Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Of all the great things about television, the greatest is that it’s on every single day. TV history is being made, day in and day out, in ways big and small. In an effort to better appreciate this history, we’re taking a look back, every day, at one particular TV milestone.
IMPORTANT DATE IN TV HISTORY: July 19, 1995
PROGRAM ORIGINALLY AIRED ON THIS DATE: Road Rules, “Sailing with No Water” (Season 1, Episode 1) [Stream on YouTube]
WHY IT’S IMPORTANT: By July of 1995, MTV’s The Real World was into its fourth season, but the network was already looking to shake things up. The novelty of the format of drawing seven strangers into the same IKEA-appointed house and asking them to engage in a series of personality clashes for the enjoyment of the home audience was beginning to seem a bit less novel. So what to do for a spinoff? How about put those same strangers into the high-pressure environment of an RV and send them on a cross-country scavenger hunt for money? And so we got Road Rules, and indirectly we got the birth of what would eventually become The Real World/Road Rules Challenge.
With Road Rules, The Real World went from being a landmark series in TV history and became the cornerstone of a reality TV franchise. The Road Rulers were the adventurers of the Bunim-Murray universe, trekking to all corners of the country (and in subsequent seasons, the globe) to compete in events that would eventually become fairly extreme and scary. In the first episode of the first season, however, the challenges were downright quaint. Land-sailing in a dry lake bed? That honestly sounds like a really chill and fun afternoon. In fact, the scariest thing in the premiere episode of Road Rules was the prospect of having to empty the RV’s chemical toilet.
If Road Rules began with comparably humble beginnings, the lower stakes gave the viewer a better chance to get to know the competitors. There’s really one one way for someone to react to having to tightrope-walk across a skyscraper, as they would in later seasons. But land-sailing in order to win a night in a fancy hotel room and then getting the RV stuck in the mud? That kind of mission left the five Road Rulers with lots of personality to burn.
We’ll probably never again be as innocent as we were during that first Road Rules season, but we can let it hold a special place in our memories.
