So long as ITV doesn't relegate it to the early hours, Tycoon looks set to be compulsively bad. It was always going to be poor, but even I was surprised by the total lack of reality in Peter Jones' new reality series.
With six businesses suddenly operating under the eye of Jones at the illogically named Tycoon Towers (it was neither a tower nor, we later learned, was it ever likely to house any tycoons), we're supposed to believe that these business novices have the know-how to run a company with only the most rudimentary comments from the jolly lean giant. Clearly there are a million researchers doing everything for these people, but no explanation was given as to how the lovely Sod Gardening girls were able to sell a grand's worth of polo shirts in one week or how the camp teen produced his terrible tabloid.
Which does bring us to the show's major selling point - most of the potential entrepreneurs are awful, awful human beings, with a coulpe of nice guys/gals who'll eventually win the day. Who to hate the most? Elizabeth and her lame alco-smoothie are pretty bad, but teen Tom and his dire newspaper for kids could be the most hateful contestant. Watching them fail, while the nicer players succeed, is great, cathartic television.
One big stumbling block is Peter Jones himself. He seems so hands off, issuing vague instructions such as a team should change its name, it surely must be his fault when the wannabes fail. Plus, he's picked up that awful thing Gordon Ramsay does on Kitchen Nightmares, speaking softly to someone just off camera as a appraises the situation. So far he doesn't have the gravitas of Alan Sugar, or even Ruth Badger, to inspire viewers to turn in. His decision to invite the businesses he's planning to close to 'the pier' also makes him sound more like a Brighton-based gangster than a hard-nosed businessman.
I can't wait to see who's heading for that pier next week...
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