Rollergirls on DVD; The Hills on MTV; rhyming is fun for me!
About six months ago I wrote about the new reality series Rollergirls that was showing on A&E. My initial reaction was that the show was a breath of fresh air, if not entirely revolutionary. Brought to us by the same team that gave us the super-slick Laguna Beach, Rollegirls presented the lives of several members of the TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls in Austin, Texas. The DVDs of the series were released late last month, giving me a chance to catch up on episodes I had missed during its initial run. Simultaneously, MTV has started to air episodes of its Laguna Beach spinoff, The Hills. Watching both shows in close proximity brought out some interesting contrasts. Read more by clicking below…
First, here are some general truths about Rollergirls, posted in no particular order:
- You can’t really call it a documentary series, and yet ‘reality’ carries with it certain Rick Rockwell connotations. Perhaps it should be classified as a “real-life-drama?”
- Rollergirls is one of the few series to be found on television that accurately portrays the lives of people living/working on the bottom rungs of the economic ladder.
- While the series starts out strong, the actual roller-derby aspect grows a bit repetative over condensed viewings. Luckily, the back half of the 13-episode run focuses less on the actual bouts, and more on the personal lives of the participants.
- Austin looks amazing in widescreen.
I don’t have much of a history with reality programming. I watched the first two seasons of The Real World when they aired in the early 90s. Outside of that, I’ve probably caught a few seasons in marathon replays (#’s 8 and 10 come to mind), but have mostly avoided the post-Survivor offerings that have flooded the networks. I’m trying to rectify this. Its debatable as to what is more signficant socially, a tremendously innovative program that no one is watching (Arrested Development), or broad, mainstream fare watched by everyone (American Idol). I’d like to say that history will be kinder to the former, but with the amount of media that being produced and stockpiled, I’m not so sure. I should probably just stop worrying and love the bomb.
With all that said, Rollergirls seems to be the absolute best of what that genre can offer. Like any good series, you begin to think that you actually know and are friends with the characters on screen. This obviously creates an interesting twist because unlike the friends of Friends, the TXRD Lonestar rollergirls are actual people (even if in real-life they aren’t exactly as portrayed*). If you’re the type who can easily give themselves over to a television series, I trust you’ll find Rollergirls half as intriguing as I did.
Which leads us to MTV’s The Hills. Unlike, the previous show you won’t feel like you know anyone here, which is, perhaps, kind of the appeal. It’s like watching a check-out rag that moves, but without celebrities. Sign me up!
While I didn’t watch Laguna Beach, it appears in the three episodes that have so far aired that little aside from the lead character has carried over. The setting, this time around is in the Hollywood Hills (imagine that), as Lauren goes to fashion school and interns at Teen Vogue. Her friend/roommate/nemesis, Heidi, is brought in along to fuel most of the drama, as going to school and working at a high profile internship simply isn’t that juicy for tweens. Heidi is delicious as Lauren’s foil. She’s preposterously stupid, and wants to drop out of school to become a party planner, something that she does only to discover that working for a P.R. agency is much more about stuffing envelopes than it is about appletinis.
This is good stuff!
The problem with the series, and where it stands apart most dramatically from Rollergirls (note: the creators of Lugana Beach and Rollergirls, Gary and Julie Auerbach, are not associated with the production of The Hills), is the production team seems too intent on creating nicely packaged 20-minute stories. There isn’t the looseness that Rollergirls has, taking frequent breaks to give us a better taste as to who these people actually are. The Hills is so focused on each characters predetermined plotline it actually can’t seem to fill out a whole episode. Instead of getting more on one of our two leads, we’re instead rerouted to completely pointless side-stories involving Heidi’s boyfriend’s roommate (?!?) and how he likes some secretary or something. It’s completely random. They could fill in the excess 5 minutes each episode with a documentary on championship Jenga players and it wouldn’t seem any more peculiar.
This brings us to an interesting crossroads. Reality programming has finally been around long enough where we can begin to assess each series on specific criteria. The way things are shaping, it almost seems like the premiere series are going to be those that have the most Altman-esque approach to the material. Are the creators willing to let their subjects breath, or is the narrative going to be stiff and unflexable. One would hope that in television, as opposed to films, the looser approach will actually attract the large audience. After all, what television can do that films can not, is develop a relationship between characters and the audience over a period of weeks, not hours. It is those relationships (when the right amout of marketing is thrown in) that can create not only the most significant series, but also the best ratings. No one would watch Lost if it were a series about a bunch of assholes on the beach.
*This illustrates kind of an interesting idea about the difference between a person and a character, especially when working within the heavily edited parameters or reality-television. Steve Carrell is not the same as his character Michael Scoot (let’s hope), and we have to assume that Marta, is not same the as Punky Bruiser (which is something addressed in the series, adding a whole other layer of meta-madness).
Tags: A&E, DVD, MTV, Rollergirls, The Hills
