Anyone who knows me well knows that there are two “reality” shows I simply can’t get enough of.  One is The Real Housewives (of Wherever), and the other is what could arguably be considered the ultimate reality show, Dateline.

I could binge watch these shows all day long, one episode after the other.  They never get old.  I’ve seen every episode before…multiple times.  I know how they end.  It just doesn’t matter.  My heart still skips a beat every time I’m mindlessly searching for something to watch on TV and one of these shows pops up on the channel menu.

Yet, I’ve recently come to the realization that if these programs are my two main sources of “reality”, it could explain why I’m a tad disenchanted by the world in general.  One show features a cast of caddy women who appear to want to kill one another, and the other features a cast of corpses who, well…have obviously been killed.  And let’s face it, nine times out of ten, it’s always the husband doing the killing, hence some of my many issues with men.  But that is a different blog for another time.

It’s a bit amusing to think that both series have a television network practically dedicated to them.  It’s rare to flip on Bravo and not see an episode of The Real Housewives.  And while Dateline isn’t the only show on ID (Investigation Discovery), and other various channels, it likely inspired a slew of alternative programming featuring death, criminals and stories that are true, but often seem stranger than fiction.

Speaking of ID, when I first discovered this channel, (no pun intended), I was absolutely elated.  It allowed me to binge watch Dateline and 48 hours and other like shows all the time.  But, as ID gained notoriety, it dawned on me that this was a network entirely built around real life stories of real life tragedies.  And there were so many of them – 24 hours worth, seven days a week.  While I love a good mystery, it’s depressing to think that there is that much evil in the world.  While I often question the authenticity of the Housewives, Dateline and its sister shows are based on truth and fact, in other words, real real life drama.

There are several similarities between the Housewives and Dateline.  Most storylines revolve around jealousy and broken relationships.  Of course, the former show deals with these issues by tossing a glass of wine in someone’s face or spreading a horrible rumor.  The latter usually deals with these same issues by someone taking a life.  I’m okay with a little pinot in my hair as long as I make it home in one piece, and well, alive.

The unfortunate thing is, the immorality in this world is just getting worse as time goes on.  Villains in the storybooks are being overshadowed by real life devils that truly don’t know how to come to terms with their problems.  It seems violence and murder are considerable options, as opposed to simply sitting down and working through something with someone, or better yet, letting go and walking away.

These extremes are going to seem quite normal to the youth of today, and even more common to those who have yet to enter this world.  I think a good way to get children prepared for today’s world would be to create a new series entitled, Dateline Mysteries: Fairy Tale Edition.  This show would spotlight different fairy tales, featuring a more realistic perspective of the originating storyline.  No sunshine and rainbows in these fairy tales…merely truth, hardships and malevolence, hosted by Lester Holt and narrated by Canadian broadcast journalist, (and newsmagazine darling), Keith Morrison.

The first episode would highlight the real story of Rapunzel.  Read below and tell me this fairy tale doesn’t scream Dateline Mystery!  The original tale, which was German, first published in 1812, and included in a collection of stories assembled by the Brothers Grimm called Children’s and Household Tales, reads more like a vampy soap opera than innocent child’s play.

DATELINE MYSTERY: THE GIRL IN THE TOWER     

A lonely couple live next to a walled garden belonging to an evil witch named Dame Gothel.  The wife, (who appears to be over forty, so we know she’s a goner), is experiencing the cravings associated with the arrival of her long-awaited pregnancy, and notices a Rapunzel plant growing in the neighboring witches’ garden.  She longs for this plant, desperate to the point of death.  (Translation: She’s a crack addict.)  One night, her husband breaks into the garden to get the plant for her, (which is obviously a felony).  The wife (junkie) makes a salad out of it and greedily eats it.  (Yes, the catalyst of this whole tale is salad.)  It tastes so good that she longs for more, (hence her growing addiction).  Therefore, her husband breaks into the garden for a second time, (leading to yet another felony and an ever-growing rap sheet).  As he scales the wall to return home, Dame Gothel catches him and accuses him of theft, (as she should).  He begs for mercy, and she agrees to be lenient with him and allows him to take what he wants on the condition that the unborn baby will be given to her at birth.  (WTF!?!  How is that lenient?)  And he agrees.  (WTF!?!  He must be smoking crack too!) 

When the baby girl is born, Dame Gothel takes her to raise as her own, (in other words, she kidnaps her), and names her Rapunzel, after the plant her (drugged out) mother craved, (which is just plain twisted).  Ironically, Rapunzel grows up to be the most beautiful child in the world, with long golden hair, (which is actually a relief since she was obviously born a crack baby to her low-life parents).

When Rapunzel reaches her twelfth year, Dame Gothel locks her away in a tower in the middle of the woods, with neither stairs nor a door, and only one room and with one window.  (Uh, I believe this is called child abuse.)  When Dame Gothel visits, she stands beneath the tower and waits for Rapunzel to toss her hair down so she can climb it and get into the tower.  (Uh, now we’re talking MEGA child abuse!  Although, I am quite impressed by Rapunzel’s ability to pull an entire adult/witch up a tower with only her hair – at the age of twelve, no less!)

One day, a prince rides through the forest and hears Rapunzel singing from the tower.  Entranced by her ethereal voice, he searches for her and discovers the tower, but is naturally unable to enter it.  He sees Dame Gothel visit, and thus learns how to gain access to Rapunzel.  (Underage Rapunzel.)  When Dame Gothel leaves, he bids Rapunzel to let her hair down, which she does, leading to a romance between the two and a proposal of marriage, which she accepts.  (Is this the Enchanted Kingdom or the South?  And by the way, she’s twelve years old and it’s only been like five minutes!)

They soon plan a means of escape, (which does make sense – does she even have a bathroom in that tower?), wherein the prince will come each night and bring Rapunzel a piece of silk, which she will gradually weave into a ladder.  (Is an actual ladder not available?  He’s a prince for god’s sake!  I’d think he’d have access to one.   Or, at the very least, couldn’t he bring her a rope instead of the silk to possibly speed up the process?  The girl can lift humans with her head – she’s quite talented.  Yet, as a prince, wouldn’t he also have access to the police or a dragon or some other form of authority figure that could assist with Rapunzel’s rescue?)  However, before the plan can come to fruition, Rapunzel foolishly gives the prince away to Dame Gothel by exposing both her expanding waist line, (yup, she’s pregnant), and, in a moment of forgetfulness, (probably because of the teen pregnancy…or the fact that she’s been locked in a tower and doesn’t have much to keep track of on a daily basis), she asks why it is easier for her to draw up the prince with her hair than Dame Gothel.  (Oh Snap!  On second thought, maybe Rapunzel is smarter than we think because that was an obvious jab.)  (The fat joke) angers the witch, leading her to cut off Rapunzel’s hair and then cast the (poor, teenage, pregnant, shut in) into the wilderness to fend for herself.  (Did someone say witch or bitch?)

When the prince comes by that night, Dame Gothel lets the severed hair down to haul him up.  (Brightside, at least it wasn’t a severed head.)  To his horror, he finds himself staring at Dame Gothel instead of Rapunzel, who is nowhere to be found.  When Dame Gothel tells the prince, in a jealous rage, that he will never see Rapunzel again, she pushes him out of the tower and into the thorns below, blinding him.  (I believe that’s called attempted murder.)

For months, the prince wanders through the wastelands of the country and eventually comes to the wilderness where Rapunzel now lives with the twins she has given birth to, a boy and a girl.  (So not only was she abandoned by her parents, kidnapped, locked in a tower and left for dead, she has now also been given the task of birthing her own TWO children – alone.  If this isn’t the stuff of a Lifetime movie, I don’t know what is.) One day, as she sings, (which is truly amazing after the life she’s had), the prince hears her voice, and they are finally reunited. When they fall into each other’s arms, her tears immediately restore his sight.  (Yeah right.)  He leads her and their children to his kingdom, where they live happily ever after (thanks to intensive psycho and shock therapy).

Fade to black and roll the credits.

Well, isn’t that just the sweetest fairy tale ever?!?! It certainly had a lot for the kiddos – human trafficking, kidnapping, drug addiction, breaking and entering, statutory rape, teen pregnancy, abandonment, physical and mental abuse, attempted murder and…it kind of sounds like the bad guy (witch) got away with it all!

Who wouldn’t want to grow up being Rapunzel?  Her life is a precious fairy tale!  (You know, the kind that gives you nightmares and eventually leads to counseling.)

Okay, maybe the fairy tale edition of Dateline might be a little too graphic for the kiddies.  But, I do think there should be some sort of tale that shows a more realistic medium to our youth that lands somewhere between Happily Ever After and Till Death Do Us Part.  That way, our impressionable youngsters will not be super surprised when they grow up and realize that the prince whom they thought was going to rescue them, actually plans to kill them with a butcher knife, cover up the murder, collect the insurance money, and marry a secret stripper girlfriend…who will later wind up dead as well.

On the next episode of Dateline Mysteries: Fairy Tale Edition…

When She Finally Woke Up