Can someone please explain to me just why I watch this show? All I can think is that its akin to picking at a scab. There’s that irritating itch that can only be relieved by trying to prise up the edge. Then the pain when you realise just what you’ve started, and the oozing blood after you’ve ripped the flipping thing off.
The show last night (21.9.06) was just like that. Nikki seems to have some weird idea of how a princess behaves. Apparently, in NikkiWorld, you should have a face like a slapped derriere on at all times, strop about like a demented penguin, and be rude and ill-mannered to the poor people forced to spend time with you. I’m fairly sure I’ve never seen a real princess behave like that, but there again, I don’t really mix in royal circles.
‘Do you have to apply to do this job?’ she demanded to know of the refuse collectors. ‘Do you think, oh I really hope I get it?’ said in her usual bewildered and condescending tone, casting aspersions on the nature of those who clear up after us. The binmen simply looked askance at her, perhaps idly wishing they could bung her in a bag and chuck her in the back of the wagon. I’m not quite sure why she screamed so at the sight of a few maggots - she lived in a house with Sezar for a couple of weeks after all.
I wonder how much they had to pay the poor woman subjected to Nikki’s hysterical giggling, as she lay being colonically irrigated. They would have had to pay me more than the entire budget for the show, especially to show my poo floating through the tube. The lady overseeing the whole procedure looked as if she would gladly perform the procedure on Nikki herself, without the benefit of lubrication, especially after Nikki took to randomly spinning dials on the delicate machinery.
The bulk (sorry) of the show was dedicated to the treatment of plop. Condoms, tampons, toilet paper, and bizarrely, large chunks of solid fat had to be cleared from the rest of the sewage. Now - I am hugely appreciative of the people who perform these vital jobs - but there is no way I would go anywhere near a sewage farm. Its bad enough living where I do when the wind is in the wrong direction. There again, I’m not being paid huge amounts to be publicly ridiculed and humiliated on National TV (which I’m fairly sure is the entire brief for this show). Nikki reacted with her usual ‘I’m not doing that’, the pained face, the heaving, and her bizarre act of not actually looking at what she’s doing, perhaps in the belief she can con herself into thinking she isn’t scraping claggy poo from a machine, and is in fact sweeping the floor or something.
Whatever it is, I wish that we could see something more than this Nikki Caricature. It doesn’t even merit being described as two dimensional - in fact calling it one dimensional is to do it credit. Unless the producers allow some of the ‘Nice Nikki’ (I know its there, I saw it appear from time to time on Big Brother) to emerge, any novelty value will wane fairly quickly. Perhaps that’s a good thing.
This article was written by Lynne Goulden, our newest contributor at Unreality TV. Welcome aboard Lynne! Check out Lynne’s own X Factor journal here.