There's nothing subtle about the title of TLC's new "live and learn" series that takes a "Supernanny" approach to what's essentially a diet makeover show. It's called "Honey We're Killing the Kids."

	Melanie and Rocky Rickard of Forest Hills with images of their children on the TLC reality show "Honey, We're Killing the Kids." Click photo for larger image.

Each week wooden and almost life-like nutritionist Lisa Hark (a dead-ringer for Dr. Melfi on "The Sopranos") shows parents pictures of what their children might look like at age 40 through the use of computer modeling, supposedly based on their current lifestyle and eating habits. Inevitably, the kids end up looking as terrible as possible.

"Parents have lost control," Hark says in the premiere at 9 tonight. "Children are running the show. The tougher I am, the further they will come in terms of behavior change."

Week after week, it seems as if "Honey" will be the same show: Families with bad habits get instruction on how to reform, Hark harps on them, they make some strides, the end.

In next Monday's episode, Hark comes to Pittsburgh to help the Rickard family of Forest Hills. Mom and dad (Melanie and Rocky) are smokers. Anthony, 12, and Stevie, 8, play video games, get no exercise and eat too much junk food.

"I must warn you, you may not like what you're going to see," Hark tells the Rickards before showing what the kids may look like in the future. The children age into what resemble criminal mug shots.

"That's not my Stevie," Melanie says. "His hair's yucky."

"By allowing them to live that lifestyle, you are killing your kids," Hark scolds. "I predict that unless things change dramatically, they will not reach 60."

Cue: Scary drumbeat, worried faces on the parents.

Hark visits the Rickard home once weekly for three weeks and lays down the law each time. First up: The parents must quit smoking, the kids need to spend less time playing video games, and everyone should eat more healthful food.

The show sets the Rickards up for failure by substituting squid for pizza. It doesn't take a degree in child psychology to know that drastic of a change is unlikely to succeed.

"Dinner was just disgusting," Anthony complains. "I'll bet dog poop is better."

The Rickards go shopping in the Strip, have dinner out at a local restaurant and get penalized for spending their weekends watching the Steelers on TV. They have to atone by spending time in the woods.

By the end of the hour, not every problem is solved. While Melanie has quit smoking, Rocky has not. More important from the show's perspective, the children seem to be more active and eating more healthful food.

The most disingenuous feature in "Honey We're Killing the Kids" is that after the family reforms its wicked ways, Hark shows the children aging into their futures, and this time they look much less like scuzzy slackers. They're even better dressed!

"Honey We're Killing the Kids" certainly sets desirable goals, but I couldn't help but think that it contributes to the problem. It's one thing for adults to consent to make fools of themselves on reality TV, but for parents to make that decision for their children -- isn't that potentially harmful?

Reality of reality TV

Don't think such concerns haven't crossed the mind of Melanie Rickard.

"I am worried for the kids," she said last week. "Anthony is very well-liked in school, and he has a lot of friends, but there are still people who will say, 'Hey fatso, I saw you on TV. I always knew you were a slob.' I think that's what he's afraid of."

Melanie said she signed the family up for the series after coming across a pitch on the Internet looking for families with worries about their children's health. With diabetes, heart disease and cancer in their family history, shethought the show might offer a good opportunity to improve their health through lifestyle changes. She had no idea she'd be shown pictures of her children morphing through computer aging into what even she said resembled child molesters.

"The first time I saw the pictures, I basically freaked out," Melanie said. "I felt like I was tricked into it. They made the kids look dirty and scraggly. Just because you're overweight doesn't mean you're dirty or scraggly or have no job."

She also objected to the insertion of tattoos on the boys in the "before" morphing shots.

"Not everybody who has a tattoo is a bad person or doesn't take care of themselves," Melanie said. "I have five of them."

She told Hark that she felt blindsided and was told, "You're the one who signed up for this show."

"But I didn't sign up to be treated like that," Melanie Rickard said. "I was so mad that day."

At a January news conference in Pasadena, Calif., Hark defended the morphing.

"We use these images to help motivate the families," she said. "Initially they're very saddened, but they accept responsibility, for the most part."

"Honey" executive producer Julie Rose McCully said the show doesn't aim to make children look bad.

"I don't think we ever want to portray anyone as a child molester," she said. "But if they continue what they're doing, they won't look all neat and pretty."

Before filming began, families were invited to a photo shoot and asked to bring casual clothes and "church" clothes. The casual clothes were used for the "before" morphing shots while the dressier clothes were used in the "after" pictures.

Melanie Rickard was also upset to see online that her family's episode has been titled "Battle of the Bulge."

"I broke out in tears," she said. "All of America will wonder, 'Who are these fat people?' I was just beside myself. They took it and did what they wanted with it."

Melanie, who said she was initially told she would be allowed to see the completed program before it aired, has now been told she can't preview it.

Though the program presents the Rickard children as video-game players who rarely see the light of day, Melanie said the boys are constantly playing team sports.

"We just finished basketball, and now we have baseball practice," she said.

Melanie said most of the family's health improvements were temporary, although she hasn't started smoking again. Despite some of her concerns, she doesn't regret her family's participation -- so far.

"It was a good experience," she said. "We learned a lot. We got to do things we never would have done before."

'I wouldn't do it again'

Phil and Anita Wobrak of Aliquippa will be featured on a yet-to-be-scheduled "Honey" episode with their children, Tia, 10, and Autumn, 9. Anita is not happy about the experience, despite the show's leading to her husband quitting smoking and one daughter becoming less of a picky eater.

"We were lied to from the very beginning," Anita said last week. "They said it was more of a documentary-type thing to help your children. We told them we didn't want to get into a 'Wife Swap' kind of thing, a garbage-type show. They guaranteed us it wasn't like that. It was garbage."

Anita said she'd been watching her weight for two years before filming last fall, losing 80 pounds.

"They put us in the studio in New York and the nutritionist didn't bring up anything about me losing weight," Anita said. "One producer we had thrown out of our house because he was mean. He scared our kids and tried to cause confrontations all the time. I wouldn't do it again; I wouldn't recommend it to my worst enemy."

McCully, the show's executive producer, said conflict between producers and participants happens "almost never," but she acknowledged, "It's hard on a lot of families. It's not easy to have a camera crew follow you around, especially when the family has agreed to change their lifestyle and do things out of their comfort zone."

Like Melanie Rickard, Anita Wobrak said she ended up getting her family on the show after surfing the Internet and finding an application. Neither family was paid for their participation, but the Rickards did get to keep a few pieces of exercise equipment.

Like the Rickards, Anita said she was asked to prepare food her picky children would not eat (couscous one night, squid another).

McCully said the show tried to shake people out of their routines by getting them to try more healthful foods.

"If you expose a child [to a new food] 10 times, by the 10th time, they will eat it," McCully said.

Wobrak said she was also asked to do or say things a second time if the cameras failed to capture it the first go-around.

"I don't think we ever manipulate them or ask them to say something they don't say," McCully said. "Oftentimes [retakes are] done because the camera wasn't in the right place."

Through a TLC publicist, a series producer said the Wobraks couldn't have had that bad of an experience because they did complete the show, including a trip to New York after filming in their home for taping their reaction to the "after" morphing pictures.

Anita Wobrak said she tried to quit the show many times, often at the urging of her husband, who questioned the show's stated goals -- especially after learning the show's title -- which they were not told when they signed on.

"They said, 'Oh, we're just calling it that to get people to watch the show, we're doing it for ratings, there's no meaning behind it,' " Wobrak said. "I was very gullible. My husband could see through things, but I saw it was a chance to be on TV. Red flags should have come up, but I thought, TLC, that's a good station, what could go wrong? They gave us a bunch of bull to get us on the show. It's not about helping the kids, it's helping TLC or whoever the producers of the show are."

The moral of the story? Agree to participate in a reality show at your own (and your children's) risk.