"Survivor, Exciting and New! Come Aboard We're Expecting You..."

So "Survivor" was cool and exciting (as one of the first North American mainstream really succesful 'reality shows' at its launch). Ok that's all good. Um.

However.

Survivor is in danger of becoming a joke upon itself, as it pushes its cart into its (17th?) season. By this time almost everyone has BEEN on Survivor as a contestant or as a winner! So where is the 'Surviving'? Isn't it more of a thrill when surviving is actually an anomaly, a happy and RARE occurance, than as an everyday (every season, at least) almost mundane happening? "Ok, so you need me to get bread, and milk and go win on Survivor? Right. Ok then, be back soon." Won't it lose a little something..?

I think by this point almost everyone (save for my mom and myself and a handful of jaded friends..?) have been 'Survivors'! Hot damn! There may just not be any more room for Specialness anymore! How can everybody be Special?? Won't that betray the very essence of being Special and 'standing out of the crowd'? In this case, the loser in the crowd is the stander-outee!! It's not that big a deal that you 'happen to be' the 113th person who has 'won' the Surviving challenge. Hell, everyone has reality-show style "Survived" and made it out alive, made it out a richer person, or even scored some new wheels in the deal too. But you may no longer be that big a shit, ya know what I mean?
Let's get real. What they need to do ('they' as in 'them', the 'powers that be', gurus of money-making, the entertainment-world self-proclaimed demi-gods of programming) is actually make it interesting. How about a reality show that is not about fame-whoring, or being another so-called "winner". How about a show called...(wait for it) "The Land of the Mediocre"!

I like that title. It would be a show about all the schmucks who have not been on Survivor (there are at least 23 of us left...I think) who are happy to be under-achievers in a content world of intensive couching, computer-mousing, remote-control-fondling and the like. Hell, I might even audition! Why not! At least, there is something new in town that is a novelty, a fresh idea!! A reality show for NON-winners, the anti-Survivor. NOBODY gets their fifteen seconds of fame! Screw you, Andy WarHO!!
I would so watch that.

Also, I am unsuccesfully trying to control my impulses toward impure thoughts that conjure up true tales of surviving: a cross between urban tales of the city and the horror genre! ie. "Thanksgiving at my Mother's...with her New, Cheeseball, Opportunistic Boyfriend who Gives Me the Creeps When He Tries to Dance All "cool" With Me"...or "Christmas Spent Consoling my Delusional Aunt as My Crazy, Drunken Uncle Embarrasses Everyone (except himself) By Foraying Into Drunken, Rage-Fueled Exposatory Storytelling..." See the Drama, Feel the Angst!

My favourite true Survivor-themed show would be, "How I Made It Out Without Slugging My Judgemental Father and His Deranged Girlfriend During Two Grueling Hours Enduring Their Insipid yet Dizzying, Frenzied, Deranged (said twice, but still accurately) One-Sided Conver-fuckin-sa-tions. Did They Ask How I the Frig I Was? No! Of Course Not!" (It's a long title, but it could work.)

Now THAT is Surviving!

Lastly, the worst part of this is that I will likely be tuning in the sodding show when it "premieres" (does that have any meaning anymore in this context??) its umpteenth season. Though I will have soaked my dentures in time to stick them back into my smile for the premiere, not to worry. "The show must go on." And on. And on. And...apparently, on...