11. Mob Wives
What it is: Akin to the Housewives franchise, Mob Wives features women who were married, or closely related to, “connected men” in New York City. Just like all the other shows featuring middle-aged women drinking and fighting with each other, it had very little substance but a lot of salacious drama.
The yuck factor: No more than anything Bravo is doing. The only gross thing about this show is the criminal element. Some of the cast’s husbands served time for mob-related crimes, and there was even a daughter of a boss flitting around. Of course, we weren’t privy to any of the interworkings of “family life,” but man, did we see a lot of extreme cursing and hair pulling. These women went all in, and they didn’t not back down.
The show capitalized on the American fascination with organized crime, except it didn’t really deliver. It was mob adjacent at best, and we didn’t get any real scoop on the goings-on the men. The women, knowing how to serve up what we want, talked and acted like gangsters, but in the end, it was just more mob-lite than it was anything else.
Where and how: There are six full seasons of this show, and all are available on VH1’s website. It even has a spin-off, Mob Wives Chicago.