Variety? What variety?

Though I have a TV set in my room I have not plugged it in even once in the past six months. Japanese television in general scares me. A lot. Usually I only watch TV when I'm in the onsen - there's a TV set in the sauna, so I sit on the bench and wonder what the heck is going on in all those variety shows; although I understand the words I can't understand the meaning. I asked some of my Japanese friends and they also told me that they don't get it. It's just a bunch of people dressed like drag queens doing weird stuff on TV. Why? Nobody knows... And even if they have "variety" in the name they all look the same to me.
Two days ago I went to an onsen and as usual got out of the sauna quite puzzled - there was this guy named "Sakana-kun" (Mr. Fish) with a fish-shaped hat on his head, travelling though Japan in search for the perfect fish. His catchphrase was "gyogyo!" and he ended every second sentence with it. He even says "arigyoto" instead of "arigato". He had a cute voice and a very wide smile and was creepy.
The other show I saw was about a guy who traveled Japan (again, it seems that it's a popular theme) with a pet monkey named Sakura. It's a miracle that the monkey survived the journey, because he let her eat everything (to the point when she kept stealing his food too).