Video Gallery: 3 Fear Factor Fails And 1 Win

Before we wasted hours on the catty Real Housewives, there was a different kind of reality show we got our thrills from: NBC‘s Fear Factor, where normal folks face their fears of heights, mutilation, and squirmy insects for cash prizes. Season 7 premieres tonight, promising helicopters carrying people over huge explosions. No, really:

The tagline is “You’re welcome, America,” but really we should be thanking them for what looks to be a badass season.

But first, let’s reminisce on the Fear Factor challenges of years past, especially the ones where the contestants fell just short of greatness. Hey, we’re not judging—we probably couldn’t do any of these stunts. That said, it still makes us laugh to watch contestants who go into challenges with such bravado and end up squealing like little girls.

Boat Jump

So short, yet so sweet. You can tell that this guy was thinking really hard about the timing of when to jump and then screwed it up by a second and had no choice but to go with it and get whacked in the face. That, or the camera crew on the other boat told him when to jump and intentionally fucked with him.

Stunt Driving Fail

I don’t know why this guy blows up at his partner. Having had no context, I thought that he didn’t even know the stunt was about to happen and the point was to scare him. Instead, his wife/girlfriend/sister/co-worker isn’t very good at driving under trucks and failed to make the stunt in less time than the prior team.

Still, his screams of frustration and terror are pretty golden.

Fear Factor Live Gone Wrong

If the edited show has its fails, then you know that the live version from Universal Studios will have a few hiccups. And yes, I went with that choice of words even after watching this video. The best part is the YouTuber who uploaded it: She thought a front-row seat to the show would be exciting, not cause for new clothes.

But it’s not all bad! Most of the time the contestants come through; as Shakespeare would say, they “screw their courage to the sticking place” and chug that rotten milk/make that jump/shave all their hair off so they look like a four-year-old’s Barbie doll after a fight with scissors. Oh, yes.

The Haircut

Poor Blair keeps reminding herself why she’s agreed to get her hair shaved into a series of patches: She’s doing this for $25,000, not because she’s a rebellious teenager trying to stick it to her parents. But you can see her horror as she reaches her hand up to feel the bald patches. And then there’s that random bitch who tries to upset them by saying she’ll win the $50,000 in the next challenge… even though she didn’t have the balls to get her head shaved at this stage of the game. Thank God Joe Rogan totally undermines her.

Fear Factor premieres tonight at 8 p.m. EST on NBC.