Let's preface this article by saying this: I haven't watched an award show on MTV in well over 10 years. Last time I tuned in it was for the MTV Movie Awards (is that even still a thing?) and that's mostly because I wanted to see the ridiculous skits between awards starring Will Ferrel or Mike Myers or whatever other SNL golden-era alum was hosting that year.
That is until I found myself accidentally watching this year's live cast of the 2019 MTV Video Music Awards (or the VMAs for the cool kids.) I say accidentally because well, it was playing on like 7 different channels at the same time so kind of hard to not accidentally tune in, and I'll admit it, I was watching Love & Hip Hop. I've addressed my love for the trashy reality show franchise in previous articles so we're not going to get into it too heavily here, but this is how the accident began so just deal with it.
This past Monday's new episode of Love & Hip Hop was moved up one hour because of the VMAs and since I love the #LHH commentary on Twitter while watching the show live, I had to adjust my schedule. Usually, after L&HH my boyfriend will promptly change the channel to something that doesn't make him perk up from reading or his phone to say "what the fuck" at various intervals and I'm fine with that, sharing the remote is actually the best thing to do for your relationship people.
On this unlikely Monday however, he got up to take a shower and left me alone on the couch to witness something I wasn't even sure was still a televised event, the VMAs. At first, I was overtaken by a sense of nostalgia for the little spaceman award and the excitement over seeing my favorite musicians singing their chart-topping hits. That excitement was promptly ended when I realized I didn't know who half of the musicians credited as "special guests" and the host was a comedian I think I've only seen in clips shared on Facebook, but still, I held out.
About 35 minutes into the award show, I realized there hadn't been much by way of awards. I thought to myself, why are all of these people here for an award show that's basically just a Taylor Swift concert? It didn't help that at this point the only award given out was for a category simply titled: Best Hip Hop. Not Best Hip Hop Artist or Best Hip Hop Album, just Best Hip Hop. I mean, don't get me wrong, Cardi B won and that was wonderful, but wherein the hell are the rest of the awards?
I continued to watch for longer than I should have and while I was riveted by performances from Hip Hop legend Missy Elliot and my fave newcomer Lizzo, I was still baffled I was nearly 2 hours into an "award" show that had only given out 3 awards so far.
Maybe I missed the slow decay of the psuedo-integrity I thought the VMAs once had or maybe they've always been this terrible? I wish I knew. If you're a tried and true fan of the VMAs and are angry about my utter bewilderment, I'm not sure what to tell you. Other than that I'm sorry you enjoy watching an over-produced benefit concert for the once epic music channel currently on life-support.
