Ah, "First Dates," Channel 4's delightful foray into the romantic misadventures of the Great British public, a show which proves that love, much like the British weather, can be unpredictable, often damp, but occasionally glorious.
The premise is simple: bring together two strangers, sprinkle in some luxury cuisine and a bit of alcohol, and watch as they navigate the treacherous waters of first impressions at what is billed as the UK's most romantic restaurant. The result? A concoction of cringe, charm, disappointment, friend-zoning, and occasionally chemistry, that often appeals more to the nihilistic cynic than the hopeless romantic.
The setting, The Anthology in Manchester, is less a temple of gastronomy and more an altar to the gods of awkwardness. Here, under the guise of fine dining, we witness the human soul laid bare, often in the most unflattering of ways. The camera, ever the silent voyeur, captures moments where you can't help but wish for a national grid blackout to save everyone involved.
Our charming host, professional Frenchman Fred Sirieix, the maître d' with an eye for match-making, and his team, are the shepherds of this human zoo. Fred, with the joie de vivre of a man who has undertaken years of training in order to know just the precise moment to offer a second bottle of wine, guides our daters through their evening with a mix of encouragement and the subtle hint that perhaps, just perhaps, a second date might be in the stars, given the irony with which the participants are paraded through the restaurant to their table like planets in a solar system of self-doubt.
The participants themselves range from the charmingly naïve to the brazenly confident, from the utterly petrified to the narcissistically arrogant, each episode serving up a veritable smorgasbord of human quirks. One such episode featured a man whose muscles were so big, he looked like a brown condom stuffed full of walnuts and whose ego was so large, he probably thought the Big Bang was just the universe making room for him. His date was a Kim Kardashian lookalike who had hair so black and suspiciously perfect, it might as well have been a wig for all the authenticity it conveyed, draped over eyes that were not so much windows to her soul, but more like portals to his bank account.
There's also the poor chap who genuinely believes his love of model railways is the key to any woman's heart, the lady who thinks sharing a love for extreme ironing might just be the foundation of a lifelong romantic pair bond, and the Doctor Who fan convinced that quoting a line from the third episode of a Jon Pertwee serial from 1972 will have a line of Playboy models queuing up around the block to have his babies. It's a parade of hopes, dreams, and occasionally, the kind of revelations that make you want to hide behind your sofa.
One suspects that, if he were still with us, Clive James would have relished the poetry of these seemingly ordinary lives, the way the show illuminates the universal quest for connection amidst the absurdity of modern dating. It's rather like watching a live-action version of a Jane Austen novel, albeit if Mr. Darcy had been more interested in discussing his gluten intolerance than his estates.
In essence, "First Dates" is a mirror held up to society, reflecting our deep-seated desire for companionship, our fears, our foibles, and yet, our relentless optimism. It's a programme that, in its own slightly madcap way, celebrates the human condition, providing both solace and schadenfreude in equal measure. I must confess, watching this show is like eating a whole box of Quality Street; delightful at first, but by the end, you're questioning your life choices.
In the end, we're all just searching for a bit of meaning, whether we find it in a love story on TV or the stars above. So, dear reader, whether you're in search of love or merely a good old sneer at the expense of others, "First Dates" offers a spectacle where the heart might not always find what it seeks, but the viewer is sure to find entertainment, if not love, in all its bizarre and beautiful forms, on Channel 4.