I've posted this elsewhere but I will say it here too - I finally watched the new season of "The Mole" on Netflix and sadly it was not near as good as I THINK the original series was.

The premise of The Mole is that you have a group of contestants that complete tasks to earn money and in the end at least one of them will win what they have earned. As the series progress they vote for the person they believe is "The Mole" who happens to be posing as a contestant but in reality is trying to sabotage the tasks to keep the pot as low as possible. Anderson Cooper hosted the original series many years ago and it was a great show.

Netflix revived the series with a new host and it may be that I've watched a lot more reality television since the original but I actually feel like the way "Reality" TV is produced now has changed and that's what turned me off (mind you I watched the whole season so it wasn't THAT bad). In The Mole we the viewer also do not know who the Mole is and we are constantly reminded of to the point of annoyance. We can't have a hope of guessing either as every contestant seems obsessed with doing 'Mole Like" things to throw the others off. When I finally got to the last episode I fast forwarded to the end just to see who it was and, as expected, I had no clue, and anyone that says they did is lying.

On the other hand..... there is a show coming to the USA in January that I am interested in. Now its already had a full season in Australia and its first UK season is currently 6 episodes in (more on how to see them online later). This show is called "The Traitors" and unlike "The Mole" we the viewer know who the Traitors are. It makes for a much more interesting show as we are in on the secret. Like the Mole the cast works together to earn money towards a pot but the Traitors also have a shot at the money unlike the Mole. Also unlike the Mole the individual Traitors can be eliminated.

My biggest qualm with The Traitors is there often isn't a need to watch the competitions as in the end everyone wants to earn the most money possible. This is a minor annoyance though.

The AU and UK versions cast about 20 "fresh faces" and I really have enjoyed both series. I am hopeful for the US version but learned this week that half the cast is made up of Reality TV 'celebrities' which is not a great selling point to me. That being said I think the show will still be worth the watch when it shows up on The Peacock in late January.

Now, how can you check out the Australian and UK versions? The AU season can be found at a website that has loads of AU related reality shows - I don't know how they do it but its been around for a few years so I'm happy to share it - check out shvideos.net. As for the UK, its a bit harder to find but dailymotion is a good resource and I have created a playlist of the first 6 episodes (they are dropping at 3 a week so be patient or wait a while) - you can find it here: Daily Motion

Whew that was a lot!! Comment away please but NO SPOILERS!!