Welcome to The Shire of Bogan

The ads have started, and it's going ahead. Channel 10’s 'The Shire', looks to be exactly as anticipated: A show about vain 20-something nobodies with delusions that a being on a reality show is a career path. It'll all be here. The Ed Hardy t-shirts. The word 'hectic'. The Southern Cross tattoos. The Jetstar specials. The horror of the modern bogan.

The Shire has been touted as an Aussie version of Jersey Shore. But with the state of channel 10’s budgets (they’ve been using the same cardboard cut-outs on the sets of Neighbours for decades), there’s not much that Channel 10 can buy their newest stars that will push their lives into anything beyond suburban mundane. Aside from the obligatory bikini babes to keep the teenage boys interested, there's not much for anyone else to tune in to.

So what will be the hook for this show? What will make people watch? Reality tv shows need to have something that keeps people tuning in. Are the Shire’s (ahem) ‘stars’ famous? No. Are they rich? No. Do they lead exclusive lives? No. Are they interesting people? Hell No. Even the most maligned reality shows have a reason which makes people want to watch the lives of their stars. Paris Hilton & K-Dash – Rich, famous, exclusive. Laguna Beach & The Hills – Rich, exclusive. Jersey Shore – Exclusive (albeit thanks to MTV’s $$).

So it looks like they’ll have to rely on manufactured drama (which will need to be edited when the hot heads inevitably start throwing haymakers at each other after too many Bundy and Cokes), cut-aways to crashing waves and seagulls, and Masterchef style recaps of what just happened. Wait for the tie-in with Lara Bingle’s show to boost the ratings (for both shows). Channel 10 will hope that the combination of the two shows will be greater than the sum of their parts.

As for reality, well no one actually thinks that reality tv is real anymore. The setups, editing and scripts have turned the genre into 'dramality'. But how will this work when there is nothing interesting about the people, situations, or stories of The Shire? Would you stop on the street to listen to bogans talk about how smashed they were last night? Or listen to them rating whatever girls have the misfortune of crossing their line of sight?

Where is this 'Shire'? Is it a mysterious place on the edge of a hidden paradise? No. Its Cronulla. A suburb of Sydney. Calling it 'The Shire' is obviously a ploy to make it sound more exciting than it is. Does anyone really call it the Shire? The last person I knew of who said they were from The Shire was a hobbit on a road trip with a ring and a little bald troll chasing him down yelling out “precious”.

Welcome to the Shire. Get off my beach.

Channel 10 is claiming this show is to show the 'heart of Australia'. But its more like what naive tourists would like to think Australia is. Bronzed pretty people who sit around all day in the sun. I wonder if they have a minimum number of times the cast will have to say “mate”. As I look out my office window into the freezing and busy concrete of Melbourne’s CBD, it seems The Shire's version of Australia is about as true to life as the fact that we hitch rides to work in kangaroos' pouches.

The mark of the well travelled

The truly sad thing about this show is that it celebrates many things that just shouldn’t be celebrated. It will be full of arrogant bogans who think their Southern Cross tattoos and Bintang singlets from Bali; self infatuation and incomprehensible accents; and ignorance to the rest of the world are something to be admired. These are the obnoxious idiots who ruin your night when seated near your table at a restaurant. The embarrassing loudmouths overseas that you cringe when you realise they share the same passport as you, and pray that the locals don’t think you’re like them.



If Channel 10 wants to showcase the Aussie surf culture, why not follow some of Australia’s pro surfers on tour? That would check off all the ingredients for reality tv – rich, talented and famous people with exclusive and interesting lives, living most people's dream job.

Instead we get a bunch of obnoxious nobodies with nothing to do who think they are a somebodies with something to do.

Being Lara Bingle is Being Boring

Some more self promos pretending to be news today on The Project.

It started out with some filler story about driverless trains, which naturally was a cue for Bickmore to talk about her son. Its just effortless for her now.

But the real 'news story' of the day was that Lara Bingle was on The Project. All of the praise and admiration lauded on her was a stark contrast to the way she used to be covered by this very show, before she became Channel 10's newest cash cow hope.

The appearance was to promote Channel 10's latest offering in cheap reality tv, Being Lara Bingle. This is another of 10's heavily promoted shows for 2012, and The Project is just the right advertising space.

I think the key goes in here. I think.

Of course there was the obligatory and confusing comparison of Bingle and Micheal Clarke to Posh & Becks. Hmmm, Posh conquered pop culture and the world in the biggest Girl band of all time, selling 75 million albums worldwide; and Becks is one of the most celebrated athletes of all time and a truly global superstar; and together they are worth over £125 Million. And Bingle and Clarke were... umm... Well Bingle's car was stolen once, and Clarke copied Becks' tattoos and haircut.



The Project hasn't been the only promo for this show. The nude photo 'scandal' was also some great promo. There's no question that this 'scandal', in which Bingle was 'unwittingly' photographed nude (again...) was part of the promotion of the show. These photos were taken of her in the apartment provided to her by the producers, standing in the window, topless, with her hair and makeup done. All in perfect time to drum up some interest in her show. The lamest part about this 'privacy invasion' is that the unblurred photos were never leaked to the internet. Come on, how silly do you think we are! Geez even Fev was able to get his nude pic of her onto cyberspace!

Watch the show an you may see more. Maybe.
You'll have to watch and see. 8.00 Tuesday. On 10.
Please watch, you might see boobs.

To prove the point the 'sneak peek' ad for Being Bingle shows an in-depth, scripted conversation about the pictures, which were of course shown over and over, albeit with the buzz kill blurring. So teenage boys - all aboard the Bingle train for potential glimpses of boob!

But Lara isn't the only star this show. Her evidently freeloading brother has moved in with his famous sister, coincidentally at the same time as her show is being filmed. In his 'meet the bingles' bio he's been Christened as "the definition of the Australian bloke", possibly because he likes getting into drunken fights at the races.

But even with all this going on, the prediction is that Bingle will go the way of Excess Baggage, and be cast out unceremoniously to the graveyard of the secondary channel without so much an obituary or goodbye.

This is because reality tv is all about the $$$$$$. Despite Lara's 'Meet the Bingles' bio, Kardashian or Hilton she is not. Watching K-Dash, you see that her idea of a weekend might include taking the private jet to Vegas; partying in the VIP area of Pure nightclub and drinking Crystal and Patron Gran Platinum all night. On the other hand, Bingle's high life weekend might involve flying Jetstar Premium Economy to Sydney, getting free entry to the Ivy and a $50 drink card. Her lifestyle just isn't exclusive or unobtainable enough to be interesting.

So what will be the draw card to this show? In other words, how will it be edited to make it interesting? Lara Bingle as the cutsie girly-girl seems to be the the angle they are going for. Will it work? Or will the drama and 'poor me' victim card be played, and show her whine about lack of privacy, while cameras film every ironic tear? Either way, the one thing you can count on is that this will be more scripted than an infomercial, and it'll be Lara Bingle selling Lara Bingle.

Time will tell...