The Ten Best/Worst Moments In Reality TV History, According To Tom Ballard

His new panel show, Reality Check, premieres on the ABC at 9pm on Wednesday.

by Steph Harmon 12 August 2014

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Reality TV. We love to hate it, and we hate to admit that secretly, we love it.

Beginning with MTV ‘s mid-’90s hit, The Real World, it didn’t take long for the phenomenon to grasp its greedy fingers around every other TV genre. There were psychological experiments like Survivor and Big Brother; talent hunts like Idol, The X Factor, and MasterChef; the aspirational voyeurism of The Real Housewives, The Simple Life, The Kardashians; and the anti-aspirational voyeurism of Duck Dynasty and Honey Boo Boo. There’s romance (The Bachelor, Catfish); there’s adventure (Bear Grylls, The Amazing Race); there’s something for every sub-culture. There’s even C-grade celebrities falling into a pool.

Reality TV evolves as our understanding of it matures, and these days it seems to be becoming self-aware. We no longer speak of what the My Kitchen Rules contestants are like as people, but we’re fascinated with how they’ve been constructed as characters. We can’t even feel sorry for them anymore. This is what they signed up for.

It’s a fascinating time for reality TV, and the ABC is about to launch a whole new show about what it all means: Reality Check.

Each week, comedian Tom Ballard will be joined by three industry experts — producers, contestants, judges, critics — to discuss the reality of reality TV. He seems to be fairly excited about this.

“To be honest with you, after leaving the security of triple j breakfast, I would have taken pretty much any telly gig that was offered. (I can’t TELL you how pissed I am that Denyer got Family Feud over me…)” Ballard says. “Happily, I happen to think that Reality Check will not only be on the air, it could also be highly entertaining and interesting. The world of reality TV is just so huge and diverse and insane and fun, it’ll be hard for us to not plate up some fucking gold.”

To whet our appetites before the show premieres tomorrow night, Ballard shared with us his favourite moments of the genre. With commentary.

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#10: Peter Coghlan on Britain’s Got Talent

…and now you can never eat again.

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#9: The God Warrior on Trading Spouses

Ladies and gentlemen, Archangel Marguerite Perrin:

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#8: Dance Your Ass Off

Why yes, there was an American reality show in which fat people tried to lose weight through the power of dance.

Season 1 was hosted by Marissa “Tracy Turnblad” Winokur and Season 2 was hosted by Mel “Scary Spice” B.

I think they should have called it Jiggly Elliott.

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#7: Bulletball on American Inventor

I know we’re only at number 7, but you’re about to have your heart broken.

Are you ready for this?

You sure?

Told you. Sorry.

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#6: KICK-ARSE UKRAINIAN COCKTAIL MAKER on Ukraine’s Got Talent

This will make you feel better!

Yayyyyyyyy!

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**#5: Famous In 12 Cancels Itself**

Okay, so this is amazing.

Famous in 12 was a show that chronicled the Artiaga family as they relocated to LA, and tried to become famous in 12 weeks. Thing is, the show was cancelled in week five due to low ratings. And then the host Harvey Levin broke that news to the contestants. As part of the show. And tried to act like that says something about society or some shit.