‘The Boyfriend’: Japan’s First Gay Dating Show Is the Best Reality Series on TV
The concept of The Boyfriend, Japan’s first same-sex reality show, is not unfamiliar: a group of nine gay men live in a house together for a month. The goal? To forge lifelong friendships and to find the man of their dreams.
Unlike other shows, the guys (ranging from ages 22 to 36) aren’t stuck on set with no access to the outside world—there are numerous occasions where work and other obligations mean that some guys leave the house for days at a time. That’s a small detail that’s more about Japan’s strict working culture than anything else, but it adds a dash of actual reality to the mix, delivering an idea of what life would be like dating someone with a busy job.
There are no eliminations or alliances. The closest thing to a traditional reality TV “challenge” is that they all run a coffee truck together. Each day someone new is in charge and gets to choose one of the other guys to work with them, in a bid to forge a stronger connection.