Armchair Gawker (Reality TV and Me)

I first heard the term "reality TV" associated with Survivor, I think. It's a strange term, since it's not like there haven't been non-fiction shows pretty much since the beginning of television broadcasts. "Unscripted television" might be better -- though I question whether it's always accurate -- but I suppose by now the term has sunk in enough that it's here to stay.

I think Wikipedia's article on reality television actually does a fairly good job of separating the various types of shows that get this label, but in particular, it's elimination shows that I generally think of when someone uses this term (with what they call "special living environment" shows like The Real World sometimes coming to mind as well). Shows like Survivor, of course -- the big mama of current reality shows -- as well as American Idol, Top Chef, Project Runway, etc.

For a long time I avoided those shows. I'd hear people talk about Survivor and I'd think "that sounds kinda stupid". (Okay, I admit to having watched Star Search back in the day, and if you want to count The Gong Show, there's that, too, but I mean the newer ones.) I totally didn't get why people were so invested in their outcomes, why discussing what happened on Survivor or who got eliminated on American Idol was so popular.

Then, one day, I was channel-surfing out of sheer boredom and happened to catch the opening credits of Survivor... and said to myself, "Self, why not see what the fuss is all about?"

20 minutes later, I was boggling that these people were real. I'm still not convinced that some of it isn't scripted, but... I couldn't... look... away. So much stupid in so little space. The horrible challenges. The sheer bizarrity of people subjecting themselves to this. The people who thought they were Machiavelli instead of Elmer Fudd ("Hehh-hehh-heeh. Be vewy vewy quiet. I'm hunting AWWIANCES!"). Honestly, it was just astoundingly bad, yet somehow...

And the next time it was on, I watched it deliberately. In fact, I watched through the end of the season -- 7 or 8 shows in total, I believe. I wasn't emotionally invested in it -- I didn't like any of the contestants. I didn't think it was exciting. I just... gawked, as if it were some horrible accident. I couldn't look away.

When the season ended, I stopped watching. For a few years, I didn't care any more. Some of that's just that I'm not really a hardcore television watcher, but most of it was that, once it was over, I stopped feeling any need to watch.

Fast forward to the premiere of Top Chef. Now, I used to watch the original, Japanese Iron Chef, and I love cooking shows in general, so it fell well within my usual interests. Top Chef became the first elimination show to attract me sheerly for its concept and to see how they executed it, and kept me as a viewer because I thought they did a good job of it. For the first time, I started to understand why people get so involved in these shows -- I loved Lee Anne, found Dave alternately amusing and annoying, wanted to slap Tiffani, and was dying to see how the chefs would handle making a gourmet meal out of vendor food or whatever the challenge was that week.

"It's just this show being a cooking show", I would think. "It's not that I really care about the reality TV thing in general," I would add to myself, even as I was vilifying chef's attitudes and rooting for my favorites. Hah.

Then one day I turned on the TV to see if I could find something to put on for background noise (I do this a lot when I'm home alone) and it was, of course, tuned into Bravo... and what should be on but Project Runway. Well, I do like me some fashion, even if I don't really understand the things high-end fashion designers choose to make, so I figured, eh, why not.

They were showing a marathon. I watched all of it. I was hooked.

"Okay, maybe there's something to this format," I admitted to myself. But, hey, it'd have to be a subject matter I cared about, right?

This weekend I turned on the TV for something to stare at while I ate. I'm out of books to read and we owe the library money so I can't get anything new from them until we pay off the fines. I figured I might find a weekend movie or something.

I paused for a moment when I saw models, wondering if it was a fashion show. But, no, it wasn't... exactly. It was a bunch of girls finishing up some sort of photo shoot and then going back to the house they lived in. (If you pay attention to TV culture at all, you probably know of this show -- America's Next Top Model.) My sweetie and I watched the show until the end, and when they announced they were showing a marathon, did we just turn it off and go back to playing silly console games?

Of course we didn't. It was the trainwreck/accident/whatever syndrome all over again. We watched two more shows, and then finally turned it off out of sheer desire to move on to the things we'd actually planned for the weekend.

Now, watching a bunch of wannabe models live together and perform bizarre challenges is firmly outside my usual interests. (Project Runway isn't exactly interesting to me for the models.) I doubt I'll be watching it again. But while it was on? Couldn't look away.

So is there a point to this? Not really, except to note that no matter how much you might think the format is silly when you think about it, somehow when you're watching it, it's hard to stop. At least for me, and given the popularity of the various reality TV shows, I expect it's the same for a lot of people. Maybe my comments can serve as a warning: Turn it off. Don't get hooked. Or maybe I just want someone to say "Yes, that happens to me, too; you're not that weird." Or maybe I'm an insomniac and wanted to post something besides an introductory post. (Okay, it's all of those.)

Next time: I talk about how much I love Tim Gunn, or possibly I comment on stupid commercials, or maybe something else entirely depending on my whims.