As the year winds down, I took a stroll through the archives, and picked out 21 stories that stood out to me from 2021, from Survivor and Big Brother to Top Chef and The Real World Homecoming.
Posts from: December 2021
HBO Max’s Finding Magic Mike, a dance competition based on the Channing Tatum movie, is a surprisingly emotional dance competition that has both heart and heat.
Reality Blurred TV critic Andy Dehnart’s picks for the best reality shows and documentary series that aired in 2021, including both new and returning series.
Survivor 41 concluded with an incredibly long and padded finale that ended with a winner whose game the jury respected almost unanimously, but the editing didn’t develop that person’s game as well as it could have—just another disappointment in a season full of them.
My thoughts on three new (or new-ish) holiday-themed reality competitions: Peacock’s Baking It, Hulu’s Candified: Home for the Holidays; and Food Network’s Buddy vs. Duff Holiday.
A season of Survivor aired but did not award a prize to one of the two finalists; instead, that money is going to charity after the producers of France’s version of Survivor, Koh-Lanta, discovered cheating.
Two reality shows following groups of 20-something people—random strangers in Austin, Black friends in Los Angeles—deliver very different kinds of drama.