Lego Masters, Mythbusters, and McCarthy

McCarthy elaborates a tension between neoliberal self-governance and governmentality in the context of early reality television. This past week, I watched infinitely more reality TV than I usually do. Shows included: Lego Masters and Mythbusters. My question is: How relevant is the “Theater of Suffering” concept in modern reality TV? In some cases, the tradition has certainly held, but in the shows that I watched, the issues of suffering and transformation play a diminished role in the shows’ content. In Lego Masters, themes of self-fashioning and transformation only exist insofar as the importance placed on the $100,000 of prize money. In general, the prize and its transformative potential are deferred in favor of wholesome conflict resolution, teamwork, and creative family fun. Mythbusters’ content, on the other hand, pays absolutely no mind to these issues. Its structure may imply a propensity for self-governance by means of the conceit “we’ll test it ourselves,” but even for relatively safe experiments the producers are sure to include the relevant authorities and licenses.