REALITY TV PICKS – JANUARY

It dropped on New Year’s Day in a new streaming model, 4 episode chunks released over 3 weeks. Shout out to my sister for telling me about it. I’ve become the patient 0 at my office, infecting people with the need to watch the entire series. I’ve never spoken to such a variety of co-workers outside of work until this post Circle world.

What IS “The Circle”? 

Well in some senses it’s a “Black Mirror” episode come to life. In fact if at the end they revealed that was the twist I’d stand up and applaud. 

Broadly, contestants are trapped in a house and can only communicate via a made up “voice activated” social media platform dubbed The Circle. 

I pity the poor PAs/ Transcribers who have to act as the automation on behalf of these fools.

Contestants choose their pictures before entering the competition. There is no requirement to play as yourself, and therefore many don’t. 

They rank each other, and at the end the most popular will end up with $100K. 

Watching them develop attachments, suspicions, and biases in such a short amount of time is fascinating. It’s also a blend of MTV’s “Catfish”, “Big Brother” and “Survivor.”
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The first episode might be the toughest to get through as it sets up the conceit of the show, but stick with it. You’ll quickly get used to the idea of them talking to an all knowing social media platform and constantly narrating their thoughts and actions (#sendmessage). I promise you it’ll be worth it!

The problems they face now are the same ones I do – bills, housing, having to go to too many weddings. Therefore the escapism has run thin. This season, many of them have also given up the pretense of working at one of Lisa Vanderpump’s many establishments.

While I’m not sold on the quality of the new cast, I’m on board with the idea of bringing in new talent.

The first episode was somewhat slow, but I’m willing to see the season through since I want to see the train wreck of Jax and Brittany’s wedding.

See this additional article for my full hypothesis.

It has the most surprising amount of variety of reality archetypes. You’ll find gold diggers, people genuinely interested in romance, the risk of catfishes, and of course – beekeepers?

The premise of the show is relatively straightforward, it follows an American and their possible future spouse who has been brought to the US on a K-1 Visa. The K-1 Visa stipulates that you must get married within 90 days of them entering the US or they’ll be deported.

The longevity of the couples prior to applying for the visa varies, thus the fun of the show. There are a bevy of spinoffs including tracking before the couples get engaged, meet in the first place, and even one where the spouses are not eligible for the K-1 and therefore the Americans go abroad. Of course there are also follow up series, and to get super inception-y there’s a show where previous cast members provide commentary on the current season, a-la “Gogglebox” or “People’s Couch.”

This season had incredible potential, but seems to be losing momentum. With the return of some played out recurring characters and some flatlining plots it’s proving to be one of the weaker seasons. 

If you haven’t seen the show before I highly recommend going back to the very beginning and catching up.

“Below Deck” is one of the few shows where many of them actually have to also be skilled at an actual task in order to remain on the show. While the interior/ server crew may not need to be quite so real world equipped, you can tell that the deck crew have to have some knowledge of how running a mega yacht goes. 

This season has been pretty solid, and if you’re looking for something to fill your time until something else comes back, you could do worse.