Ditch ‘The Bachelorette’ For These British Reality Shows
American reality TV is shitty, I don’t care how many people watch “The Bachelorette.” It’s still weird and bad. I mean you get one Chad every season and then he doesn’t even last long enough to make things really fun. That shit is too edited, too fake and too censored.
British reality TV, on the other hand, is amazing. British reality shows don’t pretend that there’s any actual high cultural merit to them which makes them all the more enjoyable. They’re all basically a montage of drinking, screaming, and putting on bronzer.
If you’re new to the scene, welcome to this k-hole that is about to swallow all your free time.
Start with “Geordie Shore.”
Although Geordie Shore is a loosely based on “Jersey Shore,” it does everything so. much. better. It’s great firstly because Geordie isn’t an actual place (it’s Newcastle) and while Newcastle might technically be on the water, there’s definitely no beach or even beach weather here (they go to the beach a few times over the thirteen seasons dressed in full down parkas). “Geordie Shore” has been on for thirteen seasons so far and the fourteenth is coming soon. With Jersey Shore they all left to lead somewhat normal lives, whereas anyone that leaves Geordie Shore seems to just look for an even weirder and more bizarre reality TV experience (see below).
When Vicky, who was on the series for nine seasons, left “Geordie Shore” I assumed she was going to pull a Snooki and start having children and host a cooking show. Instead she made the rounds on several different reality shows, Ex On The Beach (see further below) and her own show “Judge Geordie.”
On “Judge Geordie,” Vicky and her friend drive around and “help” people with the most mundane of problems. The first episode has Vicky sorting out a bizarre petty fight between two friends who can’t stop calling each other “dickhead” and the show just kind of maintains that speed and urgency.
My favorite of them all is “Ex On The Beach,” which is like a nihilistic version of “Bachelors in Paradise.” It has no real endgame, no structure, nothing really other than a basic premise which is eight single people in a house with their exes arriving periodically.
Once, twice or even three times an episode three cast members will go down to a nearby beach where one of their “exes” will literally walk out of the ocean set to “Jaws” theme music. An ex could be anyone though from an actual relationship to someone they shagged once at a club.
Everyone then just kind of hangs out at the house and sometimes a tablet will ping and give them things to do or very literally just stir the pot. There’s never a “winner,” there’s no prize and no one really gets eliminated except for when the producers are tired of someone (in which case they literally make the cast member walk back into the ocean). The cast is comprised of a mix of British reality TV royalty (see Geordie Shore past and present cast members) and a bunch of randoms who subsequently turn into Reality TV royalty.
My favorite scene to date is when the house has a 10-minute conversation about one of the girls sticking her finger in Scotty T’s ass during sex. Would you get that on American TV? I think not.
You can find these shows on iTunes or at MTV’s UK site.
