Love Island Aftersun is a disaster, and last night’s ep proves it needs to be dumped from the villa

All great reality TV shows need their equally as great companion shows to flank the aforementioned greatness. For Big Brother, we enjoyed the double whammy of Big Brother’s Little Brother that slowly evolved into just Big Brother’s Bit on the Side. On The X Factor, we got Konnie Huq making an endearing shitshow of The Xtra Factor. RuPaul’s Drag Race has Untucked – with the punchy slogan “If you’re not watching Untucked, you’re only getting half the story.” Love Island? Love Island has Aftersun. Aftersun is a soothing bottle of goodness to moisturise your tender and dry bits after a scorcher in the sun. There is nothing soothing or good about Love Island Aftersun. It should be renamed Love Island Sunburnt, because it’s about as equally pleasant.

Here’s all the reasons that Love Island Aftersun is a sinking ship disaster of epic proportions, and why ITV should switch it up urgently or let it get swallowed down into the sea.

Let’s address the elephant in the room first

Okay. I don’t mean this to be personal, but there’s one glaringly obvious reason why Love Island Aftersun is a crumbling chore of chaos every Sunday night. And that reason lies with the host of the show. Laura Whitmore is fine on the main show. I don’t think she’s the hostess with the mostess, but she turns up and does what she needs to do before leaving again with relatively no mistakes made. On Love Island Aftersun, this is not the case. Every joke she’s seemingly forced to make leaves her mouth with an air of uncertainty, not a single punchline ever lands. The audience in the studio are deathly silent. The audience at home are audibly groaning.

Laura Whitmore cannot roll with the punches, and for this hosting job it’s essential. If an audience member made a joke, she can’t bounce back because she’s meticulously flapping over the teleprompter. If something went wrong, I truly do not believe she’s got the chops to roll with the punches. It makes me long for an hour hosted by someone like Rylan Clark or Alison Hammond. There’s a reason those two are held in such high regard, borderline national treasures (bonafide, as far as I’m concerned). They’re naturals, and they embrace accidents and live disasters with love. Watching Whitmore try and hurry her show on really shows how effortlessly hard Rylan and Alison are at the same task.

Get guests on we actually want to hear from

Look, nobody wants to hear a peep from Rosie Jones and Sam from Made in Chelsea about what couples are going to make it. I truly do not care. Last night, Rosie Jones said she likes Andrew and she likes Tasha, but she doesn’t like Andrew and Tasha together because “they’re both looking elsewhere”. I mean, are they? Why doe we care about these random panel show circuit celebs giving their two pennyworth? I might as well hop on that couch and say “I think Ekin-Su is going to get with Luca and ruin Gemma’s life!” because apparently you can just go on the show and say any old shit for an hour.

Stop getting Islanders to do video link interviews

This one is a biggie, because it kills the vibe faster than vibes have ever been killed before. If the delay and lag isn’t bad enough, it’s the Islanders half arsed replies that put the nail in the coffin. We don’t want to watch Andrew struggle his way through some futile game sounding like he can barely hear the questions asked.

We CERTAINLY don’t want to watch Remi, the most recently dumped Islander from Love Island 2022, be sat for an interview looking visibly upset and reluctant to be there be questioned by Laura Whitmore and only able to give one word answers. It was painful, and unfair on Remi to have to endure. Then, he’s asked to rap again. Just to make this whole experience even more awkward for every person involved. Hellish.

You’ve got endless iconic Love Island alumni – use them

This year, episodes of Love Island Aftersun have featured a pair of Islanders from the 2021 season. Last week, we had the dream friendship duo of Kaz Kamwi and Liberty Poole, who instead of being front and centre like they deserved were left at the bar in the background and got about four minutes of airtime. This week, Toby Aromolaran and Chloe Burrows – easily the funnest and most engaging couple from last year’s season, came on Aftersun and got the same treatment.

All four of these people mentioned are infinitely more interesting than any guests the show has had on its couch and more interesting than the show’s host. ITV2, SORT it OUT. Realise what good TV you have in your alumni and use it, and stop making us suffer!

Love Island Aftersun deserves to be as iconic as the main show

This show should have promise. It should have potential. It should feel worth tuning in for. At the moment, I tune in to see how bad it can get this week. The show is giving us drama and tension, why aren’t we working with all that material on Aftersun?

Get the audience involved a la Bit On The Side. Do SOMETHING! And do it fast. Because this show is withering into ruin like an ice cream left out in the scorching Majorcan sun.

Love Island 2022 continues on ITV2 at 9pm tonight. For all the latest Love Island news and gossip and for the best memes and quizzes, like The Holy Church of Love Island on Facebook.

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