the buzz log

Back off, Grasshopper. After decades of kung faux, the small screen is going all-out for the fighting arts. The Buzz Dojo counts four offerings this August, with nary an Octagon in sight.

MTV reality show "Final Fu" sticks to the rules with traditional points scoring and sparring restrictions. The show's combatants have been leaning towards the taekwondo discipline, which explains why that fighting style ranks number one in the Buzz martial arts category. Despite its corny title, the program has tussled its way into our top 15,000 searches and host Ernie Reyes, Jr. earned Buzz too, up 21% this week.

In between all the spandex on FitTV, documentary "Deadly Arts" features a Canadian martial globe-trotter doing a Jacques Cousteau in the fighting world. The six-part show hits four of the most popular martial-arts forms in Search—Karate, Aikido, Capoeira, and Muay Thai—as well as some esoteric styles. The "Deadly" documentary originally aired on the National Geographic Channel. Now, the channel looks inward in the upcoming "Fight Science," in which a special lab dissects the finest martial arts forms. The lab took more than a year to build...didn't anyone tell them about the 36 chambers?

Equal opportunity knocks and knocks-out. The Oxygen Network skips the catfights and aims straight for the carotid with "Fight Girls," which is now registering a Buzz blip on the radar. No mixing of martial arts here: The estrogen-pumped version trains seven ladies in Muay Thai, from the deserts of Las Vegas to the jungles of Thailand. Now that's hot.