In the hierarchy of tough reality shows, Alone (Sky History) must be one of the worst (or should that be best?).
Its closest relative is probably Bear Grylls’ The Island, which was hands-down winner of the most gruelling and unpleasant on television – until I discovered Alone.
The concept is one we’ve seen many times before, but Alone tweaks it for maximum discomfort.
Ten contestants are dropped off in the freezing Arctic and must survive for as long as possible.
The thing that got me about Alone is how incredibly dangerous the whole endeavour seems.”
What makes Alone different from The Island – aside from the sub-zero temperatures – is that all 10 contestants aren’t in a group. They’re totally alone.
The winner of the $500,000 prize is the last one standing but none of them know how the others are doing, so it becomes a fascinating exercise in resilience and stamina.
The thing that got me about Alone is how incredibly dangerous the whole endeavour seems.
Although the contestants certainly couldn’t be considered amateurs – all have backgrounds in survival and living off the land – serious injury always seems just around the corner.
Two contestants in the series I watched had to leave because they poisoned themselves with parasitic fish eggs and muskrat, while another broke a leg.
And let’s not forget the woman who stabbed herself in a leg with an arrow and the man who was almost burned alive when his shelter caught fire.
The sheer jeopardy involved makes for a gripping watch and it happily doesn’t cheat by having a film crew on the ground with the contestants. They really are alone.
The simple drama of watching humans trying to survive in a place that they have no right surviving in was strangely gripping and addictive.”
I know I should be watching the latest prestigious costume drama, Netflix miniseries or an ITV thriller, but Alone consumed my TV watching this week.
The simple drama of watching humans trying to survive in a place that they have no right surviving in was strangely gripping and addictive.
I expect my next few weeks will be taken up watching all the other series of Alone.
Jamie’s search for a star
Viewers love competitive cooking shows, so why shouldn’t Jamie Oliver throw his chef’s hat in the ring?
To its credit, The Great Cookbook Challenge (Channel 4) does have an original hook.
Each week, five contestants try to impress three judges with their concept for a cookbook, which will be published by Penguin.
Oliver is a very shrewd businessman. In the same way that a new Jamie TV series is really just a big free advert for his latest cookbook, this does exactly the same thing.
If Penguin play their cards right they might even get two cookbooks out of this series – the winning one along with a “recipes from the hit series”-type one. Like I say, shrewd.
Heaven-sent comedy
One comedy show that doesn’t get half as much love as it should is The Righteous Gemstones (Sky Atlantic), which returned for a second series this week.
Think of it as a sacrilegious Succession, with John Goodman as the patriarch of a televangelist family with an obsession for money that wildly outweighs its obsession with the Lord.
Like creator Danny McBride’s previous series, Eastbound & Down, The Righteous Gemstones has a foul-mouthed and filthy exterior but a thoughtful and compassionate heart.
And like Succession, half the fun comes from the hideously petty squabbles between jealous siblings Jesse (McBride), Judy (Edi Patterson) and Kelvin (Adam Devine).
Many happy returns
Even though I’m most certainly not in its target demographic, it’s good to see BBC Three return to the schedules after a six-year hiatus online.
I have one hope and one fear about its return.
I hope it becomes a place for exciting new voices in comedy and documentaries to cut their teeth without fear of failure.
But sadly I fear this is the beginning of the end for the BBC Four as we know and love.
Film of the week: The Outsiders (Talking Pictures, Monday 9pm)
For Francis Ford Coppola’s adaptation of SE Hinton’s celebrated novel – which, amazingly, she wrote when she was just 16 and in high school – he assembled a cast of then-unknowns who would go on to become some of the biggest names in ’80s cinema.
Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Emilio Estevez, Rob Lowe, Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio and C Thomas Howell make up the “greasers” gang who spend their days in 1960s Tulsa scrapping with rivals and dreaming of escaping their impoverished lives.
When a gang fight turns tragic, Howell and Macchio flee town and set off a chain of events that you just know will end badly.
Although Coppola’s achingly nostalgic view of teenage life perhaps seems a little syrupy when watched with adult eyes, he captured the innocence of Hinton’s novel perfectly.