Love the One You're With

Krikor Daglian
January 31, 2001

One outgrowth of the reality TV fad has been the renewed popularity of shows about couples on dates. "The Dating Game" was big back in the 70s and 80s, and who can forget "Studs" from the early 90s (a show which I always felt might have originally been titled "The Men of Long Island")? Some of the new generation of dating reality shows, for lack of a much better term, follow essentially the same model. "Change of Heart", for example, has a couple go on dates with two new people, and then brings them in front of a studio audience to decide whether to stay with their long time companion or to start seeing the new kid on the block, the modern twist being the factor for revenge and trash talking that seem to be a prerequisite for modern shows about relationships. Further evidence of this trend can be seen in "Temptation Island", the new Fox show. "Temptation Island" features couples going to an island full of beautiful single men and women put there solely to tempt the couples out of their relationships and create a vicious cycle of juicy revenge hook ups and arguments for the viewing pleasure of the audience. Oh wait, did I say that? I meant that the show is supposed to provide the couples a chance to see how strong their relationship is, and provide us all with a way to assess just how strong our relationship might be, or any relationship can be in this modern world.

Yeah right. "Temptation Island" is engrossing, but only because of it's soap opera aspects. Truthfully, how many couples encounter a time when they are separated from their partner and accosted by a bevy of buff bodies encompassing every type of personality and physical look that anybody could want? Why anyone who was in a relationship that they really wanted to last would go on the show is beyond me, unless they are naive, dumb, or in a remarkably "open relationship" (or if one or both of them are good liars).

While these more extreme examples of dating reality shows, with their nasty edge, certainly have their attraction, I've become just as interested in the more mundane but in some way more real relationship shows that actually follow two people on a date for the enjoyment of the viewing audience. The two shows I come across the most are "Blind Date" and "3rd Date". Though both shows ostensibly follow the same formula, the two shows end up being quite different. As is obvious from the title, of course, one show follows a date between two people who had never met before, and one follows the date of two people who have had two dates already. There are further differences. "Blind Date" is set in Los Angeles, while "Third Date" is set in New York. As people from these two cities can tell you, the type of person who chooses to live in either of these cities is very different, and watching the show, this fact becomes ever more obvious. As a New Yorker, I'm biased, but I find that the people on "Blind Date" tend to be better looking but less than intellectual, the second quality accounting for the many nodding-one's-head-side-to-side-while-you-roll-your-eyes-moments by the viewer. Of course, it's this kind of "these people are so dumb and shallow" vibe that allows the shows creators the opportunity for the best aspect of "Blind Date," the little pop-up video-esque though and factoid bubbles that pop up throughout each date. While sometimes merely informative, most of these are snide remarks and snipes at the show's participants, either purporting to tell the viewer what the person is thinking, letting the viewer know that the person is about to say or do something stupid, or letting us know what the person's friends say their weaknesses or annoying habits are. In other words, it's Hollywood in the same way as Joan Rivers is with her critiques of the starlets clothes at the Oscars. On a side note, even though she's originally a New Yorker (weirdly enough, she was my Dad's patient (he's a dentist) many years ago, before she became famous for attempting to drill holes in other people), L.A. can keep her, and I'm sure NY would agree with me.

Anyway, because it's filmed in NY, and because the people on it aren't idiots (usually), I prefer "Third Date." Unfortunately, because it's broadcast on the Metro channel, which I assume is only available in the NY Metro area (even if it's reach is larger, I doubt it's available in Des Moines). The dates on "Third Date" are usually not the fiascoes that Blind Dates are because the two people have already had two successful dates, so they have to be somewhat compatible. "Third Date" puts a lot of the stress on the fact that the third date is usually the "get some" date, where at the very least, the couple gets at least to first base if things are going well (or farther if they've been there already). Much of the entertainment of "Third Date" comes from watching the guy try to maneuver his way into the girl's pants. If the date is going well, some getting it on usually follows (they only show kissing on camera, but sometimes you can tell that the night didn't end there). If the guy is too clumsy in his approaches, or things are going badly and the guy just doesn't get it, the show can be quite entertaining.

The funny part with all of these shows is that the most entertainment comes from watching relationships crash and burn. It might be a sad comment on our society that we get more enjoyment out of seeing things crash and burn than succeed, but then, you always get the feeling that anybody who would go on these shows (and spit hazardous words out of their mouth about their counterpart) deserves to get what's coming to them, and enjoying it isn't a sin.