I’m pretty certain that the readers of TVScoop don’t watch Big Brother (starting tonight on Channel 4, 9pm). If they do, they don’t tend to leave comments. Maybe Big Brother is one of those Great British shameful past-times like finding your inner warrior or cross dressing in a garden shed. To be honest, I don’t buy it. If something has some kind of impact on you, then roll will the slaggings and say you like it all the same. Just don’t ever start a sentence with ‘I know it’s rubbish but…” because then, you’re fair game. In saying that, Big Brother does something weird to me. I completely loathe it but I end up watching it anyway. In fairness, my job as a TV critic has something to do with that, but there’s something so appalling about the show, that I’d probably tune in anyway. That said, the derailed train spectacle is wearing thin at the moment and BB9 and I may just be bidding each other adieu.

Of course, the people who are recruited for the show make or break it. Series two is remembered, paradoxically, for being so forgetful. Since then, the producers have picked people that can be split into one of three categories: The vacuous, the argumentative and the bewildered. So should we expect any different in tonight’s launch show? Well, like every year, the identity of the housemates has been kept secret, but clues have been given to whet the appetites of people whose fingers are already hovering over telephone keypads and have been practicing their booing, just in case they go down for a live eviction.

This year’s house will include a stand-up comic, a DJ, a deported American, a Buddhist and a Muslim. Three of the housemates have children, three were born outside the UK, one starred in a film with Hugh Grant, while another has had a breast enlargement. One contestant has never watched the show, another owns a £13,000 watch and the oldest housemate is 42.