Reality Bites

I was really excited when I heard Bravo was bringing back The Battle of Network Stars with the small adjustment of The Battle of Network Reality Stars. I vaguely remember as a child the original serious that pitted such luminaries as Scott Baio, Mr. T, and Kojak against one another in cheesy challenges and the games were inexpiably hosted by the king of sport commentary, Howard Cosell. Unfortunately network executive’s egos got in the way and didn’t want their stars on other networks and the stars themselves started getting paid so much, they couldn’t be bothered to run a simple obstacle course. But in the new century, there are plenty of people who are not beneath possibly embarrassing themselves, reality stars. So when the premier of the new version premiered last night, I was there with bells on.

After watching the show, I was thoroughly disappointed with it. I watched expecting to see the old format with network vs. network; instead what we got was a mixed bag of four randomly devised teams with no network affiliation. Yet with the all the randomness, the three teams from The Amazing Race kept their couplings. Also there were some combatants I have never heard of like random chicks from The Swan (I now realized why the show failed because the chick is not at all attractive, I’d hate to see the before picture), The Bachelor, America Next Top Model, Temptation Island, and Bravo tried to sneak two people from their lame reality shows, one from Project Runway and another from Show Biz Moms and Dads. Yet no Gulager, what’s up with that? Then to add a reality twist, the three teams had to vote off at the end of the day. Did they really have to go there? That addition was really unneeded. They also have three sideline reporters, seriously three, Omarosa, Trishelle, and Bachelor Bob. Yet the host of the show is some nobody.

With all that complaining, I have to admit I will continue to watch every episode they air. The highlight of the first show was the alpha male posturing between The Miz and Richard Hatch as who would be their team captain. For my prediction on who will win, I am putting my money on the green team. They have three winners on their team (Chip and Kim from The Amazing Race and Will from Big Brother), they also have Theo who has won multiple Real World/Road Rules challenges. The green is also the only team with only three girls (all the other have four girls and guys each) one of which is Sue Hawk (can we get her a drug test?) but they do have two girly men, Joe Schmo and one of the Average Joes. The Battle of the Network Reality Stars is on Bravo at 9:00 but is repeated constantly throughout the week.