Destination X Final (Spoilers)

I know what you’re dying to ask. Did the final of Destination X avoid giving me what I didn’t want to see? The answer is yes, by and large it did and to this extent it nailed the landing. Did it give me what I wanted to see though? That’s a difficult question to answer, partly because I’m not exactly sure I knew what I wanted to see.

What did we actually get, then? Well, Rob B’s observation early doors that we were going to the first city to have over a million inhabitants AND a shopping centre signposted Rome to me. Ah, but this was the final and so it was never going to be enough to just figure out which city they were in. In fact they didn’t even have to do that since it was revealed to them pretty much as soon as they got there. Prior to that, we had the obligatory challenge in Bomarzo’s Parco dei Mostri, or Monster Park. Basically the three contestants had to run around the park, and find questions relating to what they’d seen on their travels in order to win keys to boxes containing golden tickets. Pilot Josh won two, Marketing Saskia one, and Nuclear Judith, well, she didn’t get any.

So, when in Rome. . . well, when in Rome the players simply had to find Rob Bryden. Now, from the filmed instructions I could see that he was on the top of the Spanish Steps. Now, frankly from what we’ve seen all series it looked unlikely any of the contenders had figured this out but suppose one of them had? Would they have been allowed to short circuit the final? I doubt it. This final consisted on each one being given a chauffeured Vespa, and taken to three successive games. In each they had to figure which was the right answer, based on what they’d remembered from their travels. For example, they had to put all of the destinations in the order in which they visited them. Which was a lot harder for them than us because apart from Venice, they couldn’t’ be certain where they’d visited. Golden tickets could be used to buy clues.

Once they figured out the answers, then they got to construct an X on a map to mark the spot, then they got to race on their Vespas to the spot. Winner was. . . well, it was the one who didn’t have any clues. The one who had been wrong about the previous two destinations. Nuclear Judith.

Well done!

There’s a certain satisfaction that the winner was the one who worked out the final destination and got there quickest. With a reality show it’s very easy to find yourself hoping that one or the other doesn’t win, because of the way that they have been presented by the footage that is shown. I think it helps to remember that you’re seeing what the director and the editor allow you to see, and this can give you an unfair impession. So, as much as the BBC and the people who made Destination X might push The Traitors angle, this really has not been like the Traitors at all. There were only two occasions when some of the players’ fates were not necessarily in their own hands. I doubt very much that anyone is likely to take this on board, but for the next series the only tweak I would really like to see is the disposal of the moving X advantages. For me, these were a jarring note and I’m glad that neither of them came to anything.

Initial noises from the Beeb are that it will be back for another series, and I’m all for that. Whether it’s a game I’d ever like to play myself, well, the jury is still out on that one.