Too Hot to handle still amounts to horrible TV as it returns for Season 2

Pajiba

"Remember when Netflix used to curate its content to appeal to a certain demographic with an IQ above 90? Too Hot to Handle is the streamer’s way of saying, “F**k that," says Dustin Rowles. "We have conceded brand purity to HBO Max and Apple TV+. Here are some painfully aroused twenty-something shirtless men and bikini-clad women. Watch them try not to bang. The idea behind the series, at least, is that by banning the ten contestants from having sex, they will form stronger emotional bonds. The reality, however, is that the contestants are basically left to mentally assess how much money they are willing to sacrifice to rid themselves of a case of blue balls. It is horrible television. I don’t mean because it’s cheap and morally bankrupt (although, that too). I mean: It’s tedious and boring and the contestants are insipid, empty-headed dimwits who are about as deep as a rain puddle during a three-week drought. Good god, they are awful human beings, and listening to them talk is like being the one guy at a party who chooses not to get high. I watched two excruciating episodes and not one person spoke a single worthwhile word. The entire show consists of 10 people licking their lips and breathlessly talking about which one of the other contestants they want to f**k. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. Even as a competition series, it’s beyond lousy.  The 10 contestants are told that they are being invited onto a particular type of series that apparently allows them to spend a month engaging in a group orgy only to be told that sex is verboten. It’s clear by how familiar they immediately all are with the rules that they have at least all seen the first season of the series, which essentially nullifies the ruse. They know exactly what’s going on, and they’re not there to win. They’re there to play to the cameras and generate some cheap, fleeting fame."

ALSO:

• Too Hot to Handle is TV's most confounding show: "What I find most confusing of all is: the anguish," says Claire McNair. "The screams, the yells, the abject horror when, most of the way through the second season’s premiere, the fresh batch of 10 very slightly clothed strangers learn that they have been summoned to a sumptuous Turks and Caicos estate not to participate in the made-up reality show Parties in Paradise, but in this one, the no-sex one. There will be no parties in paradise at all! Even their smiley Parties in Paradise host, 'Jeff,' is a fake! They have been summoned into a horror movie premise: a secluded mansion, a lie forged by mysterious powers with their own ends in mind (binge-watching). But instead of an ax murderer, what awaits them is, in the parlance of the show, no 'rumpy pumpy.' And yet: The contestants gasp and moan and beat their chests as if the vorpal blade itself has appeared, instead of the bizarro chastity-enforcing AI speaker technology named Lana (hm) that the show has stand in for a human host. (Sorry, Jeff!)"
• Too Hot to Handle is still hilarious in Season 2: "In season one, the contestants eventually split $75,000," says Lucy Mangan. "By the end of the current crop’s first night the prize fund has already dropped to $79,000 and it is quite possible that by the time they reach the finale, they will be required to pay the makers. Obviously – obviously – it is terrible. But, as ever, it’s brilliant to watch. Money and sex working in diametric opposition creates a unique layer of horror that no other reality show can provide, atop the jealousy, treachery, stupidity and heartbreak that customarily abounds. You would need a heart of stone not to laugh."
• Meet the Season 2 Too Hot to Handle contestants