Undercover Boss

The personalities are so appealing, and the jobs are so humbling, that this would have been a great one-shot documentary. Can they keep up the impact week after week? Or will we suffer from empathy fatigue sooner rather than later?

Undercover Boss isn't spectacular TV. But its real appeal lies in the exercise itself: watching a CEO meet actual workers and realize they work hard at jobs often made harder by petty rules and policies.

Watching home-office stiffs bomb in the real world is part of the fun of this reality show. [27 Jan 2012, p.68]

Undercover presents a wonderful tribute to the working man and woman. Middle managers are the villains here, sitting at desks and docking workers for clocking in late at lunch. The hour ends with the predictable reveal.

I want to root for a reality series that uplifts, but for this one to work, it either needs to be more fun or more real. [15 Feb 2010, p.43]

Instead of being uplifting, Boss feels opportunistic and condescending in a way that something like Dirty Jobs never does.

What we get instead is a hollow catharsis for a nation already strung out on the futility of resenting those who occupy CEO suites.