I have a confession.

In 2020, about halfway through Locky Gilbert's season ofThe Bachelor ,I lost my love of reality TV.

I know this may not sound like a huge "confession" given a good chunk of the population have become increasingly disenfranchised with the hetero-normative, white-centric portrayal of "love" and all the other 'fun things' that come with the genre, but with a job that largely compromises of writing up juicy reality TV stories, this isn't great for my career.

The parodies are great though. I mean:

I tried. I really did.

But, with all exceptions to Junior Masterchef, I found myself frustrated and bitchy at the end of any reality show I tried to endure.

I know the usual narrative, and I'm tired of it.

But I'll tell ya what doesn't fit the usual narrative?

The Amazing Race Australia.

What. A. Show.

Maybe you clicked on this article because you agree with my conclusion thatThe Amazing Race Australiais exactly the TV show we need right now.

Or maybe you clicked on it because you're looking to be convinced, in which case, read on, friend. Read on either way actually, because we have lots to discuss.

Armed with a fairly large distrust of reality TV and skepticism for its revival, I sat down to watch the first episode ofThe Amazing Racewith little expectations, and needless to say it surpassed them all.

I don't know much about the history of reality television, but I can imagine its original entertainment value came from exposing audiences to a whole bunch of different people and places.

Well, that's reallyThe Amazing Racein a nutshell.

In summary,The Amazing Racefollows 14 teams as they travel across the world working out challenges as fast as possible, competing for a $250,000 prize.

But the world is shut... of course.

So this year pairs of friends, exes, parents, cousins, brothers and twins are travelling across Australia instead.

That means we get to see Aussies getting to know their country, and I'm getting second hand travel!

It's a win-win.

For the first time in a good while, we're seeing people of all ages and ethnicities on screen.

Like the Kimberly Cousins - hello, did you SEE Dwes talking about his sexuality? Eye-opening!

There's the Super Sikh's giving us an insight into Australian-Sikh culture.