Well I stumbled across this thread one day, having never seen any season of TUF, and I started watching. It has certainly been interesting, but this last episode, #6, I feel they went too far with the drama vibe.
That douchebag Noah gets a letter implying his girlfriend thinks he is cheating on her, and thus he decides to pack his bags and quit.
First of all, I thought he guys were supposed to be cut off from contact, how the hell does that letter make it to him. More over, how does a letter like that in a big manilla envelope make its way to him. I am sure they have emergency contact info for everyone, so the producers had to know it was not a serious situation. I think this was all done intentionally to create drama, and make it more reality series-esque. That letter should have never made its way to him, but someone in charge intentionally made sure it did so that some "interesting" situation would manifest itself. I don't know about you guys, but there was no fight that episode and that annoyed the **** out of me.
Rogue Drone, I agree that the first season seemed a lot more serious. After the last TUF 3 episode I decided to see if I could find one from Season one. Sure enough the fighters and general atmosphere seems to be more focused on MMA and less on drama. Don't get me wrong, this latest season is still entertaining, but I hope they can keep it on track.