How did the Real World TV show become popular in the 90's? Who did it cater to?

Kowboy On Sherdog said:
The Challenge was legit when Prime CT was beating up all the cast.
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He's still doing the show at 45 although he's definitely mellowed out with his brother getting killed and Diem's cancer death.
 
Beth from S2 was on the latest season of The Challenge and she's 56 now.
 
They literally took mentally ill people and put them all in the same house. It was entertaining as fuck.
 
Reality tv wasn't really a thing back when TRW started. I got sucked into S3 in like 4th grade. Some of it was pretty entertaining, but after a few seasons I stopped watching. My asshole cousin convinced me Puck was in the Red Hot Chili Peppers at the time.
 
Kowboy On Sherdog said:
The Challenge was legit when Prime CT was beating up all the cast.
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The Challenges used to be so good. I see commercials now and I don't recognize anyone anymore. CT was a goon. He had everyone shook for a while there.

My favorite Challenge moments rank as:

1. Drunk CT trying to kill Adam and eat his brains
2. Wes getting the consolation threesome from Rachel and Veronica after they screwed him over (I was a bit jelly)
 
Rhood said:
Never understood how this show became so popular on MTV, during a time when music video's were still in heavy rotation. I'm trying to understand who watched this show and was glued to the TV screen for every episode.

I remember watching 1 episode (aired before Beavis & Butthead) where this lady went to her barista job, came home, ate dinner, and went to bed.
This is what a majority of people do 5 days week. Is this really entertainment?
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How did reality TV become so popular? How did YouTube and the culture of short form performative videos made by nobodies across the world usurp traditional, expensively-produced entertainment as devouring the majority of our screentime? Why does Mr. Beast have the most watched YouTube channel in the world?

I have difficulty getting my nieces and nephews to sit down long enough to watch a narrative-based show that lasts for even 15 minutes, and I'm trying to pick stuff made for them. It's basically impossible. A half hour? An hour? The duration of a feature film? Out of the question. But they will be glued for hours to these inane videos of some guy or girl playing Roblox or Minecraft, doing nothing, doing less than Seinfeld, but theatrically embellishing their emotional reactions to every tiny non-happening as they play pretend to invent it. I'm talking about crap like Aphmau or Preston Plays. I can't stomach this shit for 2 minutes.

Back when it first released Survivor was smashing records and had everyone scratching their heads. It was credited for pioneering "reality television". It didn't take long before many realized that wasn't true, and began to point to The Real World and Cops as the true candidates for pioneering serial reality television.

I never understood why The Real World was such a hit with my generation back when it was. I thought it was stupid. In retrospect, it's impossible not to admire it, at least, for being so far ahead of its time.
 
Kowboy On Sherdog said:
The Challenge was legit when Prime CT was beating up all the cast.
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I'm a fan of The Challenge, only reality show ive watched for years.. I met him and some of the cast, partied with others lol..


To TS they got to see mixed backgrounds of people who had to live together, they would offended each other and talk it out and not be canceled. Also through the interviewing and screening they would find mostly fun, interesting attractive people.
 
My Spot said:
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He's still doing the show at 45 although he's definitely mellowed out with his brother getting killed and Diem's cancer death.
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He has somewhat , last season he went to old CT for a second

 
I have never been a huge fan of stuff like the Real World.

I just find it funny one of them went on to be a Republican Congressman, and is now the US Transport Secretary and another went on to be a major WWE superstar and even main evented Mania against Cena.
 
Pittie Petey said:
Season 1 in New York was good and interesting but season 3 in San Francisco was some really great television for the time, with Puck and Rachel and Pedro(RIP)
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It's widely agreed that the first 3 seasons were great and had interesting but "normal" people.

After that it started becoming a mess with producers choosing "characters" and pushing for sex, confrontation, and general low brow bullshit.
 
Reality TV was THE catalyst that allowed the lowest common denominator programming to take over all forms of art in our culture today. A fun fact for all the rare group of millens, zoomers, alphas and betas who have interest in anything before 9/11.

...as @Madmick noted in his eloquent and concise comment above, Cops was the first "real" TV show to appeal to a certain low level wavelength in the population and the networks struck the motherload going forward.

MTV could only continue to push schlocky game shows and watered down music video production to carry the network for so long. The Real World appealed to the same low level wavelength audience and it signaled the end of a truly novel concept.
 
Possum Jenkins said:
It's widely agreed that the first 3 seasons were great and had interesting but "normal" people.

After that it started becoming a mess with producers choosing "characters" and pushing for sex, confrontation, and general low brow bullshit.
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Yea, I think I pretty much tuned out after that because it started changing and getting a bit glammed up, started evolving into what we know "reality" shows to be today
 
It's extremely appealing and it was the beginning of reality tv (although pretty scripted). The idea of 7 people from varying backgrounds and belief systems having to live in close quarters and work together is extremely appealing and it's why the show worked for 20+ years. Sorta put a mirror up to societies face and made people do internal reflection.
 
It's very easy to understand why it was huge.

It was something different. What was on TV for stale and this new.
 
Mark Long still does The Challenge, he's 54 now.
 
Pittie Petey said:
Reality tv was new and interesting, it was brash and bold and a welcome refreshing change from the tired old formulaic laugh track sitcoms that were the norm back then

It was a new generation that had grown up angry and were rejecting the safe little bullshit polite society hypocrite world that they had been presented, thats what gave rise to gangsta rap in the suburbs, ECW, reality television, etc.

Season 1 in New York was good and interesting but season 3 in San Francisco was some really great television for the time, with Puck and Rachel and Pedro(RIP)
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Man, I miss ECW.


Bigelow, Candido, Douglas....

 
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@crabmeat You've gotta remember this, it played during every commercial break. I bet so many people spent $40 in 1997 money and ended up disappointed when there was no nudity.

 
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