‘ego trip’s (White) Rapper Show’: Episode 02.
I began watching ‘ego trip’s (White) Rapper Show’ because it seemed interesting but also because I decided to have this rap blog and figured it would give me content for at least one of my intended per-week entries. I was wrong, there just isn’t a lot to say about this show. This is just a reality show; ego trip’s name before the title made me assume the show would be a little better or smarter or less exploitative than most reality shows. I’m just not used to having such a conflicted relationship with my television. My regular television viewing habits probably require a “no homo”: ‘Degrassi: The Next Generation’, ‘Full House’, ‘Boy Meets World’ and shitty local news. I’m so ‘Reality Bites’: I watch shows that don’t take themselves seriously and then have serious discussions about them with my friends. So, I have a problem watching a show like ‘The White Rapper Show’ that sort of takes itself seriously. It seems to have pretenses to being somehow insightful about race or appropriation or miscegenation but it just isn’t. Any messages or insights are convoluted by the show’s contempt for its cast or lame quasi-racist jokes like having them tour the Bronx in a prison bus. The exact position towards the white rappers is a convoluted mix of seriousness and harsh satire. Too many of these rappers are just plain bad for the show to be taken seriously. They couldn’t find ten quality white rappers? If that were the case, we’d have a house full of $hamrocks and it would be boring because they’d all sit back and sort-of take this rap shit seriously. However, if the show is avoiding a house of $hamrocks, then it’s for a laugh and Serch needs to be easy on his Tyra ‘tude and stop saying shit like: “I’m not here to clown anybody”. If Serch really isn’t there to clown anybody, the rest of the production staff is and the joke is on Serch.
Ultimately, I guess none of that matters because the show is really fun and I’ll be at my couch with friends watching it next Monday at 10:00 PM. It’s almost too much for me to handle when the show ends and I realize I have seven fucking days until the next one, this wave of frustration comes over me in a “why is the world so unfair” way that I almost can’t deal with. So yeah, I’m fucking hooked and if that’s all that the show needs to do, it has succeeded. Otherwise, it’s only entertaining in a way that kind of makes me feel gross afterwards. It’s too easy to laugh at poor rapping or sad attempts at breaking. Occasionally, there’s an actually entertaining part of the show that hints at what it could be: the list of excuses that scrolled-by to explain Dasit’s refusal to rap (the best: “I am a shook one”) or when Serch says he’s going to miss Misfit and Prince Paul chimes-in “I won’t.” Is this what television watching is? Compromise? This weird, fucked-up mix of entertainment, contempt, and disappointment? I kinda want out.
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