Don your leis and fire up your VPNs, pervs. The US revival of Temptation Island, AKA Hot Tub Betrayal Machine, is nearly here.
Four sexy couples at relatable relationship crossroads like “If I don’t propose she’s going to leave me” head off to Maui for holidays at separate resorts, each packed with sexy singles, like Bachie In Paradise but with the dysfunctional heterosexuality dialled up to 11.
If the US revival really kicks off, then surely it’s only a matter of time before an Aussie version is back on the cards.
Temptation Island, when it debuted in 2001, felt like peak reality TV: Survivor meets Big Brother, plus more sex, making for “the schadenfreud-iest show on earth“.
The promiscuous premise scandalised conservative pundits and parents’ groups, and forced Fox execs to make public statements saying they’d tested all the contestants for STIs before filming.
(Of course, in the first season, they failed to test for the ultimate sexually-transmitted health issue: parenthood. One of the couples was booted after producers found they had kids, and that crossed a line.)
When the Australian version aired, a whole teenager ago, the Sydney Morning Herald’s TV critic said: “Of all the Australian adaptations of reality-TV formats, Temptation Island is the one where we’ve proved ourselves the world’s best. … Australian Survivor is reserve-grade talent playing for reserve-grade money and Australian Big Brothel is merely a televised teenage slumber party.”
Just look at this incredibly 2002 promo for the last temptation of Kynan, Liarna, Clinton and more unwitting thirstmonsters, soundtracked by Nelly’s ‘Ride Wit Me’:
Temptation Island has all the best bits of all our guilty-pleasure faves: the flirting and gender-imbalanced harem-y atmosphere of The Bachelor/ette, the bikinis and scenic partner-swapping of BiP, the relationship drama of Married At First Sight.
We’re easily as hungry for trash and thirsty for shirtlessness as we were in 2002, if not more. And the streaming services and the ABC have us covered for original scripted series – Stan and Netflix are launching one each just in the next few weeks.
Give us Australian Temptation Island, network TV execs. You know you want to.