Bravo confirmed Friday that the onetime reality-TV sensation "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" will end its run after a 10-episode fifth season this summer. "I mean, we can't wax every straight guy's back in the country, ya know?" said Ted Allen, the former Chicago journalist who served as the show's food and wine authority.

"Queer Eye" was a ratings hit after its debut in 2003 and made instant stars of the five gay makeover experts who each week overhauled a style-impaired heterosexual man. It was parodied on "Saturday Night Live" and "South Park," and in 2004 "Queer Eye" won an Emmy for outstanding reality program.

It also prompted debate. Gay Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said the "Fab Five" embodied "damaging" stereotypes, and the Chicago comedy group Gayco depicted them as pink-faced minstrels.

The series' looming demise was one of TV's worst-kept secrets. Cast member Jai Rodriguez reportedly let slip last August that "Queer Eye's" days were numbered, a claim that Bravo swiftly denied. But the last of the episodes already had been taped two months earlier.

Bravo also announced plans for a similar makeover show starring "Project Runway" judge Tim Gunn and a reality series tracking the activities of Paula Abdul.

Well, the mystery of whether Queer Eye for the Straight Guy would return to Bravo for a fifth season is resolved. As you might recall, AfterElton interviewed Jai Rodriguez back in July. In that interview the Queer Eye culture maven let slip that the fab five had filmed the 100th episode but had not been asked back for a fifth season. This prompted a representative from Bravo to contact us with assurances that Queer Eye would indeed be returning for a whole new season in 2007. Turns out both Jai and the Bravo rep were technically correct.

Ten Queer Eye episodes filmed in early 2006 have yet to air. After about a year in the can, these episodes (episode 91 through 100) will be be put to use as an abridged fifth season later this summer. Meanwhile, Jai, Carson, Kai, Ted, and Thom have long since moved on to other projects.

Four years ago, the guys at Boston’s Scout Productions had an idea to get gay guys to make over helpless straight men. They shot a pilot on Newbury Street with a pal of producer David Metzler’s playing the straight guy and found five fab gays to set him, er, straight. The rest is history. And now Metzler and his Scout co-horts David Collins and Michael Williams are finishing up work on what will be the 100th episode [and the finale] of “Queer Eye.”

The series has moved from Boston to New York and only two of the original Fab Five survived the move - Carson Kressley and Ted Allen, who were joined by Kyan Douglas, Jai Rodriguez and Thom Filicia. But the show is still on a mission to turn drab to fab. “The 100th episode means that 100 straight guys have been tszujed and kicked around by the Fab Five,” Collins said. “And we’re planning to make it a very special episode.”

The boys will be bringing back some of their most helpless victims for the special to see if the straight guys managed to keep up their grooming, manscaping and gourmet cooking. “It’s a big fat family reunion,” Metzler said. “And it’s quite emotional.”