When it was on the air, Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction was one of my favorite shows. Not because it was particularly well-made, but because it was one of the most ridiculous shows on television. Each episode contained five short vignettes that were your standard supernatural crap that’s a staple of half of those mentally challenged “documentaries” on the History, Travel, and Learning Channels. Junk like “Guy goes to Vegas and hears the voice of his dead grandfather tell him to put all his money on hard eight” or “Family moves cross country, but forgets the dog. One month later, the dog shows up.”

The amateurish production was fun in an MST3K way, but the real treat was the show’s premise. On Beyond Belief, half of the stories were “fact” and the other were “fiction”. At the end of each episode, the host revealed which stories were fake and which where based on unreliable legends or news reports (and were most likely also fake). Not only did this make for the most perfect televised drinking game ever (aside from the spelling bee and presidential debates), but the host segments were hilarious.

Y’see, the brilliance of Beyond Belief was that the host’s only job was to reiterate the show’s already simple premise 6-7 times during each episode. For people too dim to realize the point of the show based on its title or opening, the host ended each segment by rephrasing the show’s concept. “Did this really happen….or is it something from the imagination of our writers?” the host would tease with a well-worn smirk. “Was this just another tall tale or did these events unfold as you saw them?” “Could this possibly be true? Or are we just pulling you leg?” “Can this story really be the figment of an overactive imagination…or did you just see something that actually happened?”

I don’t know whatever happened to the people behind that show, but here’s hoping they all became liberal bloggers. There are only so many ways you can point out that Joe Lieberman totally sucks.