The Moment of Truth kicked off its second season last night with contestant Curtis Frank (pictured) in the hot seat. Frank revealed a few "shocking" truths, including the fact that he'd cheated on his ex-girlfriend Aurora, who was sitting only a few feet away. This revelation came right after Frank admitted that he wanted to get back together with Aurora. Whoops.It seemed to me that Frank, along with his best friend John and younger brother Cody, who were both in attendance, had planned to get on the show, answer a few questions for some quick money, and then get out with no one getting hurt in the process. John kept encouraging Frank to answer just a couple more questions, and when that final question about cheating on Aurora came up, John leaned over to Frank's brother and said that they were in trouble now and that their plans to party were over. After answering the question truthfully and winning $100,000 Frank quit the game, saying that they had hoped to avoid this type of situation, but since it was already done it would be best to get out now. Makes you wonder if they had actually seen the show before, doesn't it?
The episode wasn't all that shocking, at least by the show's own standards. But you wouldn't have known that by watching the first five minutes, which were spent building suspense to hook viewers for the entire hour. My main problem with this approach is that they end up spoiling the entire episode this way. The clips of upcoming questions encompass all of the tough ones, so as the episode plays out and tricky questions come up, you know that the contestant is going to answer truthfully because you've already seen the rest of the questions that are yet to come.
As if this wasn't enough, commercial breaks come along right after host Mark Walberg has asked a sensational question. When we return from the break, we have to watch the entire lead-in to that question, along with the question being asked all over again. So a show that fills a one-hour time slot is actually less than 30 minutes in length once you weed out all of the repetition and build-up. Of course many shows take this approach and providing a hook for the audience is a necessary evil. It just seems that last night's show went way over the usual threshold for manufactured drama.
The preview for next week's show tease that the contestant will be the most cold-hearted person to take the hot seat in the history of the show. It'll take a lot to exceed the shock waves Lauren Cleri caused last season, so we'll have to wait and see if this next episode actually delivers.
Photo by Kelsey McNeal, Courtesy FOX
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