As former DJ Chris Moyles put it after parachuting into the jungle, “I’d rather eat a sheep’s anus than ever do anything like that again.” You’ve never been so relatable, Mr Moyles. I feel precisely the same way after watching nearly two hours of the first episode of the 21st series of I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here. While the members of Cop27 gathered in Egypt, the Not Much Cop 10 invaded Australia. “You might know me from Hollyoaks,” said one pretender to become king of the jungle. “More likely,” I told telly, “not.”
There was a huge problem with the first episode: insufficient schadenfreude. I have absolutely no interest in seeing three people I’ve scarcely heard of – newsreader Charlene White, Euros-winning footballer Jill Scott and comedian Babatunde Aleshe – dangle over the edge of a high-rise tower in Australia to win tokens for a meal in their camp. Do you really want to hurt me, sang Boy George, perhaps the most famous of the contestants in this year’s show, many years ago. Absolutely not, Mr George. There’s only one person I want to see suffer. I want to see disgraced lockdown rules-flouter and failed health secretary Matt Hancock being force-fed kangaroo penises for his temerity in suggesting that he’s getting out of the Westminster bubble and going to the jungle to get in touch with real people.
