One of the best shows on television today is Battlebots, in which contestants build radio-controlled robots that engage in quasi-gladiatorial combat within an arena. The arena itself is equipped with a variety of hazards, including radial saws that rise up from the floors, a pneumatic hammer called the "Pulverizer," and a variety of ramps, spikes, and pistons. Combat ends after three minutes or when one of the robots is dead.

One of the worst shows on television is Big Brother, in which a dozen contestants are locked in a camera-infested dwelling. Here they live out their lives under glass like so many primates in the Monkey House, where residents bare their teeth, copulate openly, throw excrement at one another, and generally fail to get along -- some of which goes on in Monkey Houses, too. Through it all the incredibly plastic pseudo-anchor Julie Chen does her best to destroy any journalistic credibility she might once have had, pretending to care about the pathetic lives of these would-be postal workers. (The psychological screening for Big Brother apparently involves only two questions: 1. Would you kill another contestant while that person was sleeping, if you thought you would win the money? 2. Do you like to let other people watch you have sex?)

Bad television is a very painful thing. The humanitarian in me would like to improve Big Brother, Season 2 of which has already featured a crazed resident with a New Jersey accent holding a kitchen knife to a drunken fellow player's throat in some sort of bizarre Angelina Jolie-style foreplay. It has also seen one of the contestants -- a skinny whore named Shannon -- clean the toilet with a fellow housemate's battery-powered toothbrush, and featured many mind-numbing rapping sessions from a white LA resident named Mike (who, mercifully, has since been voted out).

Since Battlebots is such a superb show, I think the problems of Big Brother may be solved simply by merging the most successful concepts of it with the failing Big Brother.

 

Scene opens. Petite Asian sometime-anchorwoman Julie Chen stares blankly at the camera, the nictating membranes of her reptilian inner eyelids reflecting the glare of the stage lights. Her every word is voiced in a carefully modulated monotone, and she always has the same less-than-genuine smile on her face.

Julie: Welcome, humans, to Big Brother Season Three.

Julie is joined by color commentator Dennis Miller, who twitches spastically as he writhes in his chair next to the implacable plastic mask of Julie Chen.

Dennis: I tell you, Julie, this season is going to be more [expletive deleted] fun that watching Leon Trotsky date Sharon Stone on the set of Basic Instinct III!

Julie (staring blankly at Dennis): Whatever. Tonight, America, we join our new cast of houseguests for the third season of Big Brother. There have been some changes. We think you will find that they optimize your viewing enjoyment.

Dennis: Hot [expletive deleted] [expletive deleted] on a [expletive deleted]ing crutch! You know, Julie, these contestants are competing for half a million dollars, which is how much you could save if you make all your long distance calls by dialing --

Julie: Silence. We now join our houseguests in the Big Brother Battle Box.

Dennis: The box is locked, the lights are on, it's Big Brother time!"

The Big Brother Battle Box is a Plexiglas-walled arena filled with pieces of furniture, including a few sofas and a couple of cots. A giant pneumatic sledgehammer hangs ominously in one corner. The smoothly-polished stainless steel floor is pocked with grooves and seams.

Julie: Houseguests, you are commanded to introduce yourselves.

Steve: Hi. I'm Steve, the hunky weightlifter.

Bill: I thought I was the hunky weightlifter.

Steve: Well, I guess we both are.

Dennis (chiming in): Wow, these two are running a few quarts of gray matter short in the old reservoir of the cerebral cortex, aren't they? I mean, I don't wanna get off on a rant, here, but these two could lose a spelling bee to Sue from Survivor.

Tiffani (wearing a metallic gold thong-backed bikini): I'm Tiffani. I strip for a living, but I really want to be an actress.

Candi (wearing a towel): I'm Candi. Tiffani and I do a live bondage stage show in Amsterdam, actually.

Julie: As you will have the chance to show us during your first "luxury competition." Continue introductions.

Joe: I'm Joe. I'm from Brooklyn, got it? Anyone touches my cot hauls back a bloody stump!

Joe produces a switchblade and begins cleaning his filthy nails.

Emmet: I'm Emmet. I'm older than anyone here. I hate sluts, young people, and anyone who's different than me. I'll see you all in hell.

Barbara: I'm Barbara. I just want to share with all of you the peace Jesus has brought me.

Dennis: That reminds me of a funny thing about the Holy Roman Empire during --

Julie: Enough. Commence living for the entertainment of the viewers.

Joe (to Candi): You's wanna, like, do it?

Candi: Okay. You won't respect me less, will you?

Joe: I was thinkin' a killin' you afta'.

Candi: Oh. Okay.

The remaining houseguests remain sedentary for the next twenty minutes.

Julie: That is the twenty minute no-movement limit. The arena hazards will now be activated.

Steve: What?

Automated radial saws emerge from the floor. Steve's screams are drowned out by the metallic whine of the saws as they grind into him from below. Tiffani, standing nearby, is covered with a fine red mist.

Tiffani: Oh, ick.

Bill: I'm going to take revenge for Steve by seeing to it that all of you are voted out! And what's more, I have it on good authority that all of you have entered into secret alliances, including --

Bill's eyes roll up into his head, and he drops dead to the floor. Joe stands behind him, bloody switchblade in hand. His face, chest, and hands are already covered in blood.

Joe: Bastid. I'm going to win this.

Emmet sneaks up behind Joe and pushes him into the corner of the room. The pneumatic hammer slams down and crushes Joe's skull.

Dennis: And the Pulverizer takes its first victim of the night! I [expletive deleted] swear, that [expletive deleted] hammer deflates more egos than a Hollywood hooker's tell-all book!

Julie: That leaves Emmet, Tiffani, and Barbara in the running for the money. It is now time for our first food challenge, in which the housemates compete to see what they will be allowed to eat.

Dennis: That's right, [expletive deleted] Julie. I'm going to [expletive deleted] tell the housemates a joke, and if they can't explain to me why it's funny, they get nothing but Windex and Goliath beetles for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the week.

Emmet (staring up at the commentator's box): I hate you.

Barbara: Don't worry, Emmet. Here, let me read you a few hundred Bible verses.

Emmet pushes her into the Pulverizer's corner, where the hammer kills her.

Dennis: Okay, [expletive deleted] housemates. Listen up: a suprematist artist is hard at work on a still life, when his wife comes up behind him and says, "Comrade, it looks a little fuzzy, but at least it's square."

Emmet and Tiffani look up at the commentator's box blankly.

Dennis: Don't you two get it? Suprematism is a school of abstract geometric art that originated in Russia! Come on, people! Who doesn't know that?

Julie (to Dennis): I hate you.

Dennis: Okay, bring out a big bucket of beetles!

Tiffani: No!

Tiffani throws herself on the nearest pneumatic spike board, expiring loudly.

Julie: Emmet, it looks like you win Big Brother Three. I am very happy for you.

Emmet says nothing. Grabbing Joe's knife from the floor, he claws his way up the Plexiglas wall towards the commentator's box. He reaches it only to have Julie Chen stiff-arm him backwards. Emmet falls to his death as one of the radial saws activates beneath him.

Julie begins sparking and smoking, having violated one of the Laws of Robotics in intentionally killing a human. She slumps into her chair, deactivated.

Dennis: Wow. Tonight's episode had more surprises than a birthday party at Michael Jackson's house. Well, [expletive deleted] good night, everybody!

Fade out.