"This is not a game show. This is life or death." –Eric Waterhouse.
Actually dude, if you were on one of producer Thom Beers' other shows, like Ice Road Truckers or Deadliest Catch or Ax Men, then yeah, you'd be talking life or death. The appeal of Beers' formidable slate of reality series–littered across basic cable as wantonly as Scrubs re-runs–is that they show actual, non-TV-ready people displaying expertise at arcane occupations. Beers' best work is visually dynamic, and cut with a healthy streak of "Those guys must be nuts!"
But Eric? You're a sculptor from Long Beach. You can't tell me that you really want to be out on a crab boat in the Bering Sea, trying to haul up traps faster than a secretary from New Jersey. You got a call back from the casting agency because you fit a type: the ineffectual artiste who can't hold his own when he has to do actual work. Dude, face it…you're a game show contestant.
I don't want to say that I had "high" hopes for America's Toughest Jobs, but I do enjoy Beers' work by and large, and I've been known to enjoy a good reality competition. But ATJ is not a good reality competition. Aside from the nature of the game–that 12 people will try their hands at some of the worst gigs in Christendom–everything else is straight out of Reality 101. Even though Beers narrates the show, he's also employed a non-descript host (Josh Temple) to show up at the end of each task in order to remind the contestants that one of them is going home, and won't be around to cut down giant trees or taunt rodeo bulls or whatever other crazy-ass thing that the rest of their fellows will be up to next week.
But this particular reality-show line-towing doesn't irritate me as much as the casting gambit. I've no doubt that all of these ATJ competitors have convinced themselves that they honestly crave the ultimate challenge… but that's not why they were picked to be on this show. They're here because they can be easily tagged as "Recent College Graduate" or "Wall Street Executive," and thus conform to the reality TV stereotypes. The worst offender here is that "Wall Street Executive," Amy, who refuses to take part in the ritual of biting off fish heads ("I'm allergic.") and is useless in baiting traps ("This isn't my favorite activity.") and can't even make a grilled cheese sandwich ("The stove in my apartment is full of books.") It's like something out of pro wrestling: "And in this corner, The Career Woman! She'd stab in you in the back if she knew how to find the knife drawer!"
But even the broadly sketched "characters" wouldn't be a deal breaker if the action on the show weren't so dull and repetitive. The contestants throw a trap out. They pull a trap back. They almost knock one of their competitors overboard. Some burly guy yells at them. They whine about how hard all this is. The next day it starts all over again.
Oh, and then there's the puking. If NBC's promo department is looking for a good way to sum up this show, I'd recommend the shot of the guy throwing up into a chum bucket and then lifting his head, looking into the camera with a queasy grin, and muttering, "America's toughest jobs."
Grade: D
Stray observations:
-I like the names of two captains who supervised the crab fishing: Kiwi John and Tony LaRussa. (One of these is a future Hall Of Famer!)
-Coming soon: Monster Trucks. In what way is that a "job?"
-At the start of the episode, Beers points out that in Bering Sea crab-fishing, the injury rate is nearly 100%. I like those odds!