets off a buzzer and gives the act a strike. 3 strikes, you’re out. After the first round, they switch to a call in vote ala Idol. Winner gets one million dollars.

The entertainment comes from the amazing creativity of some of the performers. AGT is also the only place in America that you’ll see magicians on network primetime. I’ll admit to some bias here, I am a stage magician and I love watching magic. I could go into a long diatribe about how the judges are biased against magic acts (or anyone who isn’t a singer for that matter), but I’ll save that for another day.

One last point about AGT. They had an audition in Seattle Washington last season and, naturally, all the crazy street acts showed up. At the end of the show, Sharon Osborn was caught on tape saying “This place is barking mad!” Way to go Seattle! It’s a real accomplishment when Sharon “My husband eats bat heads for a living” Osborn says your town is nuts.

There were, at one time, other reality shows that were decent on account of being either creative, heartwarming, or respecting the intelligence of the audience. Specifically: The Mole, Treasure Hunters, Murder in Small Town X, Extreme Makeover Home Edition, Who Wants to be a Super hero, and Celebracadabra. Naturally, they have all been canceled.

One last rant before I sign off. American Idol. I bleeping hate this show. Aside from about 3 episodes of the first series, I have never watched it and I am proud of that fact. Now before anyone points out that I shouldn’t be griping about shows I don’t watch, I submit to you that the general format of American Idol is common knowledge and therefore fair game for criticism and ridicule.

American Idol is a misnomer. The correct title of the program is American Karaoke. All the contestants do is sing cover versions of other people’s songs instead of creating something new and finding their own sounds. I understand that the judges need something objective to judge but if they are all such big names in the music business, shouldn’t they be able to tell if someone has talent no matter what they sing?

As a result of this, the American music scene has become stale over the last few years. The only concert tours generating any publicity are “come back” tours for musicians who were in their prime while I was in diapers. Oh, and Michael Jackson albums . . . LOTS of Michael Jackson albums. But imagine if American Idol was a singer songwriter contest that spat out a brand new talent and possibly a whole new movement in American music every season. Now THAT would be worth watching.

Well, that’s all I can come up with. There have to be dozens of reality shows currently airing on American TV and I can only find 3 that are any good to watch and two of those are due to my personal hobbies and preferences. And to think, we gave up a game show renaissance for this tripe, how sad.