“Real World: Denver” on-demand specials

“Real World: Denver” on-demand specials
by John Wenzel on November 10, 2006

“Real World: Denver” cast members Davis (left) and Stephen in Colie’s fantasy promo for the show.

– As you might remember from MTV’s Oct. 19th press release, “The Real World: Denver” is coming at you loaded with more extras than ever. Besides an occasional post-episode call-in show, in which viewers can ask questions of the cast members, MTV is also offering four on-demand specials that take you a bit deeper into the season. Not much deeper, unfortunately, as they’re each about five minutes long and basically repackage the same four or five clips we’ve seen the last couple months. Nonetheless, I sat down and watched them all so you don’t have to…

– They were all free on my Comcast video on demand service, but I’m not sure if that’s the case across other formats. They all begin with the same annoying Jeep Compass bobblehead ad, which is quickly becoming my least favorite commercial of the year. It’s the same ad that comes before a lot of RW Denver stuff on MTV.com, which makes me wonder if they’ll eventually offer these online for free.

– Jeep Compass is also heavily sponsoring the show and offering promotions and trivia contests to win a free vehicle, so expect to see if featured prominently on many episodes. In fact, I think I remember seeing a promo where they basically just drive around in a Jeep the entire time. Exciting.

– Following the commercial on all four specials is an intro of a stuffed monkey and a guy with a sock puppet ranting about something or other with lots of bleeped-out curse words. Also very annoying and pointless. After that, the promos begin…

HIGH ALTITUDE, BAD ATTITUDE
This special opens with a shot of the Denver city sign and its famous 5,280 foot elevation. It’s basically a montage of the same shots from all the previously leaked show previews, focusing on all the fights and screaming. It’s overlaid with shots of bucolic mountains, animal horns clashing and deer standing peacefully in the woods. It’s also an insane bleepfest of profanity throughout. Interstitial, sped-up shots of people walking around downtown Denver adds to the yawn factor. Tyrie’s fantasy hot tub promo follows with another plug for the show’s Nov. 22 premiere.

Rating: Waste of time.

From l-r: Tyrie, Jenn and Stephen hang out in the “Real World: Denver” house at 1920 Market St.

DENVER HOUSE TOUR
Ah… so this is why Dan Renzi from “The Real World: Miami” showed up in September to film promos at the RW Denver house. We originally thought he was going to host the preview/casting special, but that duty went to Tyler and Paula from “The Real World: Key West.”

– Renzi starts out by talking about how “the eighth cast member is the crazy house they live in,” which is true. He walks around the first floor, explaining all the cheesy outdoors/mountain-themed crap. It’s basically what someone from L.A. would think a Colorado-themed house would look like. In other words, a parody.

– Renzi shows the fake chairlift in the living room, which will no doubt come into play in the episodes. There’s even a shower in the living room with semi-opaque glass doors. Because, you know, it’s good to shower before and after sitting on the couch.

– A guest bedroom is decorated like a bad Florida hotel room with all kinds of soft, gross sea colors. The all-important phone room, where cast members can call home and cry, features the stuffed skunk that Tyrie posed with in his MTV.com promo shots. The yellow Jeep, retrofitted to become a bar, lights up from underneath, but the beer bottles are filled with flowers instead of booze, to Renzi’s chagrin.

– A fireplace full of fish explains the Tidy Tanks van we saw outside the house for much of the summer on our webcam. “Every real world house has a fish tank to symbolize the ‘living your life in a fishbowl’ idea,” Renzi says. Heh… clever. Do the fish get drunk and hump each other too?

– The huge kitchen features granite countertops and a tremendously large refrigerator/freezer. Lots of references to keeping the booze cold for the house’s big drinkers (Alex was rumored to be drunk for much of the show.) Up the stairs on the open second level, a forced perspective painting shows chairlifts continuing to disappear into the distance.

– Into one of the bedrooms now, which is pretty nondescript. It has two beds and sports a shoulder-height wall for privacy. Nice. The hallway floor connecting them is actually a big shuffleboard court, though I wonder if anyone actually used it. An upstairs “zen area” is full of bean bags, and shaped and colored like the Colorado state flag. The “office” is also in same room, although as Renzi points out, who the hell is doing office work on “The Real World”?

Four sinks and two showers for seven people. Hope they don’t all use them at once.

– Another bedroom with three beds features stenciled mountains on the wall. All the bedrooms, Renzi tells us, share the same bathroom, with four sinks for the cast members. Three shower heads in each of two showers means that six cast members can shower simultaneously, and I’m sure they did at times. In fact, a couple of the promos show Alex and Jenn making out in the shower with their midsections covered by an opaque mountain stencil.

– As Renzi points out, every “Real World” house has a Jacuzzi, a fish tank and a pool table, but Denver’s is the first one to have a gym. It’s small, pleasantly decorated and full of weights, which makes me wonder why the cast members ever left the house to go to places like the Denver Athletic Club. I guess after a while it was more interesting to film there than in the house’s workout room?

– The always-important confessionalroom has pictures of trees in the background but little else. Then to the porch, which features a fireplace, basketball court (also the Colorado state flag), and everything else we’ve been seeing for the last few months. A short lap pool, or “endless” pool, as Renzi calls it, also adorns the area. And then we’re done, followed by the promo for Colie’s fantasy where she pictures the male cast members nude in the kitchen making breakfast. Overall this is the best of the on-demand specials, with lots of content and a solid preview of the house.

Rating: Worth your time

Cast members Alex and Colie K-I-S-S-I-N-G.

KISS & TELL
This promo features Renzi interviewing servers, bartenders and other folks from Denver that were around the cast, although they really only go to about four or five different places (LoDo’s, the Tavern Downtown, Tryst, Rock Bottom Brewery, etc.) Rachel from LoDo’s tell us that she had to pull a male-female couple out of the bathroom, but of course MTV bleeps out who they were. Shelly at Rock Bottom Brewery chimes in about them liking that place as well.

– Joshua at Tryst said all the women were cool, but he missed the “hot girl-on-girl action.” The cast would apparently come in and close the curtains around their private little area at the upscale lounge. Suzy and Joel at Jet Hotel, another of the cast’s favorite spots, chime in with their two cents about all the hooking up that occured. Of course, every cast member’s name is completely bleeped out, so it’s pretty useless.

– Renzi interviews a girl named Jazelle that say she hooked up with a cast member, and she looks like someone we photographed with Tyrie at one point, so she’s probably talking about him. Shannon, the general manager of Jet Hotel, tells of a call she got one night from her bartender that a couple “Real Worlders” had gone to another floor without the camera crew.

– They apparently weren’t allowed anywhere but the main room, for whatever reason, so that was a problem. Kelly at Jet says the female cast member and one of her “boy toys” snuck up and returned rather quickly. Hmmm… I hope one of them had a condom.

– The spin-the-bottle promo with Alex kissing Jenn, follows. Overall, fairly light on information, but at least it gives a good sense of where the cast members hung out. Which is to say, all within walking distance of their house at yuppie/martini-crowd establishments.

Rating: A mediocre tease

They weren’t allowed to go to Coors Field during the show, but they milked the scenery like a pregnant cow.

MILE HIGH CLUB
Ah, what a clever play on that worn phrase. Sadly, “Mile High Club” is not about sex in airplanes. This special, also starring Renzi (they really got their money’s worth out of him, yes?) starts out in front of lovely Coors Field, about a block away from the RW house. Renzi goes to LoDo’s and talks, again, to Rachel. Some of her insights include, “They were enjoyable, and brought in a big crowd when they were here. They were very pleasant.” Followed by, “They drink a lot” and “Denver is huge party town.” You don’t say!

– Renzi heads across the street to the Tavern Downtown and talks to Danielle, a server there. She says the first night the cast came in they had to cut them off right away because they did six shots in two minutes. She talks about how the elevation gets you drunk faster, which of course the cast didn’t realize. Heh… lightweights. Renzi points out the shuffleboard in the bar and Danielle mentions how shuffleboard is big in Denver. He also shows the mini bowling alley there. Fascinating.

– Here’s my favorite part: Back at Tryst, Joshua says the cast “came in all the time, once a week.” Did he enjoy them? “Oh yeah, they were great, not tipping us, walking out on the tab all the time, throwing glasses across the room at bartenders, breaking things.” The anger in his voice is palpable. What did they throw? “Glassware, at people,” he says. Sweet. He seems happy to be rid of them.

– At Rock Bottom, Shelly talks about how much beer the restaurant offers and how it all comes in free sample sizes. The cast, unsurprisingly, loved the free samples. Who wouldn’t? Near the end Renzi is standing on Writer’s Square downtown and asking, “So how were they really? You’ll have to tune in and find out for yourself.”

– Hmm… I doubt the edited, soundtracked TV show is going to give us any more insight than these short specials. Although, by the end of them I was quite glad they were only five minutes long.

Rating: Mediocre