'Moment Of Truth' Still Chugging Along, Destroying Lives Wherever It Can

Our hats are off to the merciful executives who refuse to give up on The Moment of Truth—Fox VP of Satan-Delighting Alternative Programming Mike Darnell's sluggishly paced, polygraphic game show. Week in and week out, it drags itself into the dugout and attempts to deliver on the life-destroying promise it showed at Reality TV spring training, but rarely does it succeed. At best, as in last night's episode, we come away with the mild satisfaction of knowing that things will forever be uncomfortable between that week's featured nymphomaniac and the best friend she's doesn't think will ever have a professional recording career, but has often considered fucking. More »

Mike Darnell's Near-Perfect Batting Average Muffed By Passing On 'Big Brother: Muppet Edition'

Mike Darnell is the undisputed evil genius of reality TV, a fiendish Rumplestiltskin installed high atop a Fox tower, where he oversees day-to-day operations of that network's Dept. of Non-Scripted, Deluge-Summoning Entertainment. Ask anyone who has witnessed Darnell in action, and they'll describe how his mind never stops churning, processing the virtually limitless combinations of millionaires/ abandoned daughters/ homely women he can sequester on islands/ McMansions/ lie-detector-equipped soundstages, confident America will tune in to find out if they forget the lyrics/survive that reindeer attack/are dumber than a 5th grader. THR sat down with Darnell to find out what makes Satan's Primetime Minion tick: More »

Mike Darnell Attempts To Make Amends For 'Moment' By Busting Deadbeat Dads

Just when we thought reality TV couldn't sink any lower, Fox has officially scraped the bottom of the cringeworthy barrel by ordering a JD Roth-produced pilot called Bad Dads. The series, originally titled Deadbeat Dads until Mike Darnell christened it with its new name, depicts divorced fathers who've refused to pay child support, ambushing them at their ritzy country clubs on camera and forcing them to pay up. Playing the Chris Hansen role is some guy from a child-protection agency, who will go so far as to "make their lives miserable - foreclose on their house...repossess their car...all for a noble cause"! Roth, the reality wunderkind behind The Biggest Loser and Beauty And The Geek, claims the series aims to provide "justice for women." Which sounds lovely, but how exactly will pointing out just how mean and "bad" men are week after week warm our hearts? More »

'Moment of Truth' Creepily Obsessed With Dudes Who Stuff Their Shorts

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Fox's Evil Reality TV Mastermind Salivates At Very Thought Of Controversial Lie-Detector Show

In a mere two months, Fox President of Alternative Entertainment and Apocalypse-Beckoning Nonscripted Programming Mike Darnell will proudly debut his latest reality-TV abomination, The Moment of Truth, in which contestants are hooked up to a polygraph, asked a number of revealing personal questions, and then watch as their lives quickly disintegrate when millions of viewers listen to them sheepishly admit that they're no longer sexually attracted to their aging spouses. In an interview with TV Week, a giddy, tumescent Darnell shares that his naughty places haven't tingled like this since he tricked a mansion full of gold-digging women into believing that a dimwitted, part-time banana-hammock model was a filthy rich heir looking for a soulmate to help him enjoy his family fortune: More »

Japanese Still Leading Lagging American Networks In Reality TV Technology

Given envelope-pushing Fox reality guru Mike Darnell's recent contract extension and NBC rock star Ben Silverman's proven track record of repurposing the very best of foreign television for American audiences, we expect a heated bidding war for the rights to Japan's Joyous Marble-Smash Happy Funtime Challenge to begin momentarily. Our prediction is that Fox will prevail over the Peacock, and the late summer debut of the Jeff Foxworthy-hosted Can We Punch You In The Balls For A Hundred Dollars? will be an unqualified hit. More »

Zellweger To Be Sassy, Tough In Western

· Renee Zellweger will star with Viggo Mortensen and Ed Harris in the western Appaloosa, which we hope will provide ample opportunity for a spunky, bonnet-rocking Zellweger to fire a shotgun and exclaim, "You git outta my town, ya hear?" in the direction of the movie's "renegade rancher" antagonist. We love it when she does period gritty. [Variety] More »

Strike TV Schedule To Make Current Summer Wasteland Look Like Golden Age

It's been way too long since we've read a good story hinting at the unspeakable horrors that would inevitably follow a potential Writers Guild strike, but today's Variety piece on how a work stoppage will impact reality TV production has at least temporarily given us the testicle-retracting scare we've been craving. While Var says that it's "not necessarily the case" that a strike would good for the unscripted sector, it's impossible not to imagine the networks quickly devolving from the mere reality-riddled disappointments they currently are into full-blown, post-Apocalyptic, Mark-Burnett-controlled hellscapes in which nary a union writer credit will be found: More »