Stream It Or Skip It: ‘The Ultimate Surfer’ on ABC, Where Waxheads Compete On The Wave And With Each Other

The Ultimate Surfer (ABC) is a competitive reality-style outing that pits 14 seasoned surfers’ prodigious talents on the wave against their skills in alliance-building and interpersonal drama-phoning — you know, that connective tissue of the reality genre that a show’s central conceit hangs on. Here, that conceit is surfing, and all the thrills and spills that entails; the winners take home a stack of cash and a chance to compete on the World Surf League circuit. 

THE ULTIMATE SURFER: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: “Kelly Slater has conquered every wave on the planet” — cue footage of Slater, the 11-time world champion, crushing waves in Oahu, Hossegor, France, and Teahupo’o, Tahiti and raising trophies on various podiums — “but now he’s built the perfect wave…”

The Gist: That perfect wave is the centerpiece of Surf Ranch, a private facility 100 miles inland from the Pacific Ocean that Slater and a team of engineers built as a kind of test track or laboratory for surfing. The six foot wave is artificially generated in a massive, 700-yard pool, complete with lip lines for carving and barrels to hang loose through; accompanying cameras and sensors track data on surf runs, making the arena at surf ranch an alluring, eye-popping mix of science and surfing derring-do. And it’s also a site tailor made to host a reality show featuring a bunch of surfers high on their own talent supply and vying for two top spots. The winners, one male and one female, receive $100,000 each. But it’s clear from the get-go that they’re more interested in the other carrot for the victors of Ultimate Surfer: wild card entry into three stops on the World Surf League tour.

As we meet a few of the competitors — 26-year-old Hawaaian Zeke Lau, a pro since he was 15, is seen by everyone and himself as the one to beat; Malia Ward, a 22-year-old Californian, is the talented daughter of veteran pro surfer Chris Ward — we also encounter host and ABC/ESPN/Disney regular Jesse Palmer, who corrals the 14 competitors in the airy, kitschy lounge to explain the rules of the game, which boil down to beach battling skills competitions and head-to-head bouts on the surf ranch’s glistening artificial wave. Teams of two will form, be broken apart, and reconstitute until only two surfers are left standing on their boards. Halfway through the first episode, Kelly Slater appears via videoconference, and the response is one of being in the presence of royalty. He warns the competitors about his facility’s main attraction. “It goes a lot faster than the typical six-foot wave in the ocean,” Slater says. “So make sure you pace the wave out right.”

Who will win out? Well, there’s no shortage of self-assuredness here, either in the water or out of it. “Right after I started competing I started winning all types of events,” 33-year-old Floridian Anastasia Ashley says. “I’ve traveled the world competing, modeling; other surfers have been really jealous of me, and I don’t blame them.” Ultimate Surfer is stoked to put its power carves up against some serious power trips.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The presence of Palmer as host elicits hushed references by the surfers to his football career, but many also admit to recognizing him mostly from The Bachelor. Palmer’s hosting duties on the short lived ABC reality dating show The Proposal come to mind, too, and The Ultimate Surfer was probably wise to cast actual surfers with a wealth of experience, since the water was a little too wet for Antonio Sabato, Jr. Alexandra Paul, and Jenni “Jwoww” Farley on the 2013 reality special Stars in Danger: The High Dive.

Our Take: If you caught any of the shortboard surfing heat action at this summer’s Tokyo Olympics, where the event entered medal competition for the first time, you’ll recognize the inherent thrill of what Ultimate Surfer is presenting with its challenges. The skill sets of these athletes are visceral and compelling as they turn huge carves on the lip of a wave, fling spray into the air and stitch together snap turn combinations before ducking into the hollow barrel section of the wave. And it’s easy to hang on the moment with the other competitors as they watch from the lounge adjacent to the wave pool, their utterances of “Gnarly!” and “Sick!” lending the sport’s built-in slang to what we’re seeing at home. It’s that singular evening factor of human versus wave — go big or go home, as they say — that will undoubtedly keep things interesting as Ultimate Surfer winds its way toward the competitive reality finish line.

It wouldn’t be a reality show, however, without the drama component, and Ultimate is already turning the screw, pairing up rivals as roommates in the surf ranch’s little community of Airstream trailers and featuring cutaway interviews full of self-confidence by the wagon load and boasts blended with surf culture nonchalance. That inherent cockiness creates a choppy, jocular locker room vibe to the head-to-head moments, as these people look for ways to let their board skills and competitive spirit win out, but some of it rings a little hollow in the more pat, built-for-TV group moments, like in a game of spin the bottle designed to pick surfing partners, or in some of the edited crosstalk. Still, there’s more than enough here to keep Ultimate Surfer on task as a competitive reality show with a truly athletic outcome in mind, and it’s probably safe to assume that the swaggering personalities of these surfers are just what the show’s creators wanted to harness, beyond their talents on the wave.

Sex and Skin: Nope, but the prevailing wardrobe here is two-piece suits and board shorts.

Parting Shot: As they depart in slow motion, surfboards under their arms, Ultimate Surfer cuts to an interview with one of the “we hardly knew ye” competitors cut after the first challenge. “I’m gonna leave this place better than I came. I’m gonna go home, train harder, be better, and this will not be the last you see of Kayla Durden.”

Sleeper Star: The sleeper star here has to be the Kelly Slater Wave Company’s facility in Lemoore, Calif, an engineering marvel that utilizes a moving hydrofoil across 700 yards of water to produce an eminently repeatable wave backed with 100,000 pounds of pressure to emulate prime surfing conditions. Put more simply by the Ultimate Surfer announcer, it’s “a wave that’s six feet and glassy every single time.”

Most Pilot-y Line: “These competitors have left their local lineup for their big break,” the announcer says, and it’s a sublime combination of surfer speak and reality show aspiration that can only compete with one surfer, referring to the upcoming first challenge, saying she’s “gotta go big or go home.” The lingo writes itself!

Our Call: STREAM IT. At its core, The Ultimate Surfer is, smartly, all about huge tricks and big moments on the wave. But there’s enough of that other stuff, too, the cattiness and clashes of confidence, to keep its reality side afloat, too.

Johnny Loftus is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift. Follow him on Twitter: @glennganges

Stream The Ultimate Surfer on ABC