There was probably a time when I would have said that a series about people bidding on lost luggage was a waste of anyone’s time. If such a time were to exist, it would surely be at some point before I became addicted to A&E’s Storage Wars. As it turns out out, watching people bid on mystery-boxes is really fun. “Yeeeeehp!”
It isn’t A&E that’s giving us Luggage Wars, although I’m curious to know if the network will take issue with the obvious similarities between the title of this new pilot, and their popular unscripted series Storage Wars. For those of you who have yet to come upon this gem of a series, Storage Wars follows a group of people, a few of which are consignment shop owners, who bid on storage units, which have gone up for auction when their renters failed to keep up with the payments. While they’re not allowed to enter the unit or touch anything within reach of the open door, they can speculate on the value of the items inside and bid (or not bid) accordingly. After the bidding is through, we get to see what kind of loot (or junk) they acquired.
According to Deadline, Spike TV has ordered a pilot called Luggage Wars, which from the sound of it, is set up similarly to Storage Wars, except instead of bidding on storage units, people are bidding on unclaimed luggage. As they’re only allowed to eyeball the luggage, these “baggage bidders” use night-vision goggles, metal detectors and handheld ultrasounds to better help them determine if there’s anything good inside, or if they’re getting a suitcase full of maps, receipts and dirty laundry.
The series is being put together by Gurney Productions, which is behind Spike TV’s Auction Hunters. Whether it goes to series and proves to be as strangely addictive as Storage Wars remains to be seen.
