Get Real!

Just watched a fascinating episode of “The contender” on AXN. It’s a reality show based on boxers. They’ve grouped up 16 boxers into two teams and the contenders from the groups fight each other on the basis of sudden death. The boxer left in the end wins a cool $ 1,000,000.00, ain’t that nice!

After switching channels I got HBO which had this nasty movie on flies or something just as gross so I flipped channels and finally got to Star world and a rather imaginatively named program called “Outback Jack” was on. This, again, was a reality show. The plot revolves around a man”Jack” from down under (Which would explain outback) and many beautiful women who are in a race to woo him. Since I watched only like half an episode I cant really say if there is any money involved or not!

Other shows that I can recall which were similar to the one above are

For love or money: 1 guy, many girls and in the end the girl who is left is given a choice between 1 million dollars and the guy. Just for the record the girl chose the million dollars and dumped the guy!

For love or Money 2: The girl mentioned above was given a choice to go for the money or take a shot at 12 guys to find “true love” but forfeit the money.The guy she chose, rejected the money(2 million dollars this time) and chose her!

(P.S.: They got to keep the 2 million dollars in the end too)

Temptation island: Many couples on the brink of marriage, taken to an island with hot chickas and greek gods to test the participants faith! These are the kind of programs that give TVs gonorrhea!

“The apprentice” is another show of the same genre (i.e. reality TV not sleazy reality TV).It is produced by that bastard (Donald Trump!) and revolves around “managing” events. Here is the plot, there is a group of young and talented professionals from all walks of life, and they are given opportunities to show their organizing skills and team skills by way of managing big events like Concerts or Openings or sometimes with something as simple as a pet care clinic. I am fairly sure that the prize in this one is monetary; correct me if I am wrong guys.A friend of mine from IITD seems to think that this show is the best thing that happenend to him during engineering.

There are others like who dares wins, fear factor, Indian idol (the Americans started it and many Indians seemed to have liked the Indian version) and of course the one that started it all….The Survivor!

So what makes these shows so successful? Why do we love to see reality TV? Maybe its because it’s a lot of fun to watch an normal person respond to abnormal situations or maybe its because of the “real” emotions of the participants or maybe just the vicarious thrill!

Whatever it is , reality TV is here to stay!

P.S: Amazingly enough, I have still not started prepping for IIMC on 15th.