Reality TV stops being polite

The Challenge speaks to a trend toward cruelty

- JUDY BERMAN

THE FIRST PLAYER VIEWERS MEET IN SQUID GAME: The Challenge, a new reality competition based on the South Korean Netflix thriller that became an international phenomenon, is a relatable everywoman named Starla.

"Who's not in debt?" she asks, by way of explaining why she's competing for the $4.56 million prize (456 players x $10,000). "What's that like, to be able to pay off your house? What's that like, to be able to pay off your car?" She never finds out. Starla is eliminated in the first round of the first game.

As this introduction suggests, The Challenge prides itself on being merciless. Like the scripted series that inspired it - minus the violent death that awaits each of the original Squid Game's eliminated contestants, obviously - the competition pits a cast of hundreds against one another in a gauntlet of playground games. That Netflix was so quick to exploit creator Hwang Dong-hyuk's searing critique of economic inequality for what will inevitably be another hit, and so many fans signed up to play along, is the latest evidence that satire is dead. But The Challenge also speaks to a larger trend toward cruelty within its genre.