jotsheet

As a rule, I don’t watch reality shows. As a rule, I don’t watch the WB. Tonight, I broke both rules, and boy am I glad for it.

Here is the premise of the WB Superstar USA (link #2):

1. Hold a vocal talent competition in the vein of American Idol.
2. Tell all of the talented people that they’re terrible and dispose of them.
3. Select the worst performers, particularly those possess the inimitable quality of really believing they’re good—and reinforce their delusions by telling them that their auditions were tremendous.
4. Fly them to Hollywood and put on an elaborate hoax.
5. Iteratively eliminate the “best of the worst.”
6. Crown the “worst of the worst.”
7. Give the winner $100k and a recording contract, then tell him/her the real deal: you’re horrible.

I don’t understand how the last step works, either. How does one award a recording contract to a person with a voice worse than Roseanne Barr’s? Anyhow, the show is positively delicious; I felt guilty while watching it, but it was too entertaining to avert my eyes.

The question I still have, though, is just how these folks acquired their delusions of grandeur. They’re not insane; they’re just terrible singers (and often ugly, too). Who told them they were good? Who perpetuated this myth? Perhaps each one of these saps is already the victim of an elaborate hoax in their personal lives amongst their friends, all of whom tell them that they’ve got talent. Frankly, I don’t see how else one of these people would have waddled over to a “talent search” in the first place, provided they have a shred of dignity, a dash of common sense, or a faint sense of decency.

Oh, to hell with the analysis. It’s so bad, it’s good. I may be hooked.

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