After reading (OK, listening to) as much of Gone with the Wind as I could stand, I have been inspired by those classically selfish and manipulative Southern sociopaths Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler to create a bunch of Reality Shows. Let’s take a look at a few of them and hope that a network development maven is reading this!
Damned Yankees
This is an obstacle-course style show featuring contestant families competing against other families in a series of obstacles with increasing difficulty as the season progresses. Watch as loose networks of masters and servants try to overcome impediments in the form of low food stocks, pillaged live stock, fire, drought, sickness, old horses with broken-down carts, taxes, laziness, disease and finally irascible Damned Yankees to reach the finish line and claim the prize, a full belly and warm bed.
Belles and Beaus
This is a reverse Bachelor or Rock of Love type of thing wherein lovely teen aged Belles attempt to gather as many Beaus as possible at a series of balls and barbecues before they reach 19 years of age and are thus declared spinsters. The Belle who is able to string along the most beaus while eating as little as possible, wearing impossibly tight undergarments and withstanding withering humidity and vicious tongues will be crowned Belle of the County! Extra points will be given for stealing beaus from family members, life-long friends and the less fortunate.
You Rascal You
This is based on Captain Rhett Butler, the impossibly handsome and roguish, man-about-town. This bit will feature a crazed all-out race for fabulous prizes and foreign bank accounts. Each Rascal will be given a boat, a ragtag crew and a map (of sorts). The goal is to run medical supplies, ammunition and luxury items through blockades and unfriendly ports. Greasing of palms and underhanded methods will be encouraged and ultimately rewarded. Just watch out for patriotic stumbling blocks, the occasional jolt of conscience and jeering yokels. Extra points will be awarded for the successful delivery of satin, lace, bonnets, candies and useless trinkets.
Down Home Cooking
This cooking show will feature teams combining amateur chefs and professional survivalists creating something edible and lovely with limited ingredients, particularly dried peas, hominy and smallish fish. Any meat used must be gathered from the wild, or a near by burnt-out plantation. The wilder and smaller the game the better. Think squirrels and chipmunks. Creating passable substitutes for coffee and digging up hidden whiskey barrels is highly encouraged. Plundering of neighbors abandoned gardens will be mandatory as well as liberating chickens, catching loose piglets and milking goats.
Tara – Nothing Else Matters, or There’s No Place Like Home
This is a home improvement/decorating-themed show in which contestants must create some semblance of order after yet more Damned Yankees and lice-infested Confederates tromp through their “plantations” and bust up the place like an old, unused chiffarobe. A feature of this production will be Revenuers and Carpetbaggers thrown in as hosts to evaluate progress, create undue anxiety and show needless replays of scenes shown before the commercial breaks. Extra points will be given for inventiveness, resourcefulness, stick-to-it-iveness as well as the reuse of drapery and rooster feathers.
Glorious Dead Hunters
This is an "investigating the paranormal" type of show featuring a regular cast of characters, their gadgets, vehicles and a few hot chicks to draw the male viewer. These Glorious Dead Hunters will visit antebellum plantations, civil war battlefields and the oldest cemeteries the South has to offer hunting for the ghosts of the glorious confederate soldiers. Occasional forays into the North may be Incorporated into the show mix as hunting sites are run through faster than you can say Goober Peas. No prizes will be given. This is science, damn it!
May the games begin!
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