Reviewing The Kardashians New Show
You’ve heard the Kardashian name before, and you’re probably going to continue to hear it in years to come.
From clothing lines, skincare lines, makeup brands, modeling, and of course television series, the Kardashian name has trumped all.
In 2020, the iconic television series Keeping Up With The Kardashians (KUWTK) came to an end after 14 years. KUWTK was not just your normal reality show. The show helped shape pop culture into what is it today. The wealthy Calabasas family was unhinged and exciting, and you never knew what was coming next. From sex tapes, arrests, new relationships, modeling, and tons of drama, the Kardashian family made their way to the tippy top of the social hierarchy.
Having cameras shoved in your face all day and night for 14 years got a little too much for them. As they grew older, started families, and went their separate ways, they thought it was best to end the show.
The break didn’t last long. Clearly the Kardashians couldn't survive without the glam, lights, and cameras.
After signing an estimated $100 million deal with Hulu, the family joined together once again for a new reality show: The Kardashians.
During the first episode of The Kardashians, Kim Kardashian, the most prominent family member and the person who best exemplifies this strange dynamic, is at the center of it all.
The saying is true, history does in fact repeat itself. KUWTK opened up with the drama surrounding Kim’s sex tape with Ray-J, which made her famous back in 2007.
Within minutes of the first episode of The Kardashians, Kim's son Saint shows his mother the online game Roblox on his iPad, which features an image of her iconic crying face – totally unaware that the photo is also promoting the release of unseen footage from that old sex tape.
Anyone who has read the news in the last six months understands how terribly unstable Kanye West would handle his split with Kim. However, in the first two episodes on Hulu, Kim is telling people about an unseen, unheard Kanye committing to attend her SNL performance in support, connecting her with Dave Chappelle, and willing to give up his own career to act as her full-time stylist.
How real is this reality TV show? Because of the deceitful nature of so-called reality television, it's impossible to know how to comprehend any of this. The Kardashians once revealed that the exterior pictures of their homes shown in Keeping Up with the Kardashians were not their own — Kim claimed that the approach was employed to keep people from finding out where they resided.
Fans' theories on which instances from KUWTK were fully fabricated but presented to viewers as authentic on social media. Is The Kardashians going to be the same?
It's unclear how much the program will dive into Kim's increasingly tumultuous split from Kanye. Or consider Kylie's partner, musician Travis Scott, who played last year amid a mass fatality crowd crush event at the Astroworld Festival he created. Or the case of Travis Barker, a rockstar drummer and reality TV veteran who married Kourtney Kardashian without a certificate after the Grammys this year.
And the plethora of negative societal tendencies this family exemplifies, from charges of cultural appropriation to Kendall Jenner's catastrophic 2017 Pepsi commercial, and the luxury of acquiring fortune and fame via cunningly using their popularity.
If you didn't already despise the Kardashians, their new show won't change your view. And other viewers may see this show as a rerun.
But it is also true that there is something rather intriguing – and shockingly of the moment – about seeing a celebrity family go about their daily life on camera.
And it's clear after just two episodes of Hulu's The Kardashians that no family on television does it quite like this one.
