After three decades of wall-to-wall TV appearances, you might assume Ant McPartlin and Declan Donnelly would trust the audience to tell them apart by now.
Same accents, same grins, same suspiciously youthful faces — fine, but surely the nation has learned which is which.
Apparently not. Or at least, they don’t think so.
When Stephen Mulhern turned up for an early production meeting on Accidental Tourist, he was greeted by Ant and Dec sitting behind a desk with nameplates spelling out their full names, just in case.
When they later decamped to a sofa, Dec had a cushion printed with his own face, presumably to avoid any last-minute confusion.
At this point, the government’s proposed digital ID scheme feels less like bureaucracy and more like a public service for television presenters.
Stephen Mulhern, Control Freak in a World of Chaos
If Ant and Dec seemed relaxed, Stephen Mulhern was anything but.
On screen, he’s all cheeky winks and breezy confidence.
Off camera, he’s a man who likes things orderly, predictable and very much under his own control.
When that control slips, panic attacks follow.
His mates found this endlessly amusing. Mulhern can’t cope with oily foods — hummus and mayonnaise are his personal horror show — and the idea of swimming in the open sea leaves him visibly shaken.
Travelling, too, is something he actively dreads. Which, naturally, made him the perfect target for a prank dressed up as a glossy travel show.
A Practical Joke Disguised as a Holiday
The premise was simple enough, and cruel enough: strand Stephen Mulhern in South Korea, roughly 5,000 miles from everything he finds reassuring.
Ant and Dec billed it as Accidental Tourist, though that title is a bit rich.
Nothing about this was accidental, and Mulhern made it clear throughout that he wasn’t about to be bullied into doing anything he genuinely couldn’t handle.
In reality, the programme felt like an extra-long Saturday Night Takeaway sketch, stretched to fill an hour and padded out whenever the tension fizzled.
Raw Seafood and a Mukbang Star
At a bustling fish market, Mulhern was encouraged to sample raw prawns and octopus alongside Leeby, a star of South Korea’s mukbang scene — a phenomenon where people film themselves devouring heroic quantities of food, often while chatting to viewers online.
He tried. Credit where it’s due.
But anything that crossed his personal line was promptly spat out.
The joke, such as it was, relied heavily on close-ups of Stephen pulling faces while Ant and Dec laughed from a safe distance.
The Naked Sauna That Wasn’t
Next stop: a naked sauna. Ant and Dec were clearly hoping for a moment of mortifying exposure — perhaps even a fleeting glimpse of the Mulhern backside.
They were disappointed.
Stephen stayed strategically covered throughout and took the opportunity to announce, proudly, that in his entire television career he has never shown any part of his body. Not even his feet.
It was less a breakdown of boundaries than a masterclass in boundary enforcement.
A Swim That Didn’t Go to Plan
The sea, supposedly his greatest fear, turned out to be another anti-climax.
When Mulhern finally went for a dip, he revealed himself to be a strong and confident swimmer.
The panic Ant and Dec were banking on never really materialised.
For someone meant to be the helpless victim of an elaborate prank, he was clearly steering the ship.
Every challenge was accepted — or refused — entirely on his own terms.
Filler, Repetition and Diminishing Returns
Because there was so little genuine meltdown, the programme leaned heavily on recaps, recycled reactions and knowing banter.
By the end, it felt like we’d watched the same joke several times without ever quite reaching a punchline.
Any hopes that this might grow into a full series seem slim.
The concept is flimsy, the stakes are low, and once you realise Stephen Mulhern is always in control, the tension drains away.
An entire run of this would feel about as appealing as a slab of cold squid on a fish-market counter.
A Brief Detour Into Chilli-Powered Wildlife Control
Elsewhere on television, Kingdom on BBC1 offered a far more inventive solution to anxiety — this time from mango farmers in Zambia.
Plagued by elephants sneaking in at night to devour their crops, they fought back with pellets of chilli oil.
One blast of hot spice and the elephants retreated in offended confusion.
Apparently, chilli up the trunk is a universal deterrent.
So… What’s Next?
As a one-off curiosity, Accidental Tourist raised the odd smile.
As a potential series, it feels like a prank that’s already worn thin.
Ant and Dec may still worry we can’t tell them apart, but viewers are perfectly capable of spotting when a joke has run its course.
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