Boxing Info: Like Your Chances Against Mayweather?
New Boxing Reality Show May Hit TV Screens In 2007
Dutch production company No Brain No Gain today announced that it had finalized plans for a reality based American TV show that will feature average fans getting the opportunity to climb in the ring with current boxing champions. “We’re very excited about this project, which we’re tentatively calling Suicide Mission,” said the company’s spokesperson Kaant Imajin. “We’ve test marketed a version here in Holland and the ratings we’re through the roof. We had the top Dutch fighters knocking out average ‘tough guy’ types, usually in less than a minute, and audience response was amazing.”
No Brain No Gain is best known in the American market for it’s video game Bling Bling You’re Dead, in which players tries to rob as many “quick mart” type shops as possible before getting killed by the fictional New Amsterdam police force. While that project set off a chain reaction by various organized parental groups, which ultimately led to the banning of the game before it was ever released in the US, the European concern doesn’t see the same problems with it’s television show.
“It’s a well known fact on the continent that if you want to succeed in America you have to present stylized violence,” said Imajin. “We recognize that we overshot the boundaries of good taste with our video game, which sells quite well online by the way, but we think that we have hit the nail on the head with Suicide Mission.”
No Brain No Gain admits that they don’t have any takers yet among the top American television companies but they have been in talks with Nashville, TN based specialized cable network Hammered TV, purveyors of programs that largely feature inebriated contestants or actors.
“We think Suicide Mission is something that our viewers would embrace wholeheartedly,” claims Jerry Jeff Callaghan, Chief of Programming for Hammered TV. “How many times have you been in a bar on Saturday night and some guy at the other end is looking for a fight? That’s basically our core viewership and we think that Suicide Mission would fit in with the niche market that we’ve carved out since first going on the air last year. We just have to iron out a few minor details with the FCC and after that it should be smooth sailing.”
While No Brain No Gain hopes to woo such major boxing champions as Floyd Mayweather, Jermain Taylor and Chris Byrd into appearing on Suicide Mission, the production company admits that they may find more willing participants among European boxers hoping to raise their profile on the American market.