TBS has announced the return of The Joe Schmo Show. A fake reality competition series where only one person is playing while everyone else is secretly an actor, the show originally debuted on Spike TV in 2003 while follow-up seasons would air in 2004 and 2013. No new iterations have been made in the ten years since, but a new teaser for a Joe Schmo Show revival, which will serve as the fourth season, has been released, revealing that the show is coming back soon. You can watch the new teaser below.
“When The Joe Schmo Show launched 20 years ago, it was ahead of its time,” reads a statement from Turner Networks president Jason Sarlanis, per TVLine. “In rebooting this classic for a modern, savvy audience, it gives us the opportunity to comment on the often absurd and hilarious tropes of reality television in ways our viewers will love.”
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The new season will introduce Ben as the new Schmo. As with the previous seasons, Ben comes into the show believing he’s competing with several other contestants for a lucrative prize on an all-new reality show, but he doesn’t know that everyone else involved, from the host to all of the other contestants, are all actors. The games have all been rigged to end a certain way while the actors must all be staying in character the entire time so as not to let Ben catch on to the hoax before the end of the competition. This time, the fake reality show is called The Goat, and it’s hosted by Cat Deeley of So You Think You Can Dance, which should further add to the believability of the whole thing for Ben.
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Will Ben Catch On in the Fourth Season of The Joe Schmo Show?
TBS
Because the show is rigged, some of the competitive challenges are very outlandish, testing how far they can take the hoax with the show’s Schmo. That tradition seems to be carrying over into season 4 going by the teaser trailer. One challenge teased reveals Ben eating from the same bunch of grapes as a goat. Another part of the hoax revealed is for a hedge maze where the crew members literally move around the walls when Ben is inside of it to achieve their desired result. The risk they’re taking when making moves like this is having Ben realize that something is off.
“I ended up getting lost, I almost think they like, flipped the wall,” Ben says of the hedge maze in the trailer.
The announcement of The Joe Schmo Show getting revived was first made by Kathleen Finch, Chairman and CCO of US Networks Groups at Warner Bros. Discovery, at the company’s 2023 Upfront presentation. The official description for the new series also teases that “reality TV has come a long way since 20023 when the original Joe Schmo Show was watched by 44 milllion viewers.” TBS also teases that this new season will be even “more mind-blowing.” Whether the revival can similarly pull in high ratings remains to be seen, and we’ll find that out when the show returns. A release date has yet to be announced.
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