We’ve seen some bloke on the Beeb hanging around with Tribes and getting up to all kinds of mischief… but what if the roles were reversed? Well, it seems that Channel 4 have thought just that and arranged for five men from the South Pacific island of Tanna to swap their normal life in favour of Britain in Meet The Natives (Channel 4, Thursday, 9pm).
If you manage to stop yourself from thinking that a fair bit of exploitation is going on (ie, let’s dress up ‘laugh at the villagers in the name of anthropology’) you might just have a bit of fun with this show. What will stun them all the most? Our stupid fashions? Playstations? Cars? Tesco Extras? Chewing gum? Funnily enough, it’s none of those things, rather, it’s the way we keep pigs.
Apart from their bafflement at our pig rearing skills and wastefulness, the series looks at the tribe and their quest to take Prince Philip home with them (yes really) who they look upon as some kind of God. I’ll let you insert your own joke about racism here. These kinds of programmes, if occasionally lacking in taste (well, it’s just like Crocodile Dundee isn’t it? Show ‘em a bidet and snigger) provide some cracking moments of TV. When one asks “Don’t you get bored of ironing?” you can’t really fault their logic. Set the recorder for this one as it’s comedy night on BBC2… [Mof Gimmers]
