Survivor: The Balloon Race

Reality programs have reached an impasse: unplanned real events are more interesting than those currently featured in staged 'reality'. When you can't manipulate 'reality' to make it more interesting than real, random, reality, it's time to punt. Or redefine what's meant by 'reality'.

One possible solution to the conundrum would be to place cameras in the homes of thousands of randomly selected people (or, better yet, right on the people) and have them record a year in their lives. Then edit the mess together for some sort of series. Something interesting is bound to happen right? Truly inspired editing might help.

The result certainly can't be worse than the offerings of 'reality' we have on air now. Hell, the whole 'balloon boy' media event got more attention than the actual televised reality programs. Of course, it's starting to look as if that bit of news was just a staged 'reality' as well, but it did hold interest.

So why not riff on something proven to get attention? Survivor should plan a series where teams take off in homemade balloons. The plot should be which team can go from, say, San Diego, to Paris (to provide an exciting over-the-water stretch) in 13 episodes. Bonus points if the teams can fool local police into believing the flights are accidental runaways containing nuns, small children, or women known to have slept with David Letterman.

I'd watch that. Maybe ...