For any fans of reality television out there, it must be your perfect time of year for you. With X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing reaching their conclusion and I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here in the middle of its series, over 5 million viewers spend the Saturday nights and their evenings watching Austin Healey do the Paso Doble or watching politician Robert Kilroy-Silk having insects thrown on him whilst on an exercise bike. Some people can’t stand these shows, calling these programmes ‘car crash tv’ and criticise the way that ‘wannabes’ try to become famous and the way that ‘Z-List’ celebrities use these shows to revive their careers. Despite this, a lot of people watch these shows so it looks like reality television is here to stay.

Reality shows have been around for decades but they only really took off after the start of this millennium. In 1997, in the Netherlands, John de Mol Produkties, an independent branch of Endemol, came up with an idea which would change reality television forever. They decided to lock a number of contestants in a house with their every move caught on CCTV and the public deciding who will win a cash prize. Two years later, on the Dutch television channel Veronica; the first episode of Big Brother was broadcast. The show was an instant hit in the Netherlands. Then in the summer of 2000, the first series of the show came to Channel 4. This also became a summer ratings smash, with Craig Phillips taking the £70,000 first prize. The show gradually started broadcasting across the world with enormous success. This sparked the creation of other reality television shows, making it one of the main genres of programmes appearing on our screen.

The genre of reality television is split up into many sub-genres. For this article, I am going to focus on four of them. Firstly, makeover shows are shows which ‘experts’ attempt to improve the quality of one’s life in a particular way. Probably the first successful reality makeover show was Changing Rooms, where two friends try to improve each other’s house under the guidance of ‘experts’. Programmes which followed on from this include What Not to Wear where fashion ‘gurus’ give fashion advice to members of the public and How Clean is Your House? where presenters help members of the public make their houses cleaner.

Another popular genre of reality television is where members of the public live a different life to introduce them to a different way of living or living in a different place or with a ‘guru’ for a period of time to improve their behaviour. Popular examples of the first type include Wife Swap and Holiday Showdown where families of family members experience a completely different way of living to their own. These shows often leave family members angry and vengeful with often violence ensuing. Examples of the second type include Supernanny, which involves a nanny giving parenting tips to children with bad behaviour and Brat Camp which involves badly behaved teenagers improving their behaviour using a labour camp in America. This show has been heavily criticised by some people for the exploitation and humiliation of troubled teenagers.

Perhaps the biggest and the most successful genre is the reality game show genre. This is the kind which Big Brother falls into. They come in many formats. These include quiz shows, such as Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, survival shows such as Survivor and I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here and shows where contestants are constantly monitored, such as Big Brother. As you can tell by one of the shows’ name, these shows often involve celebrities, usually lesser known celebrities trying to revive their careers. These shows do not come without their critics though. Big Brother, in particular, has been criticised heavily from sections of the media over a range of issues. These include criticisms of the show itself, they say that it is tacky and un-thinking mess of a show which doesn’t warrant even being shown. Another criticism of Big Brother is that the only reason contestants take part is to try and make them famous, despite doing nothing to warrant their fame apart from appearing on the show.

The final genre of reality television is the talent search genres or ‘celebrities trying something new’ competitions. These include X Factor, The Apprentice and Strictly Come Dancing. Recently, despite its family friendly reputation, a huge controversy occurred on Strictly Come Dancing. John Sergeant, who was by far the worst dancer, was kept in by the voting public, much to the disdain of the judges. As a result, he quit the competition to let better dancers than himself win the competition instead of him. The Apprentice has been criticised by many people. It is a business competition with a rather tough taskmaster. This creates a ‘dog-eat-dog’ type atmosphere. Critics say that this is a bad show because it doesn’t show business as it is in real life.

This article was not intended to persuade you one way or another. However, one thing I will tell you is also what I told you at the start. That is, going by the popularity of these shows; reality television is here to stay.