If there is one thing that I have learned in my first month is that Serbia really knows how to do reality TV. More specifically: Survivor. Yes, my friends… somewhere on the remote islands off the coast of Panama, 16 Serbian strangers were stranded and forced to create a new society… while voting each other off. So, what makes Serbian Survivor so much better than American Survivor?
Are the challenges harder? Are the personalities of the contestants even more outlandish? Are there less stringent rules and regulations in regards to nudity on television? Do they eat each other rather than vote each other off?
No… I don't think so… Yes… and unfortunately not.
The reasons that Survivor in Serbia is so great has nothing to do with the actually game play (as I call it now)… because there is “game play”… and then there are the extras. In the States, all that you see is “game play”. You see them on the island… living… working… backstabbing.
But, imagine. Survivor meets the "Monday Night Football Halftime Report" meets a Jay Leno style variety show meets "Meet the Press".
I know what you are thinking… "how wonderful!"
Now, before you get too excited you must remember that I have no idea what people are saying… it is all in Serbian, without English subtitles. Yet just like American Survivor… I am riveted. Even more so as I try and figure out this bizarre new format for the show. Let me put it this way… the running time of an episode is two hours… BUT, just like in the State, you only get one hour of “game play”. Bear with me.
Now, my first experience with the show was a couple of Sunday afternoons ago. We do not have many English stations in our temporary house and I was flipping through the channels and low and behold… I found Survivor. And they all talked funny.
I watched it for a little while and then got distracted playing with Gray and making lunch… all that sort of fun stuff… but I left the TV on all this time. Eventually I ended up back in the living room and Survivor was over… now there was some Meet the Press looking talk show. At least that is what I thought it was until they went to a clip of a "Reward Challenge" and then cut back to the panel… and continued to cut back and forth for some time… after a while I came to realize, through body language, that the panel was arguing about strategy. It then became apparent as they cut of various clips around camp and day to day life on the island that the panel was discussing the actions and motives of various contestants in the game. Then all of a sudden… the panel stopped talking and Survivor came back on. I had just witnessed a Serbian halftime report… for Survivor!
Okay… now that was just cool… BUT... it got better. When the show ended and they voted someone off rather than eating them… the program cut back to the panel who interviewed the person who was just voted out… they showed clips of his ultimate downfall… and then… this is what caught me off guard… they introduced a band… who then played about two songs on a very badly designed survivor looking set. Imagine the design staff of Survivor decorating the music stage on Saturday Night Live (but half the size)… but due to budgetary constraints, they could only afford about $25.00 and were only approved to buy from Party City’s “luau” aisle. That was the set. It was absolutely brilliant. Finally rolling credits rolled.
Now, I should point out that the actual “game play” segments of Survivor Serbia look exactly the same as the American version. And frankly, the American Survivor did three seasons in and around Panama and it is quite obvious that they are using all of the same locations… and probably the same structures for tribal councils and the more elaborate challenges.
But as far as Serbian TV in general… everything pretty much looks like the set I described.
They have Big Brother… which I can’t stand no matter what country I am in… and it looks pretty much the same… except it is on ALL the time. It’s like the Truman Show here… 24/7.
Also, there is something that looks like Dancing with the Stars. But, I have been told that it is not… but it looks like it. But image the room that American Idol uses for its first round of auditions… three judges sitting around a table… and about 50 people sitting on bleachers… cheering for people dressed up in ballroom dancing garb… that never dance! Folks, I have yet to figure this show out… and like every other TV program here… it is on all the time. And yes, I have yet to see anyone dance. Every time I flip past it… the same kind of pomp and circumstance that marks the end of an episode of Dancing with the Star is going on. Couples are standing in rows… couples are asked to sit down in what appears to be the safe area. Then they stand up again and join the rows… the Serbian announcer reveals what seems to be a winner… and it keeps going… it’s almost like a round robin of eliminations… “okay you beat Jelena and Miroslav… but, will you beat Branka and Vladamir?” It is all so strange to me.
I wish I knew more Serbian.
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