Sidney Wu

History always repeats itself, or does it? As the writer’s strike continues for its fourth consecutive month, avid reality TV watchers are questioning if there will be a rise in new reality TV shows. This question stems from the spike in reality TV shows in 2007 and 2008 from the last writers’ strike. During that time successful and popular reality TV shows like “The Apprentice,” “Big Brother,” “Survivor,” “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” and many more emerged. These shows were able to take off when other fictional shows were halted because reality shows required little to no scripting; whereas, other shows needed writers to keep the TV shows running. Some of the shows that were affected by the 2007-2008 writers strike were “Breaking Bad,” “Lost,” “Scrubs,” “Big Band Theory,” “Gossip Girl” and countless more. 

After the 2007-2008 writers strike, reality TV shows grew in popularity more than ever before and reality celebrities were coming out of the woodwork. Most notably the infamous show, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, grew to an average viewership of 1.9 million. However, as new-age media evolves, it seems reality TV shows have begun to fade out along with other cable TV shows. 

While people are predicting a rise in reality TV, you might ask, “But who would you make the show about?” With the rise of social media and TikTok especially, it would only make sense to create a show similar to the format of “Keeping up with the Kardashians” that delved into the behind-the-scenes life of an influencer. Charli D’amelio (a TikTok personality with over 150 million followers) and her family started a reality TV show about the perks and struggles of being a high-profile influencer. Their show, “The D’amelio Show” is currently on its third season and releases new episodes every Wednesday. 

Most recently, the newest social media personality, Alix Earle, was rumored to release a reality TV show with her family. Earle, who grew to 8.8 million followers on TikTok within a year, was speculated to start a show with her sibling because viewers wanted to see more behind-the-scenes content of her life. However, after a few weeks of speculation, Earle announced she was joining Alix Cooper’s (2021 and 2022 second most popular Spotify podcast) Unwell network where she now hosts her “Hot Mess” podcast that has already climbed to number four on the Spotify podcast charts. 

Earle shut down the reality TV show rumors on a TikTok video after the release of her podcast, saying that she didn’t feel comfortable exposing her younger sibling to the reality TV world. 

There clearly is a market for influencer-based reality TV shows, especially in the state of TV production right now with the writer’s strike. Social media users are greedy and nosy, the more they can know about their favorite influencers, the longer they’ll stay subscribed to them. Therefore, reality TV shows are the best way for popular influencers like D’amelio and Earle to showcase their personality and expand their audience reach. In the following months to come it will be interesting to see if anyone will bite the bullet and create a reality TV show during this writer’s strike.