A Date That Shall Live in Infamy
I am a fan of reality TV. A big, big, big fan. This is not to say that I am indiscriminate in my indulgence; there are certain shows that I watch religiously (and have earned coveted "season pass" status on my DVR), and there are certain shows that I have never watched and probably never will. However, my tastes in reality television stand in complete opposition to my tastes in scriped TV. As far as traditional television is concerned, I watch critically acclaimed, award-winning shows: The Office, Friday Night Lights, Studio 60, Nip/Tuck, Scrubs, Rescue Me, etc. I look with disdain upon the viewers of shows like Life with Jim, King of Queens, and any other drivel that recycles the same jokes that The Cosby Show was making 20 years ago. When it concerns reality TV, however, I am a devotee of the lowest of the low--that's right. I LOVE REALITY DATING SHOWS.
It doesn't matter which show: Elimidate, Fifth Wheel, Dismissed, Parental Control, Blind Date, The Bachelor. I love them all, and for different reasons. They are like my ugly, bastard children that I can't help but adore--only my closest friends friends know of my affection for them, but I secretly want to tell everyone I know about how I can't get enough of them. I will describe the shows in two parts and try to draw a conclusion in the second, though this seems unlikely. Without further ado:
Elimidate
Premise
One guy (or girl) goes out on a date with 4 members of the opposite sex. Over the course of the 30-minute show, the (un)lucky single has to whittle down his "dates" one-by-one until he is left with one lucky-ish girl.
Quality of Contestants
Elimidate is by far the trashiest of all the dating shows. It invariably involves a girl with comically large fake breasts (let's call her Tiffany) and a guy with copious amounts of gel in his hair who is typically wearing a wife-beater as a shirt (let's call him Tony). If one of the Tiffanys fails to openmouth kiss Tony (or vise versa) within the first 20 minutes, she is almost certainly going to be eliminated.
Typical Date Activites
These dates are pretty stereotypical of dating shows. All of the singles meet as a group (this almost always happens on a pier or next to a body of water. I have no idea why they do this). If the show is 4 girls with 1 guy, the girls will start making bitchy comments about the other girls within 5 seconds of meeting them. I am convinced that this is 90% of the show's appeal. After the initial introductions, the group will go to a bar and have a few drinks. The first open-mouth kiss typically happens at this first bar (there will absolultely be other bars). After this round of drinks is downed, one girl is eliminated. She is typically the girl who stared aghast at the other girls' behavior for the 5 minutes it took them to swill their Cosmopolitans.
After the dead weight has been hacked off, the now-foursome will proceed to an "activity" that the single has "chosen". This activity will definitely involve the removal of clothes (body painting, mutual massage, water volleyball, etc.).
Final Elimination
The show proceeds until there are 2 "women" left, and the guy tells them how hard it was to make a choice, but he has to choose one of them, and he will choose Tiffany. This final choice almost always happens in a hot tub, almost always happens right after the guy has made out with each girl in front of the other, and is almost never remembered by the contestants due to an alcohol-induced blackout.
Wild card
Each show has something that makes it unique (aside from the basic premise), and Elimidate specializes in the Final Goodbye. After an Elimidate contestant is kicked off the show, she has a one-on-one interview with the camera in which she gets to have a parting shot. Each girl "disses" the other "bitches" that remain, and tell Tony what he is missing (in most cases a lifetime of fake tanner and silicon poisoning). All in all, this trash makes for enthralling television as everyone involved is completely unaware of their moral bankruptcy and lack of intelligence.
Fifth Wheel
Premise
This show's contestants are the people who were rejected for being not slutty or greasy enough (keep in mind that this still allows for plenty of sluttiness or greasiness). In the first 20 minutes of this show 2 men and 2 women each spend a date with each other on a bus (seriously), trading halfway through. With 10 minutes remaining, however, a very-attractive new contestant enters the bus, and each contestant of the opposite sex of the "Fifth Wheel" (get it??) spends time with the new entry. At the end of the show, the contestants choose if they want a second date with either of the first two girls (or guys), or with the "Fifth Wheel". As a twist, however, the girls can veto being chosen.
Quality of Contestants
These daters are slightly older than the Elimidate crowd (late 20s compared to early-mid 20s), so they keep the boozing to a minimum. Imagine if the Elimidate contestants were 5 years older and were forced to get jobs that didn't involve wearing a bikini or working in a nightclub--that would be your typical Fifth Wheel contestant. As opposed to being the scum that gets caught in the hot tub filter, they are the people that get paid $5 an hour to clean the filter.
Typical Date Activities
As I said, the majority of the show is on a bus outfitted with couches and chairs. These dates center more around conversation than drunken insults. Typical conversations revolve around "my favorite drink", "my ex", or "I hate (insert other contestant)".
Final Elimination
At the end of the show, the members of opposite sex of the "5th wheel" get to choose their favorite girls, with the girls having veto power over the selections. As this show is not always capped off by a drunken, sloppy kiss involving multiple facial piercings it doesn't measure up to the other shows' farewells. I like to think that the contestants walk off the bus and immediately begin filming an episode of "Blind Date" (more on this later).
Wild Card
The producers evidently tried to blend "Pimp My Ride" with a dating show, and the result is mixed. Instead of poor Los Angelinos getting fish tanks in their cars or 22 year-olds discussing their favorite lat exercises, we are left with a group of people in their late 20s who are so undesirable that they are still single and have enough free time to take an entire day and sit on a stationary bus with complete strangers. Let's move on.
Dismissed
Premise
This was MTV's first foray into the world of reality dating shows (if you don't count "The Real World"). It centers around a "like-triangle" made up of three 17 or 18 year olds. The contestants of the same sex each have a "time out" card that they can use during their series of group dates that will allow them to spend 15 minutes alone with their date.
Quality of Contestants
The typical male "Dismissed" contestant is a 17 year-old from LA who looks like he was assembled at the MTV Village of the Damned. I swear to God that each one of these kids looks like he bought his hair gel, hemp necklace, skateboard, bracelet, and saggy jeans all together in a "MTV Real World/Road Rules Challenge starter kit". The girls aren't much better--fake tans, high heels, and the intellectual depth of a drop of dip spit.
Typical Date Activities
These dates involve little more than sitting on the beach. They are as interesting as this description.
Final Elimination
The girl chooses between the two guys, or vice versa (depending on the episode). This show recently got interesting when the producers created "Gay Dismissed". I have only seen a couple episodes of the gay version of the show, but I will say that it shows promise. This show's signature is that the "chooser" must say, "(Lance, Gabe, Thad, Chad, Jamie, etc.), you are dismissed." I think this is supposed to sting the loser, but in reality he is probably more concerned with his chemisty homework and how he is going to score some weed from his buddy's older brother later that afternoon.
Wild Card
This show's sole redeeming quality seems to be its de facto role as an audition for "Real World/Road Rules Challenge". In 5 years when some beefed-up dude is wearing an empty beer case on his head on the Challenge, we can all look back at his pre-steroid days and reminisce about simpler times.
Part 2 coming tomorrow.....
It doesn't matter which show: Elimidate, Fifth Wheel, Dismissed, Parental Control, Blind Date, The Bachelor. I love them all, and for different reasons. They are like my ugly, bastard children that I can't help but adore--only my closest friends friends know of my affection for them, but I secretly want to tell everyone I know about how I can't get enough of them. I will describe the shows in two parts and try to draw a conclusion in the second, though this seems unlikely. Without further ado:
ElimidatePremise
One guy (or girl) goes out on a date with 4 members of the opposite sex. Over the course of the 30-minute show, the (un)lucky single has to whittle down his "dates" one-by-one until he is left with one lucky-ish girl.
Quality of Contestants
Elimidate is by far the trashiest of all the dating shows. It invariably involves a girl with comically large fake breasts (let's call her Tiffany) and a guy with copious amounts of gel in his hair who is typically wearing a wife-beater as a shirt (let's call him Tony). If one of the Tiffanys fails to openmouth kiss Tony (or vise versa) within the first 20 minutes, she is almost certainly going to be eliminated.
Typical Date Activites
These dates are pretty stereotypical of dating shows. All of the singles meet as a group (this almost always happens on a pier or next to a body of water. I have no idea why they do this). If the show is 4 girls with 1 guy, the girls will start making bitchy comments about the other girls within 5 seconds of meeting them. I am convinced that this is 90% of the show's appeal. After the initial introductions, the group will go to a bar and have a few drinks. The first open-mouth kiss typically happens at this first bar (there will absolultely be other bars). After this round of drinks is downed, one girl is eliminated. She is typically the girl who stared aghast at the other girls' behavior for the 5 minutes it took them to swill their Cosmopolitans.
After the dead weight has been hacked off, the now-foursome will proceed to an "activity" that the single has "chosen". This activity will definitely involve the removal of clothes (body painting, mutual massage, water volleyball, etc.).
Final Elimination
The show proceeds until there are 2 "women" left, and the guy tells them how hard it was to make a choice, but he has to choose one of them, and he will choose Tiffany. This final choice almost always happens in a hot tub, almost always happens right after the guy has made out with each girl in front of the other, and is almost never remembered by the contestants due to an alcohol-induced blackout.
Wild card
Each show has something that makes it unique (aside from the basic premise), and Elimidate specializes in the Final Goodbye. After an Elimidate contestant is kicked off the show, she has a one-on-one interview with the camera in which she gets to have a parting shot. Each girl "disses" the other "bitches" that remain, and tell Tony what he is missing (in most cases a lifetime of fake tanner and silicon poisoning). All in all, this trash makes for enthralling television as everyone involved is completely unaware of their moral bankruptcy and lack of intelligence.
Fifth Wheel
Premise
This show's contestants are the people who were rejected for being not slutty or greasy enough (keep in mind that this still allows for plenty of sluttiness or greasiness). In the first 20 minutes of this show 2 men and 2 women each spend a date with each other on a bus (seriously), trading halfway through. With 10 minutes remaining, however, a very-attractive new contestant enters the bus, and each contestant of the opposite sex of the "Fifth Wheel" (get it??) spends time with the new entry. At the end of the show, the contestants choose if they want a second date with either of the first two girls (or guys), or with the "Fifth Wheel". As a twist, however, the girls can veto being chosen.
Quality of Contestants
These daters are slightly older than the Elimidate crowd (late 20s compared to early-mid 20s), so they keep the boozing to a minimum. Imagine if the Elimidate contestants were 5 years older and were forced to get jobs that didn't involve wearing a bikini or working in a nightclub--that would be your typical Fifth Wheel contestant. As opposed to being the scum that gets caught in the hot tub filter, they are the people that get paid $5 an hour to clean the filter.
Typical Date Activities
As I said, the majority of the show is on a bus outfitted with couches and chairs. These dates center more around conversation than drunken insults. Typical conversations revolve around "my favorite drink", "my ex", or "I hate (insert other contestant)".
Final Elimination
At the end of the show, the members of opposite sex of the "5th wheel" get to choose their favorite girls, with the girls having veto power over the selections. As this show is not always capped off by a drunken, sloppy kiss involving multiple facial piercings it doesn't measure up to the other shows' farewells. I like to think that the contestants walk off the bus and immediately begin filming an episode of "Blind Date" (more on this later).
Wild Card
The producers evidently tried to blend "Pimp My Ride" with a dating show, and the result is mixed. Instead of poor Los Angelinos getting fish tanks in their cars or 22 year-olds discussing their favorite lat exercises, we are left with a group of people in their late 20s who are so undesirable that they are still single and have enough free time to take an entire day and sit on a stationary bus with complete strangers. Let's move on.
Dismissed
PremiseThis was MTV's first foray into the world of reality dating shows (if you don't count "The Real World"). It centers around a "like-triangle" made up of three 17 or 18 year olds. The contestants of the same sex each have a "time out" card that they can use during their series of group dates that will allow them to spend 15 minutes alone with their date.
Quality of Contestants
The typical male "Dismissed" contestant is a 17 year-old from LA who looks like he was assembled at the MTV Village of the Damned. I swear to God that each one of these kids looks like he bought his hair gel, hemp necklace, skateboard, bracelet, and saggy jeans all together in a "MTV Real World/Road Rules Challenge starter kit". The girls aren't much better--fake tans, high heels, and the intellectual depth of a drop of dip spit.
Typical Date Activities
These dates involve little more than sitting on the beach. They are as interesting as this description.
Final Elimination
The girl chooses between the two guys, or vice versa (depending on the episode). This show recently got interesting when the producers created "Gay Dismissed". I have only seen a couple episodes of the gay version of the show, but I will say that it shows promise. This show's signature is that the "chooser" must say, "(Lance, Gabe, Thad, Chad, Jamie, etc.), you are dismissed." I think this is supposed to sting the loser, but in reality he is probably more concerned with his chemisty homework and how he is going to score some weed from his buddy's older brother later that afternoon.
Wild Card
This show's sole redeeming quality seems to be its de facto role as an audition for "Real World/Road Rules Challenge". In 5 years when some beefed-up dude is wearing an empty beer case on his head on the Challenge, we can all look back at his pre-steroid days and reminisce about simpler times.
Part 2 coming tomorrow.....
posted by Spencer at 4:16 PM
1 Comments:
Spence,
just wanted to remind u, from one "fifth wheel" fan to another... you forgot about the "hook up room" on the bus, which is filled with pillows and multi-colored lights, where a guy can take a girl or even two before he picks. wow, i watch way too much tv...
-hrk
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