Are a bit like religious sermons. They exist to give the lay a glimpse at the glory that is possible through language learning, and then offer only the confounding and obtuse teachings of high-status males as the means to that end. The goal is to bowl the audience over into stunned reverence, so that they buy the books the show’s producers publish as kind of a ritual of worship.
The zenith of linguistic absurdity is usually reached when the Japanese professor of English is explaining English grammar (often the type of fundamental stuff like “the” and “a”, the kind natives never make mistakes with but 2nd language learners have a hard time getting their heads around) in Japanese to a native speaker of English. The professor says something blatantly wrong (like “English speakers always use ‘the’ before the names of musical instruments, this is a rule on par with calling teachers ‘Mr.’ and ‘Mrs.’”), and the native speaker is obliged, because after all he has no degree in English from a very prestigious Japanese university and is replaceable after all with any other native English speaker, to agree with a forced nod and a “Uh, yea, I guess so.”