The Real World (1992-1994)

The Real World is the grandfather of all reality TV shows, point blank period. MTV's The Real World blasted onto our TV sets in the early 90s and promised to show us exactly what happened when strangers living together in one house stopped being nice and started getting real. And, OH, how they got real. Ever since 1992's first season in New York City where Black and white castmates confronted each other on race and gay castmates challenged their straight counterparts, this show has been teaching lessons to both the people getting drunk under one beautiful roof and to all of us watching. The show has given us so many iconic moments from "the slap heard 'round the world" to the etiquette of reading your housemate's mail (don't do it - thank you for the lesson, Real World) to the eviction of Puck to the introduction of Mormon Julie in New Orleans and to all of the crazy twists and turns in later seasons (does anyone else remember The Real World: Skeletons, when they brought back "skeletons" from cast members' past, likes exes or family members that they had beef with? Oh, the drama!). One of the most important seasons of The Real World was San Francisco when the entire world was introduced to openly gay and HIV-positive cast member Pedro Zamora. Pedro had a relationship with Sean Sasser on the show that was heavily depicted and the hot young men even had TV's first-ever commitment ceremony. Sadly, Pedro passed away soon after the show aired, but his legacy lives on - and THAT'S real!