Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations Season 6

[Florida]

Where does anyone get the idea that the Chase advertisement was some sort of backhanded joke?

Per Adweek:

"In addition to the 30-second ad, Chase is investing in some product placements, integrating itself into four of Travel Channel’s most popular programs: Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations, Samantha Brown’s Great Weekends, Andrew Zimmern’s Bizarre World and Dhani Tackles the Globe."

Also, just a simple search of google images with the phrase: "tony bourdain and chase sapphire" will quickly pull up images of bourdain (and zimmerman) posing in front of a Chase advertisement.

[howard88]

The Chase credit card notwithstanding, Bourdains show is generally 99percent so enticing

Lets face it Tony has the career most food oriented people dream having. After each

show I find myself saying wow if only I had a list of the places Bourdain ate in, it

would make traveling so much more fulfilling. I spent two weeks in Turkey and while I

had decent food, it didn't compare to the offerings on No Reservations.

[Honkman]

"Sure, the Chase thing was blatant and bit annoying, but kinda funny" - I don't see where it was in any way funny. It was only annoying.

"Why is this "selling out"? - For somebody who always tried to portrait himself as "different", "outsider, not following the mainstream" and making jokes about the mainstream this is a sell out.

"It does not matter and has no real impact on the content of the show!" - How do you know ? How do you know that other companies / tourist organizations don't influence the content of the show ?

I guess it's a matter of opinion as to what is funny and what is not. Really? Taking money from an advertiser that has nothing to do with food is a selling out? The show still works the same way on screen as far as I can tell. I do not see them "toning it down" to appeal to a mass audience and the content is still as varied as it always has been (to kick it off we get a non-food focused Panama and then Turkey with almost nothing but food!).

As far as influencing the show, like I said, it is not evident. Now, you can be all conspiracy theory and say it was all a plot by big bad Chase to send him to Turkey so he can eat at this place that they own and hang out with the cute chick who in reality works for Chase PR. I don't buy that because the show would've worked exactly the same with or without Chase and a 2.5 second plug for them helped pay the bill. With DVR and TiVo most advertiser are resorting to one trick or another to get you to see their products. That's all there is to it. Again, when he starts shilling for a food-related company/product that I am pretty sure he does not believe in, I'll be the first to bash him as a sellout.

When on Top Chef, the contestants are asked to improvise a meal using nothing but "Product X", that's how you know advertisers, in this case whoever makes "Product X", ARE influencing content and script. Figured and example might help.

I am not saying that Chase is influencing the program but how do you know that not other (travel-related) companies are trying to influence for example where he is going or what places he is visiting during a show ? And I am not saying that there is so far any clear evidence that this is happening but just seeing in what stupid way they advertise Chase during the show gives me at least less convidence that this might not happen in the future.

[IndyRob]

I find myself saying wow if only I had a list of the places Bourdain ate in, it would make traveling so much more fulfilling.

While watching the Brittany show I saw that they are posting travel guides on the web site. Check this out...

http://www.travelchannel.com/TV_Shows/Anthony_Bourdain/Episodes_Travel_Guides/ci.Episode_Brittany.map

For Istanbul...

http://www.travelchannel.com/TV_Shows/Anthony_Bourdain/Episodes_Travel_Guides/ci.Episode_Istanbul.map

[ray goud]

We just saw the episode in Prague, and it was great, if for no other reason than it made no excuses for a country which loves its wonderful sausages and beer. Tony even annoyed a local chef when he declined the offer to visit the guy's restaurant and eat street food, instead. So far, the only episode I liked better is the one when he visited his wife's family.

Ray

[Chris Amirault]

I agree that the Prague episode was fantastic. I loved the pig butchering session in particular: how in the world was that guy stuffing sausages with his bare hands?!?

However, the Hudson Valley episode was just awful. The CIA is nice and I'm a Bill Murray fan, too, but there is so much going on up there that went unmentioned.

[Doodad]

I wish the new episode would show up on On Demand. All the others have shown up the following day except for the Hudson Valley.

[SheenaGreena]

Am I crazy or did I just see the fat guy in the new preview for next week's "obsessed" episode? YAY!!

[Fat Guy]

Next week's show, "Obsessed," is described in the episode guide as: "Anthony talks to chefs and bloggers whose obsessive love for food drives them to noteworthy feats." Though I have precious few noteworthy feats on my record, I'm one of a bunch of people he spoke to. The interview was taped last spring.

[Claudia Greco]

Way to go, Fat Guy! This ep should be a lot of fun!

[LoriZig]

Oh wow! Finally some real "must-see tv!" Very cool, FG!

[Doodad]

I have to say that Ecuador left us pretty cold. Nice looking geography, but I would not be in a real hurry to vacation there and chase meals there. The grandmother's cooking though looked outstanding.

[Claudia Greco]

Yeah - a lot of soup and stew. OK, but I'm not dying to try any of it. The guinea pig actually looked the best, though (!)

[nextguy]

Yeah the episode did not make we want to visit Ecuador. Prior to seeing the episode I had occasionally thought about visiting but now I am not so sure. Then again, it would be silly of me to base my entire view on that one show.

[Fat Guy]

On the Travel Channel website there's a 4-minute video clip of me and Bourdain chatting awkwardly on a bench. As far as I know this is not what's going to be on the TV episode -- it's just something extra they taped for the web.

[scubadoo97]

Very nice Steven!

[Fat Guy]

I haven't seen the episode and don't know much about it, but it seems at least one blogger either caught a preview or had a line on a good deal of information. She lays out a synopsis here.

[NWKate]

Personally, I liked the clip of you and Tony in the restaurant better than the park bench one. And, while I've never made your annual salary in my entire working life, I can totally relate to being servied bad food in a restaurant!

[weinoo]

In my view, the whole episode had to be done quite tongue-in-cheek. I mean, hasn't Bourdain benefitted fairly nicely from being a writer, a blogger and food obsessed? And don't forget, he wasn't a blogger till well after his time on eGullet.

It would have been better to actually see him down about half that bottle of Del Maguey that was sitting up there on the block next to that pig. Then we might have heard what he really thinks.

[mcohen]

This is probably an unpopular opinion, but I thought the show was truly awful during the part about the food blogging community. The other parts were fine but I'm just so... disappointed in the food bloggers who were all too eager to play up to the worst sterotypes about themselves, and by extension, the entire online foodie community, just so they could get some air time. I was just cringing in embarassement as the bloggers laid out to the world how pathetic they were with the whole sublimiation of sex into food. At some point, if you've got some self-respect and dignity, you need to walk off instead of particpating in that charade. The only way it could have gotten worse would have been to find out that the bloggers still living at home with their parents.

[prasantrin]

I agree-I saw a very unflattering portrait of food bloggers, and I don't think it was all due to editing. My mother overhead one of the comments made on the show (I was watching via YouTube) and said, "Who said that? Bourdain? Wow, that's very arrogant!" We were rather disgusted by those segments, quite honestly.

But the cheese and wagyu segements. . . boy would I ever like a good steak followed by a nice cheese plate right now!

[Tess]

I thought the blogger aspect did not go along with the rest; it was like they didn't have enough stuff for a whole show on either thing, so they just got smooshed together. His take on blogs seemed too naive to be true. People have been blogging on extremely narrow subjects for a very long time, often to build an audience platform for some other project and with a somewhat concocted "obsession." People have gotten on TV with blogs about things like Weight Watchers recipe cards and boxed macaroni and cheese. Bourdain's been online enough that the gee-whiz aspect of his discussion seemed kind of intelligence-insulting.

[lancastermike]

Here is another contrarian position but I think he ran out of stuff a couple years ago. Cooks Tour was brilliant stuff but they are running out of ideas and things to do. If Tony thinks food bloggers are weird what about food TV hosts. I watched the other night to see Jason but I mostly skip Tony these days.

Edited March 11, 2010 by lancastermike (log)

[prasantrin]

. . . Bourdain's been online enough that the gee-whiz aspect of his discussion seemed kind of intelligence-insulting.

I didn't see it as "gee-whiz" at all. From what I remember, he left the food forum world largely because he was disgusted with it and the attitudes of many of the people in it (and who ran it). He was attempting to get answers to questions he had had for some time. Like, "WTF, it's just food. Why the hell would you do the things you do to other people just over food?"

And he got his answer from what I heard in the show. It's all about making up for being powerless (in whatever way) in the non-virtual world. Whether it be powerless with women, powerless socially. . .whatever.

Simplistic, but not entirely inaccurate.

[edwardsboi]

Obviously, I'm new to this forum and I wasn't around when it all went down, but what exactly happened here on egullet where cofounders were exiled and lawsuits were threatened? Tony obliquely metioned it, but it was like he was afraid of getting sucked into the maelstorm of lawsuits to directly say what really happened.

If Tony thinks food bloggers are weird what about food TV hosts. I watched the other night to see Jason but I mostly skip Tony these days.

Tony's not the one who said all those embarassing things; the bloggers were the one who stuck their feet in their mouths. It wasn't just Tony who thought food bloggers were weird. After watching that show, most of the audience probably thought so too.