i am sparticus: Reality TV Redeemed

Reality TV Redeemed

There is nothing that sums up the reality of this life better than reality TV. Something practically perfect (tv) is taken and corrupted beyond belief by something moronic and stupid (humanity). There remains something good and lovely about it, but all it serves to do is attract you to and highlight the dreadful mess that is what remains. It's a sad, sad state.

But while we're in this state, I may as well try to cash in. Channel four, if you're reading here is the idea for the second^* greatest reality TV show ever. It starts out in standard reality TV format, a group of people are recruited as applicants and made to do humiliating auditions. This is all filmed (supposedly for the E4 special 'behind the scenes' part) and the people who go the biggest lengths to make the biggest fools of themselves are picked. These people are then told to book off two weeks holiday for some set point in the future and when this time comes are picked up by channel four and put into some sort of reality tv type situation for the two weeks. It doesn't matter what reality TV type situation it is really, as long as they're kept heavily claustrophobiaed and free from any outside contact. In the second week, one person should be evicted / released / removed from the situation every night to loud cheers and a huge (hired) crowd. They'll be interviewed by some famous celebrity and then swept off to a hotel, where they'll be confined until everyone is free and released. All the while they'll be told that the show has had the best ratings of any Channel Four series ever and that people are going mental about the show. On the final night they'll be an amazing coming out awards winner ceremony, with a huge amount of hired in professional crowd screamers and the ilk. Guest celebrities will come in and shake their hands for providing such great TV. The contestants, who were picked for how up themselves they were will believe every second of this.

For the next week they'll be rushed around various press conferences, tv interviews and radio stations, where they'll be told how great they were. They'll be live on air with Richard and Judy, Chris Moyles and if they're really lucky, Jonathan Ross. They'll be on the front cover of Heat, the third page of The Times and the lips of every person in the country. In between appearances they'll be kept in their hotel and forbidden contact with the outside world. Just for the week you realise until the press dies down a bit and they can relax.

On the Sunday evening two weeks after they first set foot into reality tv they'll be driven back to their homes for a glorious family welcome. They'll be dropped off outside their or house and be told that they're going to surprise their family. The TV crews will disappear around a corner so no-one will get suspicious and the now famous reality TV star will walk up to their doorway and ring the bell.

Whereupon a family member will answer the door and say "Where the hell have you been? You said you'd be back from holiday last week!". Because here's the sting you see. They won't really have been on TV. They'll have filmed it all sure, but it won't have been shown. It was all an elaborate setup, they were on Richard and Judy, but it was never shown. The copy of heat they had was a fake. Those phone interviews they did, they weren't with radio producers, they were with work experience guys from Channel Four. No-one thinks they're famous in real life. Hell, in real-life no-one thinks they were on a reality TV show.

The real TV program shall actually be the contestants being secretly filmed trying to get used to the knowledge that they've either been very badly stitched up, or gone very very crazy. The best part is that there won't be a reveal about this either a year or when the first person breaks down and goes mental, which ever one takes longer to happen.

I realise that this idea maybe considered sick and wrong, but hey, the world is a fallen place, so it's not like we're making it out to be something we're not. And if these people want fame that badly we'll give it to them. Oh yeah. IN THE FACE.

Footnote

*: The idea for the best reality TV show ever sits on my computer right now. One day I'll post it, but it needs a bit of work yet.

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