Bak's TV Week: Rumble In The Jungle

You could have been forgiven for expecting the eighth series of I'm A CelebrityGet Me Out Of Here to be the show's very last gasp, as it limped off into obscurity right behind its dead-in-the-water Channel 4 nemesis Big Brother. But you'd have been wrong. Very wrong.  In fact – thanks to the presence of celebrity curmudgeons Robert Kilroy-Silk and David Van Day – this may well be the finest series since the Brocket/Rotten/Andre/Jordan years.

 

Kilroy – who must henceforth be referred to only as 'Silksy' (largely because he obviously doesn't approve of the new moniker) – has had a great first week, going from zero to hero in just five days. The inevitable backlash kicked in early when, on receiving an unexpected (and unwanted) visit in 'away camp' from beady-eyed copper Brian Paddick, Silksy told him to 'sod off'. But who wouldn't?

 

Quite frankly, Paddick is the last person I'd want to be stuck with on a camping trip. The man's so dull he makes Carly Zucker seem interesting by comparison. Worse still, his sole personality trait appears to be the ability to deliver patronising, holier-than-thou monologues without moving a single muscle in his face, apart from the slightest, near-imperceptible twitch of his thin, grey lips. He's a tedium engine, further evidence of which is his love of boy band Blue, purveyors of the kind of anodyne supermarket soul that even the most Barlow-hardened 12-year-old pop fan would balk at.

 

Imagine being stuck in a jungle with that. Every time you saw the bore hoving into view, preparing to launch a determined tedium assault, you'd be hunting around frantically for something to do. "Sorry Brian, I'm just washing this rock." Or: "Can't talk now, Brian, I'm concentrating on drying my smalls." It's no wonder then that he's so obviously threatened by the charismatic, perma-tanned, no-frills-007 of daytime TV, who is really getting into his jungle stride now.

 

Anyone who saw Silksy's two bush-tucker trials – Jungle Gym, and the John Travolting Tank – during which he faced down whole armies of rats, snakes and spiders (and won), will know exactly what I mean. He's everything an I'm A Celebrity contestant should be: ever on the alert to rile a fellow camper with a well-placed gripe, and equally at home on an exercise bike, cycling serenely into an airborne vortex of cockroaches and green ants. Paddick, should the public ever see sense and make him face a trial, would probably cry like a little girl.

 

Newcomer David Van Day – one half of 80s pop duo Dollar – is equally entertaining, and seems to spend most of his time complaining of camp bullying and persecution from beneath his blonde hair implants. The public have clearly already taken against him, but he once called fellow failed pop star Sonia a 'poison dwarf' on national television, and seems to be the only person capable of prompting the otherwise docile Simple Simon Webbe into random acts of verbal violence, so he's OK in my book. Though the producers probably thought they'd booked Dick Van Dyke.

I'm A Nonentity

 

Plaudits must also go to 'glamour model' Nicola McLean, who wins the prize for most repugnant, self-obsessed celebrity chancer in the show's history. And, lest we forget, this is the same show that made household names of Kerry Katona and Dean Gaffney. Nicola is the kind of girl who you imagine might appeal to readers of The Daily Sport: face like a smacked a**e, looks like she's been round the block a few hundred times, has the kind of nasal Essex whine that makes Jodie Marsh sound like a Cambridge post-grad, and a pair of melon-sized funbags.

 

Nicola spends most of her time gazing at her hideous reflection, and applying the several tonnes of slap required to make her look even vaguely presentable, but rarely achieves that goal. Unfortunately, the aforementioned traits are among Nicola's finest, and it's pretty much all downhill from there. This is a girl who asked producers if she could have a birthday party for her boobs, one year on from their enhancement procedure. Granted, they have more personality than she does, but I think a party's taking things a bit far.

 

This is a girl who, on being asked to give up her luxury item in return for the freedom of Van Day and Timmy Mallett, squealed that 'no way' was anyone – or anything – going to come between her and her mascara. Did somebody say 'shallow'? This is a girl who, on meeting Mallett and Van Day, told them they hadn't 'paid their dues' in the jungle and should therefore be expected to live like animals while she lorded it over them from her hammock. This is the kind of girl who'd sell her own kids if she thought it might get her another 2-3 minutes of fame. She's horrible. Genuinely and irretrievably horrible.

 

Elsewhere, hot favourite George Takei has clearly taken a shine to balding ginger cockney Joe Swash, and likes nothing more than to while away the hours mimicking his cockney accent or indeed, on one occasion, even fondling his 'beautiful fanny'. This could be up there with Jordan and Peter Andre's jungle love story. Takei and Swash for Christmas number one with a rendition of I Got You Babe, anyone?

 

The rest of this year's campers are, however, a largely pointless bunch. Carly Zucker, a WAG and personal trainer but plainly not a celebrity, has singularly failed to utter a single word since the series began, while Simon Webbe looks puzzled every time he catches sight of, say, a tree. Or a cockroach. Martina Navratalova might as well not even be there, and don't even get me started on washed-up celebrity bike Dani Behr who, early in the series, wrinkled her forehead in confusion and asked: "Who are Holly and Fearne?" They may well be asking the same about you Dani; they probably weren't even born when you were last on telly.

Bak On TV

Read more of Stuart Bak's TV reviews in our Couch Potato archive.