There was some stick for The Island with Bear Grylls (Channel 4) last time, because there were no women. Women can survive, too; they may even be better at it. So, this time there are women, but not on the same island; they have their own. Maybe later in the series they will build canoes and paddle over for inter-island love. Or – better still – war.
We’re starting with the fellas, though. Like last time, Bear drops them off well short of the shore, so that they’re practically dead by the time they get there. “When I return in six weeks’ time, the 14 men – if there are still 14 men there, which, to be honest, I doubt – the men that do remain will be changed,” says Bear. The men that do remain? What, is he expecting it to all go properly Lord of the Flies this time? Cannibalism, even? If so, I’m thinking building-site manager Paul, 38, would be a good place to start: Paul would work well on a spit over a pit. They might even get some crackling off him. If they ever get a fire going and then catch him. Kill Paul! Cut his throat! Kill Paul! Bash him in!
Apparently, there were 40,000 applicants for the show. They have done an excellent job of getting it down to this lot. I don’t mean from a survival point of view; I’m talking in terms of television entertainment. Who wants to see a group bonding and cooperating, utilising each other’s skill sets for the maximum benefit of the team? Of course you bloody don’t. You want to see them, deprived of food and sleep, falling out, ganging up, splitting off into factions and cliques, with maybe a beach barbecue (mmm, roast Paul). That’s why I worry a little for the ladies … Boo, kill the sexist pig, cut his throat.
Anyway, this lot, gasping for air as they crawl out of the ocean and up the rocks like something way back down the evolutionary chain, are going to be fabulous. There are a couple of builders – the aforementioned Paul and also Andy – which sounds useful, but they soon fall out with each other (with everyone, in Andy’s case, even with himself). Nor are they very good at building. Well, it doesn’t help that everything they put up is immediately washed away by a tropical storm because it’s monsoon season. Ha, nice touch, Bear.
I’m most worried about 22-year-old graphic designer Joe. “I’ve never done anything that’s been a bit sort of edgy, a bit dangerous, I guess,” he says. Like leave the house? Joe’s already whimpering about wanting a pizza and missing his girlfriend. If there were any more meat on him he’d also be a candidate for that spit …
What? Joe wants to leave already? That’s what Bear meant about doubting that there would be 14 left at the end. It’s a shame they can do that, just get on the satellite phone and call a water taxi – I’m a nobody, get me out of here.
Andy wants out, too, and Paul – probably worried they’ll never get any work ever again if this very unflattering publicity for their construction capabilities, and their characters, goes on any longer. Paul, especially, will be a loss if he goes, though. Again, I’m talking from the point of view of us at home, not his fellow castaways, who would almost certainly be much happier without him. He’s a proper old-school shouty alpha-male dick-swinger. Thinks he’s funny, too – and is, to be fair. “There is a minor bit of snagging before practical completion,” he says as the water cascades through the roof of their so-called shelter.
That’s the one skill that most of these men have brought with them to The Island: the gift of the gab. You can strip them of everything, starve them half to death, waterboard them from the heavens, but, unlike the fire, the banter never dies. Maybe, in the modern male world, this is a survival skill: the need to make other men laugh. Whatever, it’s alive and well here. “I’m not sure I’m going to go for these, bit last season,” says Paul, picking up an odd pair of flip-flops, washed up on the beach. “Don’t put your finger where you won’t put your dick, cos it might get bit,” says Vic. Eh? Vic, 47, is a cleaning-facilities manager – maybe this is a health and safety regulation from work – but now he’s talking about limpets and hermit crabs, confusingly.
It doesn’t matter what he means: bash it, the limpet, the crab, Paul, everything. Kill it all. Everything but the banter: the banter must go on.
Now, ladies, over to you.