Its not every night I make an appointment with the television for some R&R, so as luck would have it, I get home to the familiar spectacle of Survivor initially, only to follow that buffoonery up with the rerunned finale of My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiance.

The concept with Survivor, being an All Star show with some of the most memorable strandees from the past, is worthwhile. CalPundit calls them lame. I'll slightly disagree. I think the show only heats up after about half the group is gone and intrigue heats up. We're still at an early point in this run, but one positive witnessed last night was that the evil creep from the first series, Richard Hatch, is now toast. He was, in fact, a unanimous pick by the rest of the tribe.

I always find it odd on some of the more competitive versions of reality shows how a few characters will succeed by being openly duplicitous. The rationale seems to go "At least I know they're lying, the other guy ... I dunno." Yet to these wavering souls, they seem to lose sight of the fact that while they are being lied to 100% by these open liars, they ignore the moments when they give in and accept something as truthful, only to wonder in amazement at the knife in their back. Hatch, of course, made a cool mill off this method. It doesn't instill a great deal of confidence in the rest of mankind to witness this, I'll admit.

That in mind, Fiance is more of a practical joke setup show, with a long drawn-out joke, and a weird ending. All throughout the show, you're wondering how the family will react when the "bride" admits its a ruse. Turns out, the joke is on the bride. The groom she thought she was in cahoots with is an actor (we, the viewers, know this on Day One). The family is naturally very upset by both the forced effort to make them swallow this odd couple pairing (several of the bride's siblings threaten to protest the wedding, but relent) as well as the revelation that this was all a con.

In the end, the actor playing the groom tries to mask any hurt feelings by noting that the love of a family kept them together and forced them to notice that this wedding should not take place ... nevermind that they were all apparently willing to let it proceed. The bride claims she wanted to do all this for the family and rake in a fat paycheck for them (initially $250,000 ... later raised to $500,000 for purpose of giving a pleasant surprise to both bride and family afterwards) Once more, I'm not sure the moral of the story says anything good about mankind.

Also on recent viewing was the finale of The Surreal Life. Concept is this ... attempt to grab that 16th minute of fame. At least this one is titled appropriately. No better word fits this show's concept than "surreal." Words fail me in describing it in any more detail.

Overall, this genre is definitely scraping bottom. I mean, when you have a version of The Bachelor for midgets (Fox ... where else?), that's rock bottom. I'd love to close my eyes, proclaim "Macarena" and see this genre put to death. Haven't checked the ratings much lately, but I'm curious ... are these shows getting watched still? Jeez, bring back a regrouped Donnie & Marie variety show for my money!