• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, January 23, 2015

With so many eligible candidates to choose from, it really isn’t possible to declare any single show as the “worst” one currently on the air.

But it is still possible to come upon a show that strikes you as so appalling that you might wonder if you have indeed stumbled at long last upon the show that when all is said and done could be the "worst" one on TV.

Consider this show called “Little Women: LA,” which started its second season on Lifetime earlier this month (airing Wednesday nights at 9 Eastern). It’s an “unscripted” show about six dwarves (not seven, fortunately) -- all women, of course -- who live in Los Angeles. 

They are supposedly friends. They socialize, they argue, and they share experiences that they have in common.

Fair enough. And please let it be said that there is nothing particularly wrong with putting on a TV show about the lives of dwarves. TLC’s “Little Couple,” for example, manages somehow to be a show in which the dwarf participants maintain their dignity and personal integrity.

However, the cynic inside me can’t help but think that such shows are put on TV because they have an ability to arrest a potential viewer in the act of grazing through a typical evening’s cable TV offerings. For many, the temptation to stop grazing, at least momentarily, at the sight of six dwarf women taking instruction on how to dance “sexy” (as they did in the season premiere a few weeks ago) might seem irresistible. Some grazers might even consider sticking around to gape at this spectacle, though this is not recommended.

Judging from what the participants on “Little Women: LA” have to say about their lifestyles, this show would have you believe that it has been conceived to raise the profile of little people and change perceptions that many of us might have about the lives they lead. “The six of us are a typical group of girlfriends, except we’re all little people,” one of them said in the season premiere a few weeks ago.

What I have learned from the show is that when it comes to reality television, little people -- or more specifically, the six little women on this show -- are as desperate for attention as any other ensemble of reality-show participants -- be they bachelorettes or “Real Housewives” -- and they will do or say almost anything to get it.

“I’m Elena and I’m a Russian bombshell,” says one. “I may be small, but I’m large and in charge!” declares another. “Just because we’re little [it] doesn’t mean we can’t rock it!” another informs us.

“When it comes to dancing, there’s no beatin’ this ass!” says one of the “Little Women,” an “entertainer” named Terra who, we learn, does a Britney Spears character she calls “Little Britney.”

We also learn that it’s difficult for dwarves to do sit-ups and dwarf men have a propensity to snore.

“I’m a dwarf -- I snore!” says dwarf Todd, boyfriend of one of the women, Christy, when she complains about his nighttime nasal noise. 

“You’re the loudest Hobbit I’ve ever heard!” she replies (with notable humor, I might add).

Later in the same episode, Todd and Christy were seen in a furniture store shopping for a coffee table, and Christy decided to flop around on the top of one table using some moves she apparently learned in sexy-dancing class as dumbstruck furniture-store staffers stared at her with open mouths.

Their reaction was understandable. It’s the same expression you will adopt if you happen to encounter this show while idly grazing with your remote control some evening. Does that reaction make this TV’s worst show? Not necessarily, but “Little Women: LA” comes close.

“Little Women: LA” airs Wednesday nights at 9 Eastern on Lifetime.