In 1989, the proto-reality television show “American Gladiators,” on which everyday citizens competed in futuristic games against athletic Samsons, premiered in syndication. Now, 18 years later, it is being resurrected by NBC, one of many desperate networks scurrying to fill a programming void left by Hollywood’s striking writers.

The return of “American Gladiators” recalls a simpler, headier time: A wiser, wimpier Bush was in office, a defeated Russia licked its wounds, a victory in Iraq loomed, and a nation had just begun to fall in love with itself, tuning in to television as the cameras turned on the audience. Warhol’s prophecy was soon to be profit — 15 minutes multiplied by 350,000,000 Americans.

By contrast, our times seem, if not more complex, then exhausted: Our cockier Bush is allergic to introspection, a new Russia has returned flush with money and menace, victory defers itself in Iraq, and what was a love affair in which ordinary people assumed the responsibilities of television stars has mutated into an grotesque orgy of Caligula-like proportions.

“American Gladiators” was a ridiculous spectacle in its first incarnation, and NBC’s new version appears to remain so, with one notable exception, one illuminated by the perspective a new century affords. It seems the original “American Gladiators” — a show on which regular people attacked giant obstacle courses crafted from Nerf foam while musclebound champions with names like Zap and Nitro, slathered in starspangled spandex, shot beanbag-tipped arrows at them — was ahead of its time. It was more, so much more, than this formerly awkward-teenager-turned-awkward-critic’s power fulfillment fantasy.

One could argue that our culture is in a stampeding horse race to the bottom, and “American Gladiators” won the race before the pistol sounded. Born during one of professional wrestling’s golden eras, and preceding reality television’s patient zero — MTV’s groundbreaking, navel-gazing, micro-celebrity sausage factory “The Real World” — “American Gladiators” typified America on the cusp of its military and economic dominance of the 1990s. It didn’t intend to encapsulate who we are collectively, but in a way it did, flexing its deltoids to the world and announcing, “This Is America!”

In a classic “American Gladiators” bit, a common man (or woman) with a dream and a prayer would humorlessly clamber up a pyramid of crash mats in order to get to the top while two musclebound “Gladiators” would try to keep that from happening. It should be noted that the Gladiators, many of whom were buxom Amazons like Malibu or Lace, were dressed in tight-fitting, revealing costumes that were not unlike those one would see during a WrestleMania epic, only more theatrical.

In one inspired contest, called the Gauntlet, the competitor — who always seemed to be a schoolteacher or some other earnest suburban professional — would run a half-pipe chute where the Gladiators, perhaps Turbo or Blaze, would wield padded shields and simply try to stop our average heroes from getting from point A to point B.

In “American Gladiator,” Clark Kent could rage against Supermen; corn-fed gumption could test its mettle against the cartoon American ideal. Perhaps that was unintended subtext, and now just unforgivably purple hindsight.

What was on the surface was foam rubber anarchy, litigation-proof combat in which two parties thwacked each other with gigantic Q-tips, all of it deadly serious business. After all, a cash prize was involved, as was the Holy Grail of American consumption — a new car. The new “American Gladiators,” which makes its premiere on Sunday night, re-creates this cacophony, complete with tri-colored Spandex and new gladiators with names like Siren and Fury, and this time, it’s not too much of a leap to suggest that we secretly pine for a simpler time.

For all the promise and possibility of the 1990s, the decade was also one of economic uncertainty. Instead of middlebrow game shows asking their contestants to vie for cash, “American Gladiators” demanded sweat, and humiliation, for the chance at a few months of perceived financial independence. Would it be too much to ask NBC to make this new generation of competitors fight for health insurance?

While being a convenient stopgap for struggling prime-time lineups, the resurgent “American Gladiators” also comes with easy brand recognition, especially to members of Generation X. Remember Generation X, those cynical grouses with the terrible luck of being born between the backslapping, Botoxed baby boomers and their precious, equally self-absorbed progeny, the Generation Y-ers? Nostalgia is the cheapest mass opiate, so it seems a risky cultural bet that “American Gladiators,” a final nod to post-’80s patrio-erotic excess, will resonate with a generation that is increasingly alienated and forgotten, neither being hardwired directly into Facebook, nor swooning to Dennis Hopper-endorsed retirement plans.

But in light of a writers’ strike that promises to provide 2008 with an unprecedented number of poorly conceived and executed reality shows (including everything from a show based on a lie detector to a show on which feminist authority figures rule over male chauvinists), it is possible that something as gaudy and as time-tested as “American Gladiators” could ooze to the top of the slurry barrel like a toxic flotsam.

For those with no cultural reference for “American Gladiators,” it might be easy to think of it as a rip-off of one of those Japanese endurance shows, like “Ninja Warrior” on G4 TV. “Ninja Warrior” is similar to “American Gladiators” in many ways, notably its dare to normal people to brave an obstacle course full of springboards, monkey rings, and ropes. The primary difference, however, is that on these Japanese shows, the contestants play for honor, or at the very least, bragging rights. To fail to swing across a giant mud pit is to bring shame upon oneself, and that is the sheer joy of watching these bizarre cultural imports.

We have no shame anymore, and “American Gladiators” is not only proof of that, but a reminder that maybe we never did. The American Dream is to be recognized, and we are on a recognition binge, mass-producing attention and notoriety on an unprecedented scale. And for the time being, on NBC at least, those who dream of camera time and cash prizes will have to duke it out against a beefy phalanx of American Gladiators wielding pillow-soft lances and decked out like South Beach versions of Captain America.

And in the future, our times will seem simpler, and everyone will have 15 minutes of privacy.