I love watching people date – not creepily pressing my nose against the windows of cute French bistros, but by streaming hours and hours of reality TV.
Over the years I’ve seen every premise imaginable – singles trying to figure out which of a group of the opposite sex an algorithm had determined was their perfect match; people judging the naked bodies of potential suitors before they hear their voice (outrageous when it launched but now Channel 4’s Naked Attraction is a national treasure); and even the American women who thought they were competing for Prince Harry’s hand (it was a rather poor lookalike).
But a common, recurring thread throughout has involved trying to match people by personality, not looks.
The British version of US dating show Love Is Blind launches on Netflix tonight
The show starts with 15 men and 15 women, kept separately from each other. They can hear but not see the potential partner they’re dating
As a child, my first experience of dating shows was Cilla Black’s Blind Date, which left such an impression that my cousins and I used to recreate our own, fictionalised version and make our parents watch and cheer in ‘the audience’.
Since then, we’ve had Dating in the Dark and Married at First Sight, where strangers walk up the aisle – and then get to know each other. Not to mention Netflix’s Sexy Beasts, where pairs date disguised as strange creatures.
But of all these shows there’s one that does it best – Love is Blind. The original US series came out in 2020 and I was immediately hooked. Now we have our very own British version, which launches tonight.
If you somehow managed to miss the original Love is Blind, let me fill you in on the premise. The show starts with 15 men and 15 women, kept separately from each other; their only interactions are in ‘pods’ that allow them to hear but not see the potential partner they’re dating. After dozens of dates, whittling down the people you have a connection with, you get to meet your match only if you get down on one knee and propose to them – someone you’ve never laid eyes on.
At this point, we have a handful of coupled-up fiances who go to the next stage: a pre-wedding honeymoon followed by a few weeks of living together to see if they can handle the real thing.
Husband and wife presenting duo Matt and Emma Willis will host the UK version
Finally, each of the couples heads down the aisle at a real wedding and declares in front of family and friends (and the viewing public) if they do or they don’t.
One of the biggest issues with reality TV is the ‘reality’ part of it. Often, we’re very aware that the contestants are just putting on a show for us, the audience, and while I know you can never avoid some elements of that, Love is Blind comes across as one of the most genuine reality programmes.
That’s partly because you can only lie for so long, and because the production team have hundreds of hours of dating footage to choose from, with most of the 30 daters never getting more than a few minutes on our screens.
You might think I’m naive, but at least eight of the ten couples that got married on the US show are still together to this day – with a divorce rate that must be lower than the average population.
In a moment of reality TV magic, on Season 3 of Love is Blind, one contestant who had his proposal rejected paused his straight to camera interview, not to compose himself but to place eye drops in his eyes to give the impression he’d been crying – the genius editors decided to keep this moment in.
So now we’re all waiting to see if the UK version can match the hype. I’ve watched the first four episodes and without wanting to get ahead of myself, I’m as excited and optimistic as a teenager downloading Tinder.
Husband and wife presenting duo Matt and Emma Willis host the UK version and they do a great job. But the presenter of the show is just part of the furniture, a bit like a commentator at a football game – you need them to not be rubbish but the games you remember are the ones where the players performed. The show is entirely made by the cast.
Writer Flora Gill’s first experience of dating shows was Cilla Black’s Blind Date, which ran from 1985 to 2003
Flora, pictured, was immediately hooked on Love is Blind US when it came out in 2020
Already I’ve got my favourites – charming funeral director Freddie, whose job seems to be an anaphrodisiac – and there are characters I’m suspicious of, like ‘nice guy’ Sam, who keeps saying things like ‘the sweet guy never wins’ and ‘I think if you put it [my life] into a book, it would be the best book that someone could ever read’.
The beginning of every season of Love is Blind is always my favourite and the UK version is no different. Dating is a process that renders people very vulnerable and it’s fascinating to watch as a third party. There are the cringe lines (Be prepared for poems and spiritual journeys), the honest conversations (How do you meet in the middle when one person wants kids but the other isn’t sure?), and the sudden sparks when you realise you have something in common (One pair learn they both wear the rings of their deceased grandparents, while another both go to the gym twice a day).
The slightly depressing note is that Love is Blind pretends to be a ‘social experiment’, a term so overused that 14-year-old boys now run around filming pranks for TikTok claiming ‘it was just a social experiment’ when really they just like doing horrible things such as tossing ice in the faces of unsuspecting strangers.
The show really tries to ram down your throat that it’s just testing out a theory about whether love is truly blind, as if a group of scientists and psychologists had worked out that an entertaining reality TV programme was the only way to know for sure.
But the truth is the series is better than that, and has all the drama and disappointment needed to keep you hooked.
On Channel 4’s Naked Attraction, now a national treasure, people judge the naked bodies of potential suitors before they hear their voices
On Netflix’s Sexy Beasts, couples go on dates disguised as strange creatures
And if you needed any more evidence that it’s not really about how blind love is, then just take a look at the cast – they’re all incredibly hot. Presumably it’s easier for love to be blind when you know your prospective other half is at least a nine out of ten. One of the first comments a man makes on seeing his fellow contestants is how tall they all are, which shows just how carefully they’re selected.
But then it’s nice that the show isn’t about some huge ‘gotcha’ moment where you discover the person you’ve proposed to looks like Jabba the Hutt.
This is the eighth international version of Love is Blind and each one offers something slightly different.
In Love Is Blind Brazil, they’re incredibly open and passionate with lots of drama. Love Is Blind Japan is far more heartwarming and wholesome.
No one does a dating show like the UK (Who else would come up with the Love Island format?), and judging from what I’ve seen so far, this edition of Love is Blind has the potential to be incredible. That famous British banter mixed with a tried and tested American concept… I’ve not seen the whole series yet, but I think I’m ready to say: ‘I do.’
The first four episodes of Love is Blind UK are available on Netflix tonight.
