Can MTV Bring Reality Television Back To Life?

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With the whole Time Warner-Viacom face-off over New Year’s, the anemic ratings of MTV’s two newest reality shows may not have gotten that much attention from MTV executives. But now that the dust has settled, they will most likely be taking a second look at “The City” and “Bromance.”

Though the programs themselves have little in common (“The City” follows young fashionista Whitney Port as she tries to make her way in the big city; “Bromance” pits guys against each other in an effort to become BFFs with Brody Jenner), they share a common heritage in “The Hills” (Port was Lauren Conrad’s co-worker at Teen Vogue, Jenner, the bachelor err.. bro makes regular appearances as Conrad’s on-again off-again love interest). And therein lies the root of the problem…

How can MTV expect these shows that star peripheral characters to continue holding viewers’ interest after so many iterations? By definition they’re derivative. Just take a look back… before Conrad aka LC took off for “The Hills” she was a part of the high school ensemble on “Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County,” which itself was a take off of the fake Orange County, “The OC.” Now, setting aside the irony that a primetime soap created to skewer this privileged community instead launched multiple reality series reinforcing the stereotypes, there is the question of sheer momentum. At this point, it’s like copying a carbon copy of a carbon copy, no?

This issue is further compounded by the contrived premises of both shows. Much has already been made of “The City’s” fake factor, and I think YAB member Alyx summed up the problem with “Bromance” pretty nicely in his YIR post where he named “Reality Shows” as one of the “Worst Moments” in television: “We’ve learned over and over again that searching for romance, best friends, and other valuable relationships on live TV is a waste of time, so why don’t people give up already?” Teens have clearly absorbed this lesson to the point of saturation; shouldn’t the folks in charge of programming catch up?

Chances are these shows will flicker out soon enough, but what will replace them? With 16 new programs on MTV’s lineup (the channel’s supersized attempt to hold on to its target audience), there are no shortage of contenders. I’m personally curious to see how viewers will respond to a slightly real-er version of reality with the new series “College Life,” a compilation of student-produced video footage from the University of Wisconsin (a similar web-only project called “What the Flip?” was recently launched by MTV.com with Flip cameras on a nation-wide scale.) Of course, in the hands of MTV, you have to wonder if both projects won’t just end up being more art imitating life…

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Categorized under: TV

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