In related news, I am staying at my parents' for the holiday and they watch a lot of bad TV
yes these shows are designed to make ugly, mean-spirited people feel better about themselves by providing ridiculous caricatures of "trashy" people to feel superior to
I've noticed that max became flooded with some of the most disgusting reality TV schlock after the Discovery merger. Zaslav's personal mission is to make the average American meaner and dumber, if that's even possible
the worst I've seen was a show called [slur for Romani people] Sisters
The ”look how fat this person is!” and ”look at this horrible disease!” kinds are by far the most disgusting.
On second thought, the cop-based ones too.
The cop ones in my country are pathetic. It's a small country with little crime so they don't really have any car chases or gunfights to film. Instead they make shows full of the most boring and mundane cop shit. Most of these shows are about traffic cops where you see them handing out speeding tickets, interspersed with interviews with cops saying things like "speeding next to a school in a residential area is very dangerous". No shit Sherlock. It is so pathetic they even made a show about mall cops once.
I honestly like finding those kinds of cop shows. Its like an escapism where a kid watches movies about functional families.
I'll watch and be thinking "that's right, let that person know about social responsibility, they shouldn't speed in school zones!".
I guess that's the appeal of these shows. They are boring, predictable and repetitive but you see justice being done in a non-complicated everyday setting, assuring you that everything is normal and that the powers that be are acting in your best interest.
German reality cop shows at this point have just branched to include like pretty much everyone who works for some sort of enforcement agency, tow truck drivers, pest control and private security, I suppose because there's only so many times you can watch some cop stop somebody cycling on the sidewalk and explaining to them how that's very unsafe and countering every "every time I ride on the road a lorry nearly flattens me, the fuck am I supposed to do you dicks" with "well that's also illegal"
The Finnish cop show was similarly pathetic. It kinda makes it feel even grosser to me when there's not even any spectacle, just someone being drunk in public being put on national TV for everyone to ogle.
At least it showed how little the cops actually do, lmao
BORDER POLICE
'Allo look ere this grandma tried to bring in a DANGEROUS BANANA, she's up for a $1000 fine'
Oh yes, they send the Australian border cop show here as well. It's 75% non-white people being punished for bringing food.
Meanwhile fire ants are taking over the country because quarantining and disinfecting cargo is a barrier to profits and the taskforce responsible spent all their money on overpriced drones that seemingly only detect warm cow poo instead of fire ant nests
They'll looking to satellites now https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-10-22/qld-new-funding-to-destroy-fire-ants/103007596
In the UK there's one called "Can't pay? We'll take it away!" that's just about bailiffs evicting people
Ew... that one sounds especially vile. I don't know the format but I wouldn't be surprised if they went to great lengths to villify the victims to avoid people feeling sympathy for them.
Its funny that the EP of the fat people show is the kid of the doctor they all see. The kid wanted a media career and could only get it by exploiting his father's real job. And funnier that its not the first show like that.
Reality shows are just what happens when they don't want to pay writers well.
I have been saying this for my entire life and it has never not been true.
I think a blanket recommendation for anything Nathan Fielder is good. Nathan For You is fantastic. The Rehearsal is fantastic. In fact, the Rehearsal has an entire arc that ends up calling out Evangelical fundamentalists and Zionists for their insane beliefs
That arc in The Rehearsal actually made me cry, just gonna put that out there. It's a good show.
Another good show is "The review" which is fiction, but kinda in the same vein as Nathan for you
I think Nathan's shows are best understood as fiction too, even if they blur the line by letting the real people involved improv a bit.
Definitely has its moments, but God damn does it drag in the middle.
Reminds me of the 2000's when VH1 and MTV reality TV shows were nothing but that. Does VH1 even exist anymore?
Vh1 and mtv were both viacom from waaaay back in the late 90s or early aughts iirc
They make these micro celebs do the most embarrassing things for a small chance at fame. It's demeaning, dehumanizing, and exploitative (except when the microceleb is some nepo with nothing else to do)
But more importantly it's just bad writing. Most of the "reality" shows I've seen have the actors ab libbing within the thinnest tracks of whatever narrative the director wants to push. The narratives are often racist or some other brain worm laden rot.
Most of the "reality" shows I've seen have the actors ab libbing within the thinnest tracks of whatever narrative the director wants to push.
It's so bad when they try to come up with little plots and character arcs for episodes. Oh no! Dr. Pimple Popper has forgotten the true meaning of Christmas!
I often wonder what 90 Day Fiancee is up to since I haven't seen an episode since mom passed. She watched that trash religiously and hoo boy it was something.
I am in a similar predicament, but there's also the type of show that's about rich assholes with dozens of kids who live in giant houses
something about mormonism gives it this weird proclivity for subjecting children to the panopticon of broadcast television
cirque du freak but the vampires are network executives and hollyweird producers
I only read the first three books. Is it worth going back to some 20 years later?
I also haven't read it in about 20 years tbh
recently I read Lord Loss (the first in a different series from the same author), and it was decent despite being clearly for a young audience
Read all of them as a kid like 10 years ago and I thought they were pretty good
Yes and no. Good story but holy fuck does it get convoluted later on.
FBoy Island is Ulysses for the modern age and no I will not elaborate.
I guess it depends on how you define reality show. Are home buying/renovation shows reality TV?
Anything which is a contrived scenario but not dramatised. So yes, home reno is reality TV.
I mean yes it is reality TV, and does serve the same purpose of telling boomers "Yes, everything is fine", but it's from the opposite direction of a freak show.
Instead of atypical people getting punished, it's folk conservatives would approve of getting rewarded by buying million dollar houses.
Hmm. I haven't really watched anything like that but presumably the contestants face various dilemmas to make the show interesting.
In that case it would be the same. Commoditising the angst of contestants.
Not really, the dilemmas are "He wants something mid-century-modern, she wants something more traditional" and then they buy or renovate a house and both people explain why this house fulfills their requirements (or forget about them) and how happy they are with their new house.
But also those shows are just adverts for the various retailers of construction supplies, fixtures, and furniture used in them.
All free to air is mostly product placement. That's why reality TV is so popular.
Of course it goes without saying that most if not all tv as we know it wouldn’t exist without advertising
I dunno, by choice I don't watch much TV, but most of what I've caught on my parents' tv seems to consist of "let's laugh at these people going through the carceral system (who are most likely suffering from a mental illness and clearly not getting the help they need)" and "let's laugh at these people embarrassing themselves in public (who are most likely suffering from a mental illness and clearly not getting the help they need)"
It's the network television version of r/PublicFreakout
One of the formats I really hate is "let's laugh of people in debt" where the actors have fucked up personal finances due to irresponsible spending but then, when the grown up experts intervenes, scolds them for being stupid, makes a budget for them and forces them to sell their motorcycle/caravan/other expensive luxury item things are going to be fine. None of the actors are poor, they are just really bad with money but that format has completely muddled the public perception of what poverty is. It is right wing propaganda spreading the lie that "financial trouble" is a question of individual responsibility and morals.
My dad has been wrongfully detained before, yet he still can't comprehend that maybe the cop shows where loitering drunks are being baited into acting aggressive so the police have an excuse to play basketball with their skull might be wrong.
I hate competition reality shows with eliminations like Drag Race and Lego Masters.
I think there's too much financial incentive to be inauthentic/make a brand and the censorship and editing keep people from acting human. Everything feels artificial and I feel bad for the people sent home.
Genuinely creative people alongside people who can afford to take weeks off work.
Something like British Bake Off is a little better at least, but thinking about the countless hours of reality TV churned out every year, it's overwhelming to think about.
Lego masters
I keep pushing back the misanthropy but with things like this I don’t think I can. I’m outraged
When I try to explain this to my friends who watch reality tv, they accuse me of also watching reality tv because I watch Horizon and old episodes of Mythbusters. 😒
My wife really likes Naked and Afraid, and there is an element of "sure seems like it sucks to be nude in the swamp and harassed by 10,000 mosquitoes, glad I'm on my couch under a comforter and not in the Everglades right now," but I think there's also an element of rooting for people to be successful at using their survival skills in a harsh environment.
My wife really likes Naked and Afraid
You could just play that one mode in Rimworld for similar effect
