"Kid Nation" or "Child Island"?

One of the more controversial new shows airing this fall is CBS’ reality show Kid Nation. This is a description of the program, one that a great deal of people find very exploitative and problematic. Me, I just think it could end up being really boring.

“The show, which recalls William Golding’s The Lord of the Flies, will feature 40 children, aged 8-15, living in a ghost town named “Bonanza Town” that had been uninhabited since the 19th century. The children will be required to create a functioning society in the town, as well as set up a government system used to solve problems in the town. The children will be attempting to prove that they can create a functioning society.

At the end of each episode an elected council of kids award the “Gold Star”, worth $20,000, to a fellow participant.

The show stresses the pressure of creating a viable society. The official CBS promo depicts children arguing with one another, crying, and falling over with exhaustion in challenges.”

Sounds kind of creepy, doesn’t it? Who could have possibly thought of such a premise?

Apparently, comedian Jamie Kennedy already did years ago. In this clip from the WB hidden camera prank show The Jamie Kennedy Experiment, he plays a Hollywood producer pitching an idea for a new reality show to a focus group made up of children and their worried parents, the show he refers to as “the final chapter in reality television,” known as Child Island. (The slogan--"Who will win? Child or island?") Showing them what he describes as a kids version of Survivor, he manages to expose what really goes into network television promotion and pretty much tell the future.

The clip has been barred from embedding, so below is the link to the video file.

YouTube: Jamie Kennedy's Child Island

Seems that the star of Malibu’s Most Wanted and Kickin It Old Skool has a little bit of Nostradamus in him. Who knows if other bits of his show, which was canceled in 2003, may also come true in the future?

I vote for the prank in which a restaurant worries its patrons with the upsetting news that there may be a rodent infestation in the walls. At the climax of the sketch, a six-foot rat breaks through the walls and chases the staff.

It could happen.

More "Big Brother" Than You Can Shake A Stick At

I've made no secret of my love for the CBS reality show "Big Brother." I find it the cream of the crop when it comes to reality shows, what with its soap opera histrionics, its loyal fan base and its deeply involved quest to uncover everything that makes a human being who they are, what makes them tick, and often what makes them go BOOM. By trapping people inside a house with no outside contact in real time for three months (if you last that long without being voted out or ejected) and letting them expose the human condition--there's that term again--in ways matched only by the high-quality programs on HBO, it's pop culture post-modernism at its finest. This isn't even mentioning the dozens of other incarnations around the world, which vary in their games, houses, sexuality and sociological implications. I could probably write a good 5,000 words easily on the topic, but I won't subject you to that torture.

To show my devotion, my mother and I were present at Season 5's live finale due to my second degree association to one of their editors (who is now working on "The Amazing Race") and some last minute film school hooky.

Usually, unless you were paying over $10/month for the 24 hour live feed internet service--which is reportedly very low-resolution and often cuts away when really good things are happening--viewers get the free (and admittedly more-than-enough) one hour three nights a week, edited almost on-the-spot by those aforementioned wonderful editors.

According to Variety, however, it seems that Showtime (partnered with CBS) will air three hours of (mostly) uncensored live feed a night on their Showtime Too (ShoToo) channel midnight to 3 a.m. ET (which sounds much better since I'm on Pacific Time) starting along with the premiere of the show on the fifth of July. The channel comes with most Showtime packages and can easily be found on any TiVo subscriber's list of seven gajillion channels.

There you go. Another thing to add to my TiVo. My fiancee is going to kill me.