Who’d be a travel show contestant? Long gone are the days of watching Joanna Lumley fab around the world, presenting documentaries in far-flung locales: these days, people want their exotic destinations with an extra frisson of tension. Five series of Race Across the World, which sees strangers circumnavigate the globe on a miniscule budget, have been runaway hits.
Now new BBC gambit Destination X tries to borrow some of that success.
This new reality series (which has been lifted from Belgian show Bestemming X) follows 16 Brits who meet in a German airport. Thirteen make it through an initial challenge and take off in helicopters wearing VR headsets so they don’t know which direction they’re travelling in. When they land in an anonymous location, they board a coach without blackout windows. None of the contestants know where they’re going, although the odd clue lend the contestants – and us playing along at home – an idea as to their whereabouts. Rob Brydon is the games master, popping up next to random lakes and on the in-bus TV screens to dish out the team’s latest cryptic tip-offs as they try to work out which part of Europe they’re in.
The concept is a neat one. It must be incredibly frustrating for the passengers to be careering through random countries without knowing where they are, and watching from home is perfectly infuriating too. We’re dished up the odd panorama of mountains or sweeping forest, but could that be Italy, Switzerland or Austria? I must admit I didn’t manage to get any of the clues right, and ended up as lost as the contestants by the time it reached the end of each episode, when they had to place an X on a map to guess where they were (the furthest-away guess is eliminated at the end of each episode).
The fresh concept kept me watching, even if Destination X feels a little twee. Large swathes of the show is filmed within the coach, which is by definition a boring place to hang out, so much of the runtime lacks the thrill you’d hope for from an adventure travel series. Compared with the classic travel shows or the wonderfully frenetic Race Across The World where people are pegging it through souks, past temples and on tuk-tuks to traverse the land, the innards of a 52-seater feel rather less than thrilling.
There are some terrific characters, including charming 58-year-old London taxi driver Daren, switched-on pilot Josh, 26, charismatic but back-stabbing e-commerce manager James, 23, and warm 62-year-old crime writer Deborah. In a clear nod to The Traitors, contestants are encouraged to lie and cheat their way through the challenges to get one step closer to landing the ultimate prize of £100,000, which one winning contestant takes home, and a little makeshift Big Brother-style diary room on the coach is a fun, bitchy little touch.
Gavin & Stacey legend Rob Brydon is an affable presenter, if slightly too soft to put the fire in our bellies. I was left wanting more of the contestants out on location, and more glamorous shots of exotic locales to make me feel like I was actually away with them. But despite that, Destination X is fresh enough conceptually to entertain, and offers something new in the reality TV stakes, which is an increasingly hard challenge to succeed at.
Destination X is streaming on BBC One and iPlayer
