Reality TV will you please try harder?

As I languish in the wake of another season of Project Runway, I can't get rid of a nagging sense of joylessness about the show. It has nothing to do with the winner of the contest, the best man won, no question. No, it is something else all together. While mulling over my pall I remembered that I felt this way about Bravo's other great show, Top Chef, at the end of its previous season. Eventually I realized that my problem with the shows are the people they are choosing for contestants.

See, in the beginning of the shows the contestants were far less accomplished in the field that they were competing in. Jay McCarroll, the charming winner of the first season of project runway was just some hick from backwoods Pennsylvania who liked to sew. Many of the contestants on Top Chef that first season had some cooking experience but were mostly caterers, personal chefs, etc. Namely, not already top chefs at high end resteraunts. These contestants were all people who needed a break, they had talent but no access. To put it another way, they are us.



The 'ordinary' quality of the contestants is what made you root for them, or against them, with the same fervor that you use when hoping for the success, or failure, of people you actually know. These were not accomplished prosessionals, they were people who needed break bad enough that they were willing to put themselves in an aquarium so the world could observe and see their flaws and forgive them for them because of the undeniable potential of their talent.

Those were the days. Now both of the shows are stacked with people who already own their own clothing lines and who are already the top freaking chef at four star restaurants. These people are not motivated by the same struggle to get established, they are already established. The reason they are on the show is because they are the bullying, attention-grabbing, ass-bags that already choke so much of the world, making it impossible for the quietly brilliant to ever find a voice.

Now, Bravo is trotting out yet another competition show, make me a supermodel, which alienates me even more than the previously discussed. Is there anyone we can relate to less than these people? I already hate america's next top model, now we have another show for the pretty to try to out pretty other pretties? The base struggle of the wholly untalented, bravo Bravo? I think not.

I know that this trend is not going to reverse itself. I also know that there is a sound argument to be made that by having contestants who are already more skilled makes the competition stronger. I know I would rather watch the tigers than the Schuler softball team. I don't buy those arguments though. It was never about the level of competition, it was about the hope attatched to the idea that if the only gay guy in Lehman, Pennsylvania, can get a shot then maybe, someday, we'll get ours too.