Novaya Realnost

Dendy: The New Reality (Денди — Новая Реальность, Dendi - Novaya Realnost) is a Russian children's television program, hosted by Sergei Suponev, that ran from 1994 to 1996 and mainly focused on video games that were released for 8-bit and 16-bit consoles.

History

In 1992, a Russian IT company named “Steepler” began selling the Dendy, a famiclone assembled in Taiwan from Chinese parts, and ran a marketing campaign that included the Video-Ace Dendy gaming magazine. Marketers began throwing around the idea of having a children's TV show too and the only logical candidate at the time was Suponev, an icon of children's television in Russia and the late Soviet Union.

The first season aired on 2x2 at 11:10am on Saturdays with reruns at 3:40pm on Fridays and 33 episodes were produced by “Sorec-Video” (Сорек-Видео), airing between September 17, 1994 and April 29, 1995. It went over games for the Dendy and Sega Mega Drive, then later included the Super Nintendo and Game Boy as well. The show once had a contract with Nintendo at one point, but it didn't last long.

Around 1995, Suponev had became the director of children's television on ORT since it was hard to work with two channels and he had more projects with them. The second season moved to ORT as well, where it would rebrand to The New Reality (Новая Реальность, Novaya Realnost). It aired 4:35pm on Fridays, then moved to 3:40pm on Fridays, and these 30 episodes were produced by “Class!” (Класс!) instead.

The episodes aired between June 16, 1995 and January 19, 1996, but it had a harsh run on ORT since the time slot wasn't ideal for the target audience and the network was stingy with advertising. Eventually, they must've realized that the show was running out of topics, as “Steepler” had financial difficulties in 1996. When the season ended, reruns would air until the show disappeared off the channel.

List of Episodes

Unfortunately, I don't have the energy to translate this list into English. There's an attempt on the Bootleg Games Wiki, but it's incomplete.

Season 1

Episode	Original air date
01	1994-09-17
02	1994-09-24
03	1994-10-01
04	1994-10-08
05	1994-10-15
06	1994-10-22
07	1994-10-29
08	1994-11-05
09	1994-11-12
10	1994-11-19
11	1994-11-26
12	1994-12-03
13	1994-12-10
14	1994-12-17
15	1994-12-24
16	1994-12-31
17	1995-01-07
18	1995-01-14
19	1995-01-21
20	1995-01-28
21	1995-02-04
22	1995-02-11
23	1995-02-18
24	1995-02-25
25	1995-03-04
26	1995-03-11
27	1995-03-18
28	1995-03-25
29	1995-04-01
30	1995-04-08
31	1995-04-15
32	1995-04-22
33	1995-04-29

Season 2

Episode	Original air date
01	1995-XX-XX
02	1995-XX-XX
03	1995-06-30
04	1995-07-07
05	1995-07-14
06	1995-07-21
07	1995-07-28
08	1995-08-04
09	1995-08-11
10	1995-08-18
11	1995-08-25
12	1995-09-01
13	1995-XX-XX
14	1995-09-15
15	1995-09-22
16	1995-09-29
17	1995-10-06
18	1995-10-13
19	1995-10-20
20	1995-10-27
21	1995-11-03
22	1995-11-10
23	1995-11-17
24	1995-11-24
25	1995-12-01
26	1995-12-08
27	1995-12-15
28	1995-12-22
29	1996-01-XX

Successor

In some markets, The New Reality was succeeded by Dendy World (Мир Денди, Mir Dendi) which aired on MTK¹⁾ on Saturday evenings, but the show was hosted by Semyon Furman (Семён Фурман) and Andrey Gvozdev (Андрей Гвоздёв) since Suponev had a contract with ORT. Suponev did make a guest appearance, but without him hosting, the show's ratings were generally low and it didn't last long.

External links

Dendy: The New Reality on Bootleg Games Wiki [EN]
Dendy: The New Reality on Wikipedia [RU]
Dendy: The New Reality on GameWiki [RU]
Dendy: The New Reality on Suponev [RU]

¹⁾

“MTK” is an abbreviation that stands for “Moscow Television Channel” (Московский телевизионный канал, Moskovskiy televizionnyy kanal) and the channel was replaced by TV Centre in 1997.

Nameless Rumia's Wiki

Table of Contents