Fox's Alter Ego is "legitimately nightmarish" and possibly the worst show of 2021

The Guardian

"More than perhaps any other television format, the singing competition has found itself in a state of accelerated progress," says Stuart Heritage. "In quick succession, American Idol’s basic 'We’ll tell you if you’re a good singer' premise gave way to The Voice’s 'We’ll tell you if you’re a good singer without looking at you,' which in turn became The Masked Singer’s 'We don’t care if you’re a good singer or not, because you’re a minor celebrity dressed up like a sentient banana.' Evidently, however, progress isn’t always a good thing. Now the singing competition has landed upon Alter Ego; a show so catastrophic, so legitimately nightmarish in both concept and execution, that it deserves to be drowned in concrete and hidden at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. I guarantee that people will be talking about Alter Ego for decades to come. This is because the enduring global mystery of the next 50 years deserves to be “How the hell did this charred wreckage of a series ever get made? The premise of Alter Ego is as follows: a procession of singers dress up in skintight mo-cap garb and then perform a song backstage. Meanwhile, out on the studio floor, their movements are recreated in real time by a computer-generated avatar. If you ever wanted to see a dreary power ballad belted out by a pink fairy, or an androgynous alien with tentacles for hair, then Alter Ego is the show for you. But obviously you don’t want to see that, because you place value in your ability to not constantly wake up screaming every single time you fall asleep."

ALSO:

• Alter Ego puts forward a fascinating, odd concept that’s moving from the fringes of pop closer to its mainstream, and says that the only reason one might pursue it is to hide from oneself
• Alter Ego is yet another failed attempt to duplicate The Masked Singer's success
• What's most shocking about Alter Ego is how desperately it tries to take itself seriously, attempting to elevate the gimmick through sheer force of will