The cast of The Real World: Brooklyn moved into the Red Hook district to start filming the show in August and have been roundly reviled by the community ever since.  As an avid fan of the show, I chalked it up to Brooklyn-hipster snobiness and thought little of it.  But when the cast started doing press last month and actively whinging about people not liking them, I started to suspect there might be something special about this group.  Could the producers have actually found the most frustrating people yet?  The show premiered Wednesday night and the answer, miraculously, is yes.

The ingredients of a satisfying season of The Real World?  Arrogance, ignorance, promiscuity, absurdly conflicting values, stunt casting, and tons and tons of drinking.  This crew has it all.  Mormon-virgin-probably-closet-homosexual Chet opens the show with, “I thought Brooklyn was a place you don’t want to end up,” and the hits just keep on coming.  Ryan, the Iraq vet-songwriter with a burgeoning drinking problem tries to goad transgendered Katelynn into confessing her special secret.  Devyn (Miss Teen America 2005) looks on lustily as Scott (winner of “best abs on the East Coast”) tells his new friends about his ambition to get into “the modeling and acting thing.”   Then they go out and play stickball.

On top of the stellar casting and painfully awkward location, they’ve also brought a couple of new wrinkles to the formula for season 21.  There are eight housemates this time around instead of seven (that’s 14% more angst!) and they have no job to get in the way of getting drunk and making out with each other.  We’re not yet sure who the racist in the house is, and we’re waiting on a pregnancy scare, but these are early days.  And the future’s looking bright in Brooklyn.