Docu-soaps
Created | Updated Jul 31, 2003
Submitted for your approval. The weekly adventures of a mobile dog-worming clinic in Scarborough. No? What about a decorating show where the stars must be blindfolded and the 'real' people colour blind and sub-literate. (Fooled you, that one already exists).
How many more variations on one particular theme can there possibly be? A twice weekly show about a local butchers shop with 'hilarious' chat from pensioners with cataracts, rickets and advanced senile dementia must be just round the corner.
The importance of reality TV in our lives was brought home when, on a recent Animal Hospital programme, Rolf Harris has to ask the viewing public to stop calling the surgery, as people who were having their own animals treated at the surgery could not get through, because of the volume of enquires about animals featured on the show. This is not only ridiculous, it is worrying that the public can be so easily manipulated. If people had any sense, such announcements on TV would be unnecessary.
Is there such a gap in our own lives, that a dog caught in a car engine could cause such public displays of support, when animal charities struggle to gain funding? Does Ready, Steady, Cook promote good nutrition to the masses, or merely show the talent of chefs making a meal from deliberately obscure ingredients? Does Changing Rooms offer ideas on home decorating, or amusement when watching people having to live with pink walls and a green sheepskin rug on the wall?
Some of these shows do at least provide some educational content, but what on earth do shows such as Britains Sexiest or What Not To Wear offer, apart from seeing Joe Public being ridiculed by celebrities (in the broadest possible sense of the word). Even worse are programmes featuring celebrities ie I'm a Celebrity.... and Reborn in the USA, giving another bite at the cherry to has beens, and giving the general public another chance to kick them in the teeth.
The music world has also been hit, with manufactured acts like S Club 7 being overshadowed by acts not just manufactured, but moulded from plasticine, like Hearsay, Will Young and Gareth Gates. If any of them have a career in 6 months, it will be on Blankety Blank sitting next to Bobby Ball.
The king of Reality TV must be Big Brother, which has at least created a genuine celebrity in Brian Dowling, who seems to have enough of his own personality to last in the celeb jungle. But what the many shows that have adapted the format have failed to realise is that they are feeding from a decaying corpse. Reality TV shows no sign of adapting, and is in grave danger of stagnating. More audience input will be required, and the effort to become involved, as well as the choices of what show to be involved with, will result in audiences dropping and shows being dropped. At the moment, only The Salon shows any sign of innovation, the rest have all been done, better, already (including Big Brother, whose last series was a shadow of it's previous ones).
What will replace these shows in our lives when they are gone? More sport or soap operas; God help us.
How many more variations on one particular theme can there possibly be? A twice weekly show about a local butchers shop with 'hilarious' chat from pensioners with cataracts, rickets and advanced senile dementia must be just round the corner.
The importance of reality TV in our lives was brought home when, on a recent Animal Hospital programme, Rolf Harris has to ask the viewing public to stop calling the surgery, as people who were having their own animals treated at the surgery could not get through, because of the volume of enquires about animals featured on the show. This is not only ridiculous, it is worrying that the public can be so easily manipulated. If people had any sense, such announcements on TV would be unnecessary.
Is there such a gap in our own lives, that a dog caught in a car engine could cause such public displays of support, when animal charities struggle to gain funding? Does Ready, Steady, Cook promote good nutrition to the masses, or merely show the talent of chefs making a meal from deliberately obscure ingredients? Does Changing Rooms offer ideas on home decorating, or amusement when watching people having to live with pink walls and a green sheepskin rug on the wall?
Some of these shows do at least provide some educational content, but what on earth do shows such as Britains Sexiest or What Not To Wear offer, apart from seeing Joe Public being ridiculed by celebrities (in the broadest possible sense of the word). Even worse are programmes featuring celebrities ie I'm a Celebrity.... and Reborn in the USA, giving another bite at the cherry to has beens, and giving the general public another chance to kick them in the teeth.
The music world has also been hit, with manufactured acts like S Club 7 being overshadowed by acts not just manufactured, but moulded from plasticine, like Hearsay, Will Young and Gareth Gates. If any of them have a career in 6 months, it will be on Blankety Blank sitting next to Bobby Ball.
The king of Reality TV must be Big Brother, which has at least created a genuine celebrity in Brian Dowling, who seems to have enough of his own personality to last in the celeb jungle. But what the many shows that have adapted the format have failed to realise is that they are feeding from a decaying corpse. Reality TV shows no sign of adapting, and is in grave danger of stagnating. More audience input will be required, and the effort to become involved, as well as the choices of what show to be involved with, will result in audiences dropping and shows being dropped. At the moment, only The Salon shows any sign of innovation, the rest have all been done, better, already (including Big Brother, whose last series was a shadow of it's previous ones).
What will replace these shows in our lives when they are gone? More sport or soap operas; God help us.
