Back in the ’90s and early 2000s, reality television, if you were lucky, could be a fateful entry point into Hollywood, the music industry and even corporate America. Now, the once-ridiculed genre has expanded so much— with shows like Love Is Blind and Real Housewives occupying their own universes—that many reality stars are maximizing their celebrity within that space. It certainly helps that a number of reality series and competitions nowadays cast old/current TV personalities, putting them in a house together and hoping for a big, fat drama-fest. Examples this year alone include MTV’s latest season of The Challenge, Peacock’s The Traitors, Bravo’s Winter House, MTV’s Jersey Shore All Stars, and, on Oct. 12, House of Villains on E!.
Despite its placement on a less buzzy network, House of Villains is the ultimate meeting of chaotic reality forces. The small but star-studded cast of produced and self-delegated antagonists include Jonny Fairplay from Survivor, Tanisha Thomas from Bad Girls Club, The Real World/The Challenge’s Johnny “Bananas” Devenanzino, Love and Hip Hop: Miami’s Bobby Lytes, Love Is Blind’s Shake Chatterjee, The Apprentice’s Omarosa Manigault-Newman, The Bachelor’s Corinne Olympios, Vanderpump Rules’ Jax Taylor, 90 Day Fiance’s Anfisa Arkhipchenko and, last but not least, Flava of Love’s Tiffany “New York” Pollard.
Hosted by Joel McHale, the show sees this Mount Rushmore of “villains” competing in a series of “Battle Royale” challenges for a $200,000 cash prize and the worthless title of the ultimate reality supervillain. The winner of the challenges gets to nominate three players to put on a “hit list,” who then compete in an redemption challenge where the winner can escape possible elimination. Afterwards, the rest of the house votes off one of the two remaining nominees. Just like The Traitors, which this show feels like a hurried response to, the ability to gather allies ultimately trumps any sort of physical or mental strength that may help you win a challenge.
That said, it’s fun to watch someone like Jax Taylor, who’s clearly out of his element, struggle to filter himself in front of his opponents and question the point of strategic games in general. I particularly took pleasure in hearing a straight man say, “I come from Bravo where we do this sh*t face-to-face!” It’s equally enjoyable to watch a naturally commanding force like Omarosa immediately take control of the house and remind her housemates that this is an eat-or-be-eaten game. For the first two episodes, though, everyone is mostly on their best behavior, making important moves without giving us any meme-able moments or noteworthy confrontations. The thing is, a lot of these people have seemingly outgrown their worst characteristics or are only capable of terrorizing weaker people.
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Casey Durkin/E! EntertainmentPresumably, the drama will amp up as the series progresses. But even with the amount of big personalities on display, there’s something about this competition that’s glaringly lacking.
House of Villains’ main defect is that it relies on its infamous cast as its one and only draw. While there’s only so many games television producers can come up with—most American game shows are just reboots of international shows, at this point—the competition itself feels very extremely generic and unspecial. Based on the lackluster setting in a plain-looking McMansion and a lack of commitment to the show’s (casino? gangster? spy?) theme, the series feels like a perfunctory play for viewership as reality TV continues to dominate. It hardly feels like the establishing of an eventually long-running series with its own unique rules, language, setting, and host.
I also think reality competitions like these naturally benefit from the bigger casts and wider range of personalities. To reference The Traitors again (sorry), the first American season featured a range of reality stars and celebrities who weren’t all necessarily known as the biggest and the baddest in their respective realms. Therefore, there was an element of surprise watching them navigate tense situations and go against tougher players. Contestants also behaved like they had something to prove, aside from the goal of winning money. Whereas on House of Villains, even with a big cash prize, being cast on the show seems like the main honor for these folks.
House of Villains could prove itself to be an addictive watch over time. But for now, it’s a perfectly adequate viewing that could use a little more spectacle outside of its villains. While the cast may have all built notable identities for themselves, House of Villains doesn’t really seem to have one yet.
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