Try some new ‘Extreme Makeover’ editions

Tim Engstrom, Pothole Prairie

Published Tuesday, October 7, 2008

“Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” started as a spinoff of the TV show “Extreme Makeover,” which gave people makeovers, not homes. Folks would apply, and they would travel to Hollywood, where the show would take them from ordinary to stunning with the use of plastic surgery, exercise, haircuts and new clothes. This first “Extreme Makeover” started in 2002, all but disappeared in 2006 and finally was canceled in 2007.

“Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” started in 2003, and, as you know, is still going strong. You know how the show works.

There was an “Extreme Makeover: Wedding Edition.” It had a pilot episode in 2005 that didn’t get high enough ratings to warrant a series. In it, the show would coordinate a wedding in three days for a destitute-but-loving couple that couldn’t afford a wedding.

Apparently, the idea was to create an “Extreme Makeover” empire, much like how there are 42 kinds of “CSI” and 73 kinds of “Law & Order.”

So I have a few ideas for new editions of “Extreme Makeover.” Watch for the pilots next year on a TV set near you:

“Extreme Makeover: Boy Band Edition”

Usually boy bands are filled with young singers and dancers who have had a pretty easy life. They take the stage and pretend they are streetwise. Well, in this show, producers have voice coaches and choreographers take a bunch of boys who really are streetwise and teach them to sing and dance — in one week!

“Extreme Makeover: Politics Edition”

In this show, Karl Rove and James Carville take your everyday local political candidates, such as House District 27A incumbent Robin Brown and challenger Erik Larson, and turn the race into a high-stakes, well-funded, all-out mudslinging game of who can degrade whom the most. In the end, everyone loses.

“Extreme Makeover: Town Edition”

Producers find a hard-luck town that has lost jobs and has some noisy complainers. They have star economic developers convince large multinational companies to build a factory with high-paying jobs that will change the fortunes of the town and its people. The first episode takes place in the hard-working town of Albert Lea. Subaru opens a plant to manufacture electric, all-wheel-drive cars, and the plant has zero pollution. Nobody ever complains about anything ever again, and everyone smiles all the time. The show’s producers even manage to permanently affix a rainbow over the town.

“Extreme Makeunder”

Have you ever seen the movie “Trading Places” starring Eddie Murphy? It’s sort of like that. Wealthy, good-looking people for one week are turned into unclean street bums who have to sleep in boxes, hold cardboard signs at freeway interchanges and ask pedestrians for money. However, instead of spending what they get on alcohol, they have to give it to a good cause, such as a mission for the homeless. The show would have produced a lot of laughs, sort of like watching Paris Hilton working on a dairy farm, but it dies for lack of applicants.

“Extreme Makeout”

This series would show teenagers and young adults making out all the time. However, this idea already is on the air. It’s called MTV.

“Extreme Makeover: Rodeo Edition”

The “Extreme” producers decide they need to defend their brand against infringement by Xtreme Bulls, the bull-riding circuit of the Pro Rodeo Cowboys Association. They come out with this competing version of bull riding; only in this series, ordinary folks are made into professional bull riders in one week. After getting banged up, they could have gone on the original “Extreme Makeover,” if it were still on the air.

“Extreme Makeover: Parole Edition”

You guessed it. The show takes hardened criminals who just got out of prison — you know, drug dealers, gang members, arsonists, dog kickers, Enron executives — and gives them shots at being functioning members of society. They get to try jobs such as bankers, nurses, chamber of commerce directors, high school principals and TV news anchors. The show’s results are not very heartwarming, but, man, it sure is thrilling to watch! The saying about how it is difficult to look away from a car accident applies.

“Extreme Makeover: Commercial Edition”

TV advertising experts would take lame local TV commercials, such as car dealers dressed in cowboy hats shouting about how they’ve gone crazy and are practically giving away the cars, and they would remake the commercials into something worth watching. No offense, Rochester Lapidary Jewelers, but, boy, you need a better song. I hit the mute button or change the channel when your commercial comes on. This show would be for you.

“Extreme Makeover: Job Edition”

In this show, the producers take poor schmucks who absolutely hate their jobs and they give them the careers they always wanted. You know, this might actually be a workable idea. Hey, “Extreme Makeover” producers, maybe you can hire me to be an idea guy. I can think up TV shows. Just have your people call my people. Oh wait, just call me. I don’t have people.

“Extreme Makeover: Extreme Edition”

This would be a show where every problem in the world is solved in just one week. Even then, the next week, a whole new set of problems have developed. Don’t ask me how they would solve these problems, but I know this much: The show would have to be animated.

Tribune Managing Editor Tim Engstrom’s column appears every Tuesday.