I know about this one. Even did the first season in my reality TV finale thread. I find the “Face The Banker” portion just as unbearable as the original game show (roughly the same pace as plate tectonics, 100% pure dumb moronic brainless luck while the apologists constantly yammer at you about how it isn’t, and that whole “what-WOULD-you-have picked” cosmic bullcrap, where the contestant receives massive emotional abuse if wrong and wins diddly-squat if right, which is the single most offensive trend I have ever seen in television). so I only watch everything leading up to it. It’s pretty fun stuff… lots of scheming, lots of strategizing, lots of butting heads, all kinds of second-guessing. And then there are the contests themselves, which are almost always a complete circus and, like all good reality TV contests, do a fine job of pointing out the doofuses.
I won’t deny that there is a certain level of manipulation (there’s now way in hell Rob Mariano makes it to the final without a lot of help), but I’m fine with that. I’ve watched enough of these things to realize that there needs to be entertainment and sometimes they need to sacrifice “honesty” in favor of something the viewers are actually willing to watch. Remember Splash, which had the brilliant idea of being a PURE, HONEST, FAIR, SERIOUS COMPETITION WHERE EVERYONE WOULD BE JUDGED EXACTLY THE SAME AND IT WOULD BE 100% OBJECTIVE WITH NO FAVORITISM, and the result was that the best-looking contestants got ejected first and the final was all wrinkly old guys? How that train wreck made it even that far, I’ll never understand. That’s not going to happen on DONDI. The producers know that lovely bikini ladies bring in numbers, and they will damn well hold on to their meal ticket.
Right now it’s way too early to pick up on any trends, so I’ll keep watching, and with any luck I’ll have something more current pretty soon.