FIGHT FANS: This is both a review and a wrap-up. There are spoilers and they are gruesome.

Kimbo Slice is the perfect representative of the latest season of the Spike TV reality show The Ultimate Fighter. He has the chiseled torso of a young athlete but the world-weary countenance of a man much older than his reported 35 years. If Slice, whose real name is Kevin Ferguson, were from theatrical pro wrestling instead of competitive martial arts, he’s be referred to derisively as a “back yarder.” His reputation has been earned through bare-knuckled brawls in Florida parking lots and boatyards. While his fights resemble something out of the Great Depression, the millions of YouTube views they have garnered place the brutality solidly in the 21st Century. For Slice, the chance to earn a UFC contract through the rigors of weekly reality show competition represent the rough-hewn street fighter’s last, best chance to compete legitimately at the top of his chosen profession.

With the tagline “Size Does Matter,” the UFC is hyping the tenth season of its testosterone-fueled cable hit around its collection of heavyweights, but maybe the show’s publicists should have added the rejoinder, “and so does experience.” In addition to the hard-living Slice, Season 10 sports three martial artists who have previously fought in the “Octagon” and four former NFL players. Since 2005, TUF (as the show is commonly called) has focused young up-and-comers looking to grapple their way out of whatever dusty burg they hail from. In contrast, Season 10’s combatants have the back-stories filled with triumphs, disappointments and declining options that only come from older men. While it’s doubtful that we’ll see any of these guys chasing chickens in back alleys, TUF’s current offering is designed to give the sport of mixed martial arts its Rocky Balboa story.

While this season of TUF may aim for something a little deeper than just the spectacle of heavy men with heavy fists bludgeoning each other behind a chain link fence, it’s still a reality show where 16 men are divided into two competing teams and then crammed into the most violent dorm-room living situation of all time. The men may be a little bit older this time around (though some are still in their 20s), but that only makes the egos bigger. Roy “Big Country” Nelson, a potbellied but determined bruiser with a southern drawl, was the last champion of the now defunct International Fight League. The 6’10” Wes Sims claims a victory against season eight coach and former UFC heavyweight champ Frank Mir, although Sims was actually disqualified. If size does matter, then coaches Quinton “Rampage” Jackson and Rashad Evans will have their hands full. As light heavyweights, Evans and Jackson both give up as much as 60 pounds to any fighter they’ll be coaching.

Hardly the grizzled ring vet, Evans is a fresh-faced kid who earned his big shot by winning the season two finale of TUF back in 2005. He turns 30 next week. “Rampage” Jackson is only a year older and is best known for swinging a chain as he enters the octagon. While their resumes may not seem deep enough to be called coach at first glance, both men are former UFC light heavyweight champs with the desire to win back their crown, something they have in common with many of the men on their respective teams.

Episode one moves at a brisk pace. There’s some trash talking between Rashad and Rampage to lead it off and Kimbo Slice is given a drawn-out entrance that puts a “target on his back,” a point that UFC President Dana White really wants you to remember. White also calls Kimbo “the toughest guy at the bbq” but then fesses up to the brawler’s ratings potential. Teams are chosen quickly with Evans methodically selecting the best grapplers who can take direction. “Rampage” picks flamboyant fighters that must remind him of himself. Sims and Slice are both on his team but Jackson dismisses “Big Country” Nelson for his “big belly” and “titties.”

Dispensing with the tired judging rigmarole of just about every other reality show, each episode of TUF thankfully ends with a bout in the octagon. If only season one of Dancing with the Stars could have concluded with a cage match between Kelly Monoco and John O'Hurley. Because Evans got the first pick of the fighters, Jackson gets to determine the next two matches. Jackson pits his man Abe Wagner, a boxer with some jiu-jitsu training, against technical wrestler Jon Madsen. During the build up to the bout, Wagner, a corporate finance director with a mechanical engineering degree, confesses that he usually vomits several times about 20 minutes before a match. “I try to plan accordingly to what won't taste as bad the second time,” he explains. He is later shown puking into a wastepaper basket. The Ultimate Fighter is for mature audiences folks.

Despite Wagner’s height and reach advantage, Rashad Evans believes that the boxer will fall to Madsen’s wrestling skill. “Abe has nothing on the ground and pound,” Evans says, sussing up the match-up. “Once he gets down there, he's going to be stuck on his back."

“You know we both bleed,” Madsen adds almost prophetically in a separate interview, “but who’s gonna’ bleed the most.”

The fight takes place in an octagonal cage in a mostly empty gym, save for the other fighters, the coaches and the cameramen. The canvas is covered in more corporate logos than the chest of a NASCAR driver. Burger King, Mickey’s Malt Liquor, Tapout sportswear and a really annoying sportsbar chain called Dave & Buster’s all take up a piece of mat space. If that wasn’t enough to ensure the continuation of the broadcast, the bout is sponsored by Need for Speed Shift for the Xbox and Playstation 3. There will be two five-minute rounds and both fighters are 29 years old.

At the beginning of round one, Madsen quickly takes down his opponent and then uses his leverage to push the bigger man up against the chain link wall. Madsen rears back on his legs and comes thundering down on Wagner’s face with fists of granite. “Put your feet on his hips and push him off Abe,” Jackson yells, instructing his fighter from the ringside. Madsen continues to pound Wagner, keeping him pinned to the wall. Wagner struggles to trap one of Madsen’s limbs in the hopes of working some kind of jiu-jitsu submission hold, but Wagner doesn’t have the room nor the skill to pull off such a complicated maneuver. While in a clinch on the canvas floor, Madsen starts to grind his elbows into Wagner’s face. A red mist sprays from Wagner’s forehead and soaks a corner of the octagon with a dark shade of crimson. The bell sounds. The round is over.

Wagner stands up to go to his corner. His right arm and one side of his chest are covered in blood. A flap of gnarled flesh is clearly visible at the crown of his skull. He resembles something from Saw VI or Jennifer's Body, the horror flicks that also helped bring us tonight's drubbing. Dana White remarks that Wagner is the bloodiest “bleepin” fighter he’s ever seen. There are mutterings that Wagner won’t continue, but the “toughest computer geek” that Wes Sims has ever met returns for another round, albeit with a widening cut over his right eye and a split lip.

Madsen takes Wagner down a second time but doesn’t have the energy to mount the offense that he did in round one. Wagner lacks the command of leg sweeps to take advantage of Madsen’s fatigue. The referee stands the fighters up and Madsen takes Wagner down again. Flecks of blood splatter across those corporate logos and the mat starts to look like a crime scene. The referee stands the fighters up a third time but the result is the same: Madsen takes Wagner down again, scoring points in the process. The bell rings but there is little suspense in waiting for the judges' decision. Madsen wins unanimously and Wagner, scarred with a gash that reveals the bone with little effort, probably won’t fight again this season.

One wonders if the image of Abe Wagner being ground into oozing slag is what Dana White needs for the UFC as he tries to convince a skeptical public of mixed martial art’s athletic legitimacy. But managing the opinions of potential detractors can only take you so far. White has bit into the bottom lines of both Don King and Vince McMahon by delivering a savage authenticity that fans of the UFC aren’t finding in either boxing or pro wrestling. With TUF, White is generating new stars (or recycling old ones) by using the same methods in which new American idols, top chefs and top models are crowned only with a painful twist. The Ultimate Fighter has to do more than endure the verbal barbs of smarmy TV personalities or win more votes in telephone popularity contests: he has to beat the man in front of him. There’s nothing more real in reality TV than that.

As for Abe Wagner, he has a professional career to fall back on. One hopes he considers this before getting back into the octagon.

The Ultimate Fighter Season 10: Heavyweights airs Wednesdays at 10pm on Spike TV.

Bob Calhoun is the co-author of the autobiography of mixed martial arts pioneer and frequent UFC judge “Judo” Gene LeBell, titled The Godfather of Grappling, which is available from GeneLeBell.com. Calhoun’s work has also appeared in Grappling, Inside Kung-Fu and Filmfax. At one time, he attained the rank of blue belt in Gracie Jiu-Jitsu. You can learn more about Calhoun at www.beerbloodandcornmeal.com.