Reality TV Roundup

 It's been a while since I checked in here, and even longer since I wrote something that wasn't typed in a big raccoon-induced wave of anxiety. There's so much I could give updates on, but I'm not going to tonight. And luckily I live near so many of you readers now you likely know what's going on with me. Instead, I'd like to tackle something more important: a round up of the frankly excellent collection of reality tv I've consumed in the last week or so. but hey!!! don't let me lose you just because you think you don't care about reality tv!! because maybe you should care or at least maybe you could. 

With Love, Meghan: Meghan Markle's new lifestyle show (Netflix) 

Imagine this: you are Meghan Markle's old makeup artist/friend. You have flown from New York city to California. You are forced to spend the day with her in a studio house that you both repeatedly acknowledge is not her real house. When you arrive, it is probably morning. You are immediately served crudite before watching her make a pasta dish not fit for tv (it includes Swiss chard, arugula, and kale INCLUDING THE STEMS and parmesan grated using the big holes on a cheese grater). After this, you make beeswax candles. Like Meghan says, anyone can do this at home-- just contact your local beekeeper for the wax, and you probably also have a large bookcase stocked with professional and beautiful looking candle making supplies, right? She hasn't done this before, but she is insistent that you do it just right. While the candles set, you must go decorate a cake. During this process, she offers you tea for the allergies you said you'd been having. But the teas is honey syrup from the cake, lemon slices, fresh ginger, and cayenne pepper. By the end of the day, you say aloud that you can't wait to go back to her [real] house and relax. Luckily she made you a half gallon of bath salts last night. 

Overall, it is an exceptionally pleasant show to watch. She is unrelatable and unqualified to be teaching you anything, but beyond this, I think most criticisms can be attributed to the fact that it is just extremely easy (and shockingly acceptable) to hate women. 

Paris and Nicole: The Encore: Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie's 20 year reunion documentary (Peacock) 

I didn't watch Paris and Nicole's original reality tv show that this reunion was commemorating but I don't think that diminished my experience. The premise of this 3 episode doc was that they would be staging an opera, based off a one word song they wrote 30 years ago. They shop this idea all around town, giving deadpan looks when a variety of professionals show surprise that they are staging an opera, and politely decline to be involved. I think most of these people thought they were dumb. I believe they were doing a bit, and I found it very funny. I lost faith in them a little bit when it's revealed they've only given themselves 3 weeks to produce the opera, and then a little bit more when they even later reveal they haven't even cleared their schedules for these 3 weeks. The fear really sets in when it's 24 hrs before the performance, they watch the first act, and look at each other and go, "that was really bad. like the worst thing I've ever seen. I can't waste people's time flying in to see this." It turns out, there was nothing going on behind the scenes, and when all those professionals turned them down, they didn't really get other professionals to help them with much. They end up pulling it off, although the performance does take a considerable pause in the middle when backstage they've gotten locked out of Paris's dressing room, which contains all of the costumes and props needed to go on, and they show a guy taking a drill right to the metal handle trying desperately to get them back in. 

I must say, it was a much more entertaining 90 minutes of tv than I ever expected. Like Meghan's show above, and I think a lot of the criticism Paris and Nicole get is because it is just so gosh darn easy to hate women. I think they are smart and funny women who just wanted to do something silly and fun together as lifelong friends, and I really liked watching it. 

Love is Blind, Season 8: love is blind, season 8 (Netflix) 

*I will do this without any spoilers on the very slight chance any of my friends who are known to watch the show still read this blog* 

Honestly I forgot what my take on this one was. It's been a little boring, and every white man in Minnesota seems to look the exact same (predictable). The men this season are worse than the women, in that they are causing a lot of problems and yet somehow spinning it to make it the women's fault. I guess a real theme of this post, and maybe reality tv in general, and I suppose even reality life, is that it's real easy for women to always be getting the short end of the stick!! 

$$$$Bonus$$$: Bridget Jones Mad About the Boy: the 4th installment of the Bridget Jones movies (NOT reality) (Peacock) 

To be honest, I thought this movie, based on the poster/thumbnail, was about Bridget Jones and her son. It turns out that the featured much younger man (Leo Woodall) is actually Bridget's (Renee Zellweger) love interest. Sadly, I did not find their romance believable in the slightest. Overall, it paled in comparison to its predesesors (I tried that one like 3 times, including with a c or 2, and blogger still won't tell me how to spell it!!) anyway it paled in both the comedy and romance departments. Honestly, we should probably just let some franchises go out while they're still good and make NEW movies instead of continuing to REBOOT and make sequels to EVERYTHING. 

Well, there's my roundup. This was really made possible by housesitting for my sister on a cold weekend in Pittsburgh in a house that had a couch, a TV, and Peacock.