#9 – The Real Housewives Series
The Real Housewives franchise started out with The Real Housewives of Orange County in 2006, and has since expanded to follow the lives of Real Housewives in Atlanta, New York, Beverly Hills, Miami, Washington, D.C., and even New Jersey. These women spend their days shopping, socialising, and generally being glamorous amid a haze of drama, confrontations, and the occasional thrown prosthetic limb. It’s apparently quite stressful being a Real Housewife. Fortunately this is what the show’s creators were going for: the series was reportedly inspired by hit drama Desperate Housewives.
The show has been a huge hit, and the participants have helped things along by regularly tweeting about their antics. It has also been syndicated internationally, and there are now shows set in Athens, Vancouver, and even Cheshire among others.