Netflix, Please Give Us an American Version of The Boyfriend, Japan's Delightful Gay Dating Show

Looking at the dating shows of today, it would be hard to believe that the classic reality TV shows about finding love used to actually be about finding love. From recent seasons of The Bachelor and The Bachelorette to Love Is Blind, not to mention more chaotic shows like Too Hot to Handle and Love Island, the focus of today's dating shows seems to be getting its contestants sponcon deals more than it is romance. But there's a beacon of hope for us hopeless romantics: Netflix's delightful new reality TV offering, The Boyfriend.

The Japanese series, which premiered in July, brings together nine queer men to live in a beachside house called the "Green Room" and work alongside each other, running a coffee truck named Brewtiful. Unlike most reality shows, however, the matchmaking is subtle and more organic instead of over the top (no tantric yoga workshops here!). Though the show does feature challenges, most of them are about teamwork and allowing the men to get to know each other, and aren't structured as dates.

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Almost as importantly, and reminiscent of another groundbreaking Japanese reality show, the calming Real World-esque Terrace House, The Boyfriend did away with the fourth wall by introducing a group of celebrities to guide viewers — and more often than not provide the same snark-free commentary we were thinking of. Megumi, Chiaki Horan, Thelma Aoyama, Durian Lollobrigida, and Yoshimi Tokui act as the audience's stand-ins as the action unfolded, providing a gentler, funnier version of the social media discourse around reality TV.

In the end, the results for The Boyfriend, which recently finished its first season on Netflix, speak for themselves. When the cameras finally turned off, two pairs of contestants left the show as strong couples: Dai and Shun, and Alan and Kazuto. But beyond the series making these men connect romantically, it also pushes them out of their comfort zones, and in some cases, make life-altering decisions. Though Taeheon doesn't leave with a partner, he leaves with something perhaps even more important — the courage to come out to his parents in person, instead of letting them figure out who their son was by watching a reality TV show.

To get there, the show doesn't require big fights, no one has to get half-naked, and there is no need for the Love is Blind staple — the gold cups — seen every time a contestant drinks booze. That's not to say that the contestants refrain from living their normal lives and go out of their way to remain celibate or sober. Instead, the show allows these men to get to know each other in an environment that, though manufactured, feels as real as possible within the confines of the reality TV world. Who would have thought?

All of these things would be a welcome change for the reality TV landscape in the good ol' U.S. of A, where cynicism from the audience and clout-chasing by the participants have all but crushed the thought of real love. Shows like The Bachelorette and Love is Blind have delivered fewer and fewer couples and more and more wannabe influencers in the past few years, with the ratio of couples in Love is Blind dropping steadily in each season and the amount of time it takes for couples to break up post-The Bachelor or The Bachelorette getting shorter and shorter. 

A few weeks ago, ABC aired an episode of Celebrity Family Feud featuring the winning couple from The Golden Bachelorette. The only problem? Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist, who met, fell in love, and got engaged on the ABC show and then went on to marry in a live televised event called The Golden Wedding in January of this year, had already been divorced for months by the time the episode aired, their rushed union forever preserved in the annals of game show reruns. Talk about awkward.

But a glance at social media tells us that at this point, that's pretty much the expected outcome for reality dating shows in America. No one's tuning into Love is Blind or The Bachelorette, much less Too Hot to Handle, expecting love. Instead, they're expecting D-R-A-M-A. And even when these shows do deliver a couple, that couple is met with cynicism, instead of the benefit of the doubt.

A U.S. version of The Boyfriend could be the antidote to the increasing skepticism over American reality TV. It's at least worth a shot in the still-popular genre, where audiences have lost faith in the outcome of basically every show that purports to sell "love." The Boyfriend, with its focus on empathy and kindness, feels like a much easier sell than another offshoot of The Ultimatum, or a different twist for Too Hot to Handle. Been there and seen that; we're already over Bad Lana.

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The Boyfriend is, of course, much harder to pull off in the U.S. than it was in Japan, particularly after so many other reality TV shows have skewed what Americans think of the genre. Japan isn't a stranger to reality TV, but there's much less cynicism surrounding the genre, and casting nine people looking for a real connection feels like a much easier endeavor outside of the U.S. But that doesn't mean Netflix shouldn't try to catch lightning in a bottle with a U.S. version of The Boyfriend.

Just find a beach somewhere, throw nine queer men together, give them a job that forces them to spend time together, and see what happens. Or, maybe, throw nine queer women and make the first version of The Girlfriend. Netflix could even try a gender-neutral version. All of those work. The point is that reality TV used to be more about the result than about the drama along the way. The Boyfriend reminded us of that fact. Now it's up to Netflix to take advantage and give us the U.S. version of the show that we — and American reality television — need.

The Boyfriend is now streaming on Netflix.