American Gladiators and its ultra-gay international spin-offs present themselves as athletic competitions. Homo-journo Mark Simpson, however, sees something a little more "tarty."

From the daddy of metrosexuality:

Some of the men…seem to be wearing bras. It’s difficult not to wonder they’re a bit lacking in the tit department but have good abs, so they gave them something to cover up their saggy breasts or over-large nipples.

Or maybe, along with the skirt, it is just more evidence that the male body is now as packaged and fetishised, not to mention scrutinized, as the female variety - at least on Prime Time TV.

Actually, on the basis of the new Gladiators, you could argue that women are now held up to less exacting standards. The men are showing more flesh than the ladies - and their flesh is much more spectacular. Spartan’s abs aren’t really terribly useful, but they do look fantastic, so let’s have him hanging by his arms while the camera zooms in on them.

Either way, the Gladiators, male and female, with the exception of pigtailed Battleaxe who looks like she might actually be able to handle herself in a pub fight, seem less like super-heroes than a bunch of tarts.

And we wouldn't have it any other way!

American Gladiators and its various international spin-offs sure are gay, huh?

Who could forget when Yankee gladiator Militia was revealed to be a gay porn star? Then there was Australian contestant Sam Brodie's porny past. Well, the Brits are getting their own same-sex scandal, as Gladiator David "Tornado" McIntosh gets his moment in the lavender spotlight.

No, he's not a porn star, but he has posed for gay rag Boyz - and, in a special twist, he's a marine!

David, who has served in the Gulf, Afghanistan and Northern Ireland, has been given time off by military bosses to take part in the 15-week show.

And he warned opponents: "I’m loving it. I can’t wait to get out there and give the contenders a serious whooping."

We have no doubt…

Former gay porn player and current American Gladiator Militia has already grabbed an endorsement gig.

The mammoth man has signed a $35,000 contract to represent HeadBlade razors. Company president Todd Greene could barely contain his excitement: "Militia will play an important role enhancing our lifestyle brand across multiple media platforms as he continues to redefine the modern-era gladiator competition."

"Lifestyle brand?" Ha!

Readers will no doubt be happy to hear that NBC's American Gladiators are totally steroid free. Executives reportedly subjected hopefuls to drug testing prior to casting.

So all those muscle men and women aren't junkies - they're just obsessive freaks!

Militia and his gay porn-ready package helped American Gladiators dominate this season's crop of new shows. From Media News Daily:

NBC'S premiere of the remake of "American Gladiators" posted a surprisingly strong showing Sunday, delivering the best debut for any new show this season. The series premiered with a 5.9 in "live-plus-same-day" 18-to-49 ratings for the special 9-to-11 p.m. premiere–and saw its ratings build in the second hour.

People must have spread the word.

The dialogue? Forced. The graphics? Cliche. The testosterone? Heavy. The bulging muscle? Plenty.

That about sums up last night's premiere of American Gladiators on NBC, with a new roster of gladiators — some of whom we've seen before. Personally, we were enjoying the debuts of Titan (total cheeseball) and Militia (packin' heat), but as you'll see in the clip after the jump, the former porn star wasn't up to the challenge on Day One.

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Now we're really excited to watch NBC's resurrected American Gladiators.

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Words cannot describe how excited we are about American Gladiators! The athletically-inclined game show proved integral to our adolescent masturbatory fantasies, so obviously we're totally psyched that NBC revived the series.

The network has now posted the complete Gladiator roster and, after much deliberation and examination, we've decided that Militia's our favorite. Why? He's got the biggest dick. We may not be size queens in real life, but we take no penis prisoners when it comes to American Gladiators.

Meanwhile, in other Gladiator news, one of the male cast mates goes by the name "Toa". Here's how they describe him (to be read with exaggerated baritone): "With his tribal garb and distinctive tattoos, he may conjure up images of an island paradise, but facing him in battle is pure hell." Who writes this shit?

We don't know about you guys (and gals), but American Gladiators definitely informed our queer identity. All those sweaty, muscle-bound men (and women) fighting, hitting one another with their big sticks and firing their balls at them with fierce, animalistic passion really got us going. When the show got the ax in 1996, we thought we'd never love again.

Luckily, ESPN Classic recently started rerunning those combustible competition, thus ensuring us at least one hour of happiness per week. Yes, Laser, Nitro, Gemini and all the other preposterously named Gladiators again fill our fantasies.

By some stroke of conversational fate, this retro love came up here at the Jossip office, at which point Debbie Newman - Jossip's always informative editor - reminded us that Ellen Degeneres' Ellen (the sitcom, not the talk show) once featured an episode in which the then-closeted comedienne fell for and dated Nitro. Nitro, however, had a thing for fellow gladiator, Ice: a climactic revelation that pushed Ellen to beat Ice silly. In fact, Ellen makes good on her promise to turn the beefy gladiator into a "sadiator". Oh, zinger!

We would provide the entire clip, but some horrid monster disabled the embedding code. Thus, we can only provide you with the picture above and this link. We know navigating away from Queerty can be painful, but this one's well worth riding the world wide web.