America's Next Top Model, Revisited

There was truly something different in the air during the filming of most 2000’s reality TV shows. The drama was more intense, the stakes were higher, and the boundaries of what was TV-friendly were nonexistent. This was a time before cancellation, accountability, or TikTok apology videos, a time when what was said on television felt untouchable. Contestants cried under fluorescent lights, judges screamed harsh monologues we still quote to this day, and the viewers at home kicked back their feet and used it as a comforting show that they absorbed as normal. But, there are few shows that captured that energy better than America’s Next Top Model.

At the time, America's Next Top Model wasn't just a time slot on CW; it was a phenomenon. Cycle after cycle, the weekly episode drop became more exciting, and the watching became more addictive. The makeover episodes felt like national events, and the eliminations had the audience screaming from their couches. Even those who didn’t watch couldn’t resist the anticipation of seeing which model’s picture was left in Tyra Banks’ hand, and which model was “no longer in the running to be America’s Next Top Model”. You can even hear her voice, can't you?

Tyra Banks was at the center of it all. She was the creator, the mastermind, and the ringleader. Girls entering the competition fell to their knees and cried when they met her. And they worked their asses off to please her. And before we get into the well-deserved criticism of her, you must admit, she was sort of a genius. The core idea of the show—weekly themed photoshoots, filming CoverGirl Ads, racing through go-see competitions, and the drama of a dozen models in their late-teens to early twenties living together—was a hit right off the bat.

It’s an undeniably interesting watch. Banks wasn’t just holding a competition but creating a universe of high fashion. To the teen girls watching, it was like a cultural currency. It defined what was chic and what was “dreck”.

What made the show dominant was also what made it distinctly of its era. The early 2000’s rewarded spectacle and thrived on the extreme. Producers manufactured drama, scripted conversations, and made cuts displaying things that didn't quite happen as they showed on air. America’s Next Top Model wasn’t the first and or only show to play on these dehumanizing angles. Shows such as Big Brother or Survivor operated within the same ecosystems. They looked for heightened personalities, either to push to the top or put through a humiliation ritual. There was often no real regard for the cast of these shows; the concern was getting attention and gaining views. And if that meant throwing someone under the bus, those producers were quick to do it.

Then, 2020 happened. The pandemic hit. Everyone was at home. Everyone was bored. During lockdown, comfort viewing took over. Streaming services resurfaced old seasons, and YouTube compilations started to rack up views. Suddenly, those who had watched these shows in their early middle school years were rewatching as adults, with social media-conscious minds, and it wasn’t pretty. The rewatch struck a different chord than the initial watching did. It wasn’t fun drama; it was actually pretty concerning.

The “Next Top Model Look” began to show the way eating disorders were pushed, not only in the show, but also at this time. Models were almost horrifyingly underweight and harassed for gaining even a pound; comments were made about girls looking bloated, and what was considered plus-size on the show was not what was considered plus-sized on store clothing racks. Body image wasn’t the only negative aspect of the show; Banks and producers were doing just about anything to the models’ appearances to achieve a high fashion look, sometimes even against the models’ wills. Shaving heads, bleaching eyebrows, and even dental procedures were done in order to be America’s Next Top Model.

Moments that had once felt like tough love critiques now seemed harsher and more like an attack. It’s important to keep in mind that most of these girls were freshly adults who had just left their small-town homes. Some hadn’t even worked a real job, let alone been critiqued for every inch of their bodies, their attitude, and their runway walk.

Even if you haven't watched the show, you've seen the cycle (season) four clip of Tyra yelling at young model Tiffany Richardson, “I was rooting for you! We were all rooting for you! How dare you!” This iconic clip was just a high-tension moment when first watching, but looking back, this was truly an aired moment of humiliation. Tyra wasn’t just the ringleader or the woman to impress; she was a bully. She was a villain.

During rewatches, what we once saw as reality TV drama, we now see was actually essentially verbal abuse. And with age, the emotional breakdowns exposed feel less like entertainment and more like real, vulnerable moments exposed and packaged for ratings. And it’s not that we as an audience have become overly sensitive; it’s that we have context now. It’s a knowledge and language about mental health, body image, and power imbalances that didn’t exist in mainstream conversation when the show first aired.

The things Tyra Banks did and said in the early 2000’s would have been brutally cancellable if they had happened in the past five years. That’s what makes the new docuseries land the way it does. It doesn’t just revisit a reality show. It revisits a cultural mood, one that viewers had already been reassessing with their more recent rewatches. With a new lens of social consciousness, viewers get to see the deep cuts of a once-beloved reality TV show. Just as we did, America’s Next Top Model got an intense Reality Check.

Have you watched the docuseries? If so, what were your thoughts, and where would you rate it on the dreck-itude meter? Leave a comment below.