Young viewers head for 'The Hills'

Here's the simplest way to think of "The Hills": It's the postmillennial "Friends."

Don't get all huffy, "Friends" fans. The appeal of both shows -- the MTV "reality" soap, which has its third season finale Monday, and the classic NBC sitcom, which went off the air in 2004 -- hinges on aspiration.

"Friends" painted a picture of post-college life that was impossibly rosy and cozy -- and yet viewers loved it because it was an aspirational fantasy. Who wouldn't want to live with one's friends across the hall, sufficient money and endless free time for coffeehouse gossip sessions?

"The Hills," which pulls in only a quarter of the typical "Friends" audience but is a monster hit by cable standards, also allows its audience to vicariously experience a worry-free existence.

A couple of weeks ago, Lauren Conrad, the star of "The Hills," decided to rent a new place. Soon the aspiring fashionista and her friends Lo and the hilariously passive Audrina were ensconced in a beautiful house in Los Angeles. Seemingly minutes later, they were throwing a tastefully lit party on their property -- which, of course, includes a spacious guest house.

No muss, no fuss, no creepy landlords or endless, sweaty trips to the moving van for these glossy twentysomethings.

Not much transpires on "The Hills," but the things that do occur happen as if by magic. Lauren and her frenemy Heidi Montag (think Barbie doll, but more fake) just happen to run into each other or an array of exes at various clubs, and Stephanie, the sister of Heidi's icky boyfriend Spencer, just happens to become pals with Lauren. You'd think Los Angeles was a tiny town in Kansas the way these shallow, uninteresting people keep careening into one another.

Over the course of three seasons, the canny, enigmatic Lauren has rarely broken a sweat, even when one of her enemies or greasy boyfriends has done something, like, really uncool.

And that's just one reason that "The Hills" irritates people older than 35. Adults know that life is harder and messier and much more expensive than the manicured dream that "The Hills" presents. And it makes some of us aging Gen Xers -- a group that made a fetish of authenticity -- mad that this gossamer froth is labeled "reality."

But why shouldn't members of Lauren's generation have their fantasy, too?

To a generation that reinvents itself daily via MySpace pages, the demarcation between "real" and "not real" must seem quaint and pointless, like churning one's own butter.

Lauren and Heidi, true children of the media age, would probably shape their lives into pleasing TV narratives whether there were cameras around or not. Having grown up on TV, they instinctively know how to work the cameras and how to create soapy drama.

Although I'm starting to understand why some obsess over "The Hills," which is full of fake tans and real Chanel bags, I can't quite understand trading Ross and Rachel for Heidi and the gag-inducing Spencer.