The social media rave that greeted the announcement of the return of the Gulder Ultimate Search reality TV show earlier in the month is a testament to the fact that Nigerians hold the show dearly to heart. It has been seven years since the last show took place, yet, many remember it like it was yesterday.
In the period when the show was off-air, many Nigerians would make reference to it, pointing out how much they missed it and wish it would come back. When a return was announced, organisers said they got more than 48,000 applications. The application website crashed as a result of the expected but overwhelming activities on the server. Social media and offline conversation around the return of the show has also continued to grow – reaching over — people in three days, according to analytics company PlaqadIQ.
The early 2000s ushered in several reality shows in Nigeria, a country full of diverse talents and an engaged consumer audience. From the weekly “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” to Big Brother Naija and the music-oriented Project Fame, Maltina Dance Hall, Star Quest, and Nigerian Idol, that period marked an important point in the transformation of home entertainment in a country of 200 million citizens
Some of these shows have since gone off the air around the same period the Gulder Ultimate Search did. Yet, they have not enjoyed the sort of clamour for their return as the latter has.
Gulder Ultimate Search enjoys a cult following because it presents a combination of fantastic and realistic elements woven to present the Nigerian trials and travails seasoned with hard work and tenacity that ultimately leads to the discovery of a treasure. The contestants become a sort of combination of heroes and villains who have to work hard, plan, strategise, and defeat their adversary in order to be the winner. It is the ultimate survival of the fittest.
For the younger audience, Gulder Ultimate Search may be considered a representation of that fantasy of searching for treasure on an island or forest battling imaginary monsters as a sort of superhero. To adults, the show may be perceived as a metaphor for human endurance through life sustained by the promise of success at the end.
As a show, Gulder Ultimate Search is pure entertainment. Participants are given different tasks regularly. Those who succeed extend their stay in the forest, while those unable to may be asked to leave. These tasks test the limit of their physical, intellectual and social abilities. Sometimes, the ability to work together in a team is the goal. Other times, particularly towards the later part, the individual capability to push to the limit of endurance is required to climb up the ladder.
Gulder Ultimate Search is similar to the American reality show “Survivor”, where participants are taken to a remote place and have to compete against each other for more than a month until a winner emerges. The iconic series has had 40 seasons and is considered the number one reality show in the US, and continues to influence pop culture.
As Allison Herman puts it, “Survivor is so integrated into the fabric of American culture it’s become an extension of the society it helped to shape. You can’t talk about America without talking about television; you can’t talk about television without talking about reality, which long ago crossed over from novelty to fact of life; and you can’t talk about reality without talking about Survivor, which showed how much resonance and profit there was to be found in the field. Imitators were inevitable and arrived in such numbers that they now make up a substantial share of modern-day programming.”
Although Gulder Ultimate Search has not had forty episodes yet, nor has it averaged seven million average viewers per episode, its followership based on reviews and reactions shows it is on its way to being one of the most-watched reality shows in Nigeria. And now that a new, revamped season is upon us, pundits say we should expect an unprecedented impact seeing this is the first time a social media generation would have the opportunity of engaging with the show, real time. We can’t wait.
