Back in 2011, the first episode of Black Mirror revolved around the prime minister being forced to have sex with a pig on television. For weeks the prospect of such a spectacle entranced and enthralled the nation but, when the moment itself came, viewers found themselves depressed and appalled by the act. Anyway, Matt Hancock is on I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! now.
After days of anticipation, Hancock has finally arrived in the camp, a little later than everyone else, although his entrance was as grim as you would expect. To arrive at camp, he was forced to crawl on his belly through a narrow, pitch-black tunnel, where he was festooned with scorpions, maggots and a substance he could only describe as “slurry”.
On the surface he coped well, steering clear of the full-body freakout many of us would experience if we had to Shawshank blind through what is essentially a maggot-filled rectum. But on reflection, a bit of human emotion wouldn’t have gone amiss. We already knew how desperately unconvincing Hancock is when asked to cry on cue, and now we have plenty of proof that he isn’t much of a natural smiler anyway. Instead, he sort of distorts his face into a harrowing approximation of the kid from AI eating food for the first time. The nation is watching, Matthew. This is your big chance to show us that you are a real boy. Don’t blow it.
Fortunately, Hancock didn’t enter the jungle alone. His partner was Seann Walsh, the comedian who catapulted himself into a national scandal when he was photographed kissing his Strictly Come Dancing partner behind his girlfriend’s back. So, if nothing else, at least he and Hancock have something to talk about in quiet moments.
Not that there will be many of those, because Hancock has come to this briefed to the gills. He had the relatable topics rehearsed and loaded in (he knows two lines of an Ed Sheeran song! But don’t get him singing!) and he barely needs to be prompted to give his big speech about Why He Entered Politics. The show actually broadcast some of it this time, which seems generous since he’s destined to spend the next few weeks being pelted with animal genitals for sport at the whim of a vengeful public.
Eventually Hancock and Walsh arrived at camp, and you could trace the reaction of his fellow contestants in waves. First there was despair (“Oh god, I’m on holiday with Matt Hancock”) followed by slight elation (“Wait, everyone’s going to vote for him to do the Bushtucker trials, and not me”) before the nosediving despair set in for good (“But this means I’m on holiday with Matt Hancock”). Flashpoints are now just a matter of time. Charlene White almost immediately started quizzing him on the appropriateness of an MP doing a gameshow while parliament was sitting (“Rishi’s great, he’ll be fine,” Hancock replied, choking on his tongue). More pressingly, Boy George spent the entire latter half of the episode vibrating with rage, to the point of tears. This is far from over.
Which brings us back to Black Mirror. It might have seemed like fun at first, but now we all have to live with the fact that Hancock is being paid nearly half a million quid to get some maggots on him. There’s something unsettlingly Victorian about the sight of this public hate figure being punished on television for our entertainment. It was the closest thing there has been in a while to public flogging, and we’re all complicit in that. It’s very depressing to watch. On second thoughts, we should have wished for a general election instead.
