By Michela Arlia
The latest reality show to take the streaming world by storm has to be “Selling Sunset,” the tale of a group of real estate agents selling luxury homes in Hollywood Hills, Los Angeles. With season five released two weeks ago, the show stands at number one in the U.S. for the streaming service.
I’m usually never attracted to these types of shows, but started binging after needing a new show that was less than six seasons and not very plot driven.
Now with the latest season’s release, I naturally had to look into the multi-million dollar homes that one could only dream of affording and what the ladies in the office had in store with all the drama. And let’s just say the drama was intense – dare I say, nail biting.
The thing about “Selling Sunset” is that it’s like most Hallmark movies. The acting is hammy, but it reels you in and you can’t help but continue watching.
The girls all have the highest standards when it comes to clothes, shoes, and hair extensions, a complete flip from many of our lives here in Brooklyn. The drama is plain petty and transported me back to the cafeteria tables in middle school. There’s just something about all these grown women with families of their own cat fighting that is really worth binging. And it’s great publicity for the streaming company.
With all the drama that is hyped up by the promotional ads put out before the season started, and the elevation of drama that lasts throughout the season, the ending was very anticlimactic and disappointing. There are no answers found in the last episode. Catchy and stylish music plays as montages of different women on the show flash across the screen. We see one getting on a private jet, another at the airport, and one woman just staring out of her window looking into the sunset. All of these images give no background information and no context, and feel almost as if production needed to fill some space after bringing everything to the editing room.
Now of course it serves as a cliffhanger, but there has been no talks of a sixth season coming any time soon, so who’s to say if this was the end.
One of the main things I had to take away from the entire season was this: Oreos.
Yes, Oreos, the popular cookie brand. In the span of a 10-episode season, the cookie was mentioned probably 10 times, all by the same person. Emma Hernan, one of the stars and agents in the office, couldn’t help but first mention Oreos when her co-star Heather El Moussa said she never tried them.
Hernan then again mentioned the cookie when commenting on another agent’s outfits throughout the show.
I took to Twitter to see the initial reaction of viewers only to find that there were very similar reactions to the cookie comments.
One user even tweeted, “how much did Oreo pay #sellingsunset for them to keep mentioning it like this.”
Aside from the overly enthusiastic approach to milk’s favorite cookie, one really interesting thing about reality TV is that it is unscripted for the most part and the events that occur are actively happening in everyday life. If you head to the stars’ social media pages, you would see that what’s played out on screen has happened close to a year ago. That being said, it’s hard to see everything that goes down on TV as new information. It might be helpful to have the women hide most of their lives from social media if they want an even larger reaction from audience members.
As unrealistic as this show poses itself to be for a reality program, it still is a good way to pass time, and I’m sure many viewers along with myself are looking forward to sitting and pining over a potential season six some time in the future.