MTV. BIG TOBACCO REALITY SHOW

MTV and Truth - the nation’s largest youth smoking prevention campaign - launched "The Blaze", a four part reality show that plays by the same rules as Big Tobacco. First aired during The Real World Road Rules Challenge "The Island". Read more here

Agency: MTV
Writer/Director: Alan Harris

Teaser


episode 1


Boulder Push requires two contestants to push against a huge boulder in opposite directions in order to move the boulder into their corner. When the contestants balk that the task can’t be done, the host reassures them that it is only a “light boulder” and the camera shows it labeled as such. After one of the contestants is crushed with the boulder, the voiceover explains that “Big Tobacco labels cigarettes as light and ultra-light even though they can be as deadly and addictive as regular cigarettes.”

episode 2


Chemical Pass challenges two contestants to fill a cup on one end of a course with a variety of chemicals from bottles placed on a table at the other end of the course. The catch is that the contestants can only use their “own body, and the clothes [they] have on.” After they attempt to transport formaldehyde in their mouths, or try to grab caustic formic acid with their hands, or splash radioactive polonium 210 in their eyes, the contestants can’t complete the task and lay on the ground writhing in pain. The voiceover explains that “of course this wouldn’t happen from smoking, but these [chemicals] and more than 4,000 other chemicals, can be found in cigarettes or cigarette smoke.”

episode 3


In Name Change one contestant is challenged to take on the “Flight of Death”, by climbing 50 feet up a platform and attempting to jump for a gold ring 10 feet away -- with no net beneath him. After he misses and his broken legs are tended to by the paramedics, the host tells another contestant that his “challenge is totally different. It’s called Leap of Fun.” In fact, the challenge is exactly the same and has the same results. The voiceover reveals that “In 2001, a Big Tobacco executive said changing the name of their company could, quote, ‘focus attention away from tobacco.’”

episode 4


In Mystery Pool two contestants are asked to swim to the bottom of a pond and collect as many gold coins as they can in 30 seconds. The pond is black and oozing and contains what appears to be a sea monster, judging by the tentacle sliding through it. The host explains that he is “not legally obligated” to tell them what is in the pool. After the contestants jump in and are given their 30 seconds of collection time, the host calls them back, only to be answered with a burp from the “pond monster”. The voiceover says that “Products like chips and cereal list ingredients on their labels, but cigarettes, a product that kills a third of its users, doesn’t.”