TV Review: NBC’s ‘Love in the Wild’ Offers No Perfect Getaway

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CHICAGO – In the mid-’00s, there were a series of 1-2 season reality programs all trying to work magic from “The Bachelor” formula. They may have had different names like “Average Joe,” “Age of Love,” and “Paradise Hotel” but they were all variations on trying to find love with unique twists. Like a program that some wise executive turned down in 2006 but is now needed to fill an empty timeslot, here comes NBC’s “Love in the Wild,” an atypically awful dating show. There’s a reason they stopped making these.

HollywoodChicago.com Television Rating: 1.0/5.0
Television Rating: 1.0/5.0

Darren McMullen, the Australian host of “Minute to Win It” (one wonders if there isn’t some sort of foreign exchange program in which Guy Fieri is hosting a similar show in the Outback…can we leave him there?), serves as the Chris Harrison for the program — a host, a master of ceremonies, a game runner, and the person who eventually sends contestants mercifully on their way home.

Love in the Wild
Love in the Wild
Photo credit: NBC

Home from where, you ask? The ten men and women of “Love in the Wild” have reportedly tried everything to meet Mr. or Ms. Right and are heading to Costa Rica to continue their individual quests. The men and women are immediately paired off in a random manner not unlike teens picking teams for dodgeball in school and sent on their first adventure. Each week will consist of some outdoor activities, followed by what really matters in the hot tub and individual rooms. Each outdoor adventure is won by one couple, who get a night in the “Oasis,” this program’s version of a fantasy suite. Will the time together in nature’s paradise produce love or hate?

Love in the Wild
Love in the Wild
Photo credit: NBC

Or neither? Considering the track record of programs like this one when it comes to actually finding love, probably neither. And this one seems even less attuned to true love. Almost all of the contestants on “Love in the Wild” feel like they’re trying too hard to make an impression on the cameras. Take Ben, the kind of obnoxious jerk who plays well to casting agents but doesn’t come off as genuine at all. He’s acting. Or at least you’ll hope he’s acting. Even if he’s not, he’s playing up his persona for the camera. And he’s not alone. And the ones who don’t feel like they’re trying too hard to make an impression on the producers simply aren’t interesting. Most of them are so self-centered that one wonders if the reason they may finally find love in the wild is because there are fewer mirrors around than in their normal lives.

To be fair, there are a few “normal ones.” There always are on programs like this — the poor men and women that sometimes look lost in the chaos as if they didn’t realize they were above junk like this until it was too late or they’re just there on a dare. So, there are a few men and women who one could become attached to and hope that they find love in the wild like Mike & Samantha, a couple that shockingly appears to have chemistry on the first day. But the producers of this show even waste that opportunity, too often focusing on the bickering or most obnoxious travelers instead of the ones who might be worth rooting for.

At the end of each adventure, the men and women are allowed to partner swap. They can ask someone else to be their new “Love” mate and the last two kids on the playground without teams are sent home. It’s a bizarre and weird way to run a dating game. They could have called it “Musical Chairs of Love.” Wait, wasn’t that a show in 2007?

“Love in the Wild” premieres on NBC on Wednesday, June 29, 2011 at 9pm CST.

HollywoodChicago.com content director Brian Tallerico

By BRIAN TALLERICO
Content Director
HollywoodChicago.com
brian@hollywoodchicago.com

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