Yeah, Memorial Day can be tough on television's consistent viewers. "Encore presentations" and burn-offs of unsuccessful series show up all over TV listing pages. Still, some promising programs do get their slots. Do I watch them? Not this year. Instead I chose the second installment of this season's "The Bachelorette", and the debut of "Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition, from the team that runs "The Biggest Loser"Not exactly adventurous viewing. Tonight, Monday, I wanted safe, familiar -- and mostly, fun. I didn't get it.
"The Bachelorette" franchise has not freshened up its formula. Plucky, smart, hot-looking single girl bravely wades her way through 25 bachelors (down to 13 tonight) via staged-for-televion dates and "private" conversations with the suitors, randy and rowdy on the surface, more sensitive in their hidden hearts. Ashley appears sincere; some of the guys strike me as worth dating. Yet even I, with my robust appetite for not-so-good TV, can't do this franchise again. I'll peak in for rose ceremonies and pieces of the finale. Beyond that, even my tastes are maturing a little. It would be delightful surprise if future "Bachelorette/Bachelor" seasons could do a modicum of maturing, too.
As for "Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition", there's hope for a better show coming out of the one that aired tonight. Chris Powell offers tough training and nutrition facts adaptable to people's real lives. Rachel lost 161 pounds over the course of the hour, but it was a believable fight; in the middle, discouraged, she managed only a three-pound loss in three months. Powell wasn't there to hold her hand through the year of life-saving loss. Unlike the featured "Biggest Loser" participants, she had to do much of the grittiest work alone. Her final-moments victory didn't get her to her desired weight, but it got her much of the way there. That's some serious inspiration.
Because it's just an hour, however, "Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition" has almost no time to emphasize its takeaway points on exercise and smart eating. It shows the struggling dieter crying about self-sabotage, yet gives us no useful advice on recovering from foiling one's own cherished plans.
It would have held our attention, to learn specifics from the often tearful Rachel and her bright light of a coach. More information and authentic stumbles, less emoting -- if the producers steer in that direction, they'll be steering the show into fresh territory, with its capacity for celebratory moments intact.
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