Fancy a Bit Xtra?

Holly Willoughby, who henceforth, and for the purposes of comedy, shall be known as the Wallaby, walks toward the camera, half-bellowing, she begins to fire out complete non-sequiturs like “This is bigger than the Battle of Hastings, the end of the Cold War, the landing on the moon.” I’m not sure it is; I think it’s just filler to take up more space in the vacuum that is ITV2. “We’re looking for next idol, like Diana, Winston Churchill, or William Shakespeare.” I can’t help feeling that Churchill is rotating slowly about 6 foot down. This is the Xtra Factor. A show so completely incendiary it requires five minutes of filler at the start of Wallaby prating about in a very small car. Much in the same way Jeremy Clarkson prated about in the same model of tiny car on Top Gear. Still, they say imitation is highest form of flattery. Xtra Factor has a different format this year: we are now shown auditions we haven’t already seen, both successful and not, as well as the usual mush of morons’ extended auditions from the main show.

And after this dubious intro, we have a brief mingle with judges. Wallaby claims that Louis Walsh patted her on the arse. The slo-mo clearly shows his hand made contact with her back. Even if Louis did pat her on the arse it would be because he’d mistaken her for Ronan Keating. The pat being a prelude to a cheeky rub, one suspects.

Then the parade of morons and mentalists begins. “These are all the great bits you didn’t get to see”, they say. I seem to remember The Simpson’s Troy McClure saying something along the lines of “if that’s what they cut out, what they leave in must be pure gold!”before pulling a rictus grin. Wallaby seems to be constantly pulling the same face. A group of giggling, middle-aged “big booby women” (Wallaby’s words) audition for the judges. Wallaby takes some Polaroids to match them up with for Simon. They sing a doo-woop number. It’s ok, actually. Simon says they sound like something from a Tupperware party. What kind of Tupperware parties does Simon attend? Has Simon ever attended a Tupperware party? Well yes, one with doo-woop group, I suppose. Wallaby says they’re more “Ann Summers than Tupperware.” I vomit into my mouth.

Wallaby sits down for a chinwag with professional beard Cheryl Cole. “I don’t know I got in the band,” she says, referring to her time on Popstars: The Rivals. I know why she got in: they needed someone pretty to balance out the ginger one. Wallaby fires out some more nonsense about what it takes to be an idol: “You need to be original, attractive, focused…” My Leon score card remains blank. “You need to want to be Michael Buble, whilst having a complete black hole of a personality.” She doesn’t say this. One auditionee blames his terrible performance on being on antibiotics. He’s taking them for some festering STD, I’d imagine. He can’t concentrate due to the itching and oozing pus. I made this bit up. Mock him! Mock him!

We’re back in Cardiff for the auditions. Tom Jones is the infuriatingly obvious choice of music. “We’ll settle for Charlotte Church,” says Louis, probably secretly dreaming of Gavin Henson. A girl band from Cornwall, called Satin Dolls (creepy name), who describe themselves as “a jazzy version of the Beach Boys” sing a vaguely jazzy choral number. The judges don’t like it. It’s OK. “They were amazing,” enthuses Wallaby. She persuades the judges to give them a second chance. A whiff of cheesey stagey-ness emits from my TV. The girls get their second chance. It’s agreed that they’ll sing “Umbrella” on their return. The band isn’t privy to this discussion. Presumably they know the words. Tough luck if they don’t. This all seems very fishy. A mentally ill woman who “sings jingles” is next. She attempts to sing Bohemian Rhapsody. It’s abysmal. “Sing the jingles then,” says Simon. Said women launches into the theme from Only Fools and Horses. It’s equally terrible and furthermore not a jingle. The judges laugh. The mentally ill woman slopes off to rub cats with bacon or something equally demented. I laugh then feel sorry for her. Why do the all crazies come out of the woodwork for this show? I’m worried that the rate of mental illness in this country is much higher than statistics suggest.

We then get the scary looking guy from the main X-Factor show that sang Bootylicious and did a frightening dance. He looks like one of the Lone Gunmen from X-Files crossed with the one from the Chemical Brothers that isn’t boffing Lily Allen (good choice, Mr Chemical). Satin Dolls return. They launch into “Umbrella”. It’s about the same level as their previous effort. The judges put them through. My beard grows itchy. Dermot says that Holly is now their leader. Presumably she’ll drag them out to Chinawhites with Fearne Cotton and da crew. They’ll all get tattoos and start relationships with z-list indy rockers. Lucky Satin Dolls.

The shows returns. “It’s more revealing than Britney Spears getting out a car,” croaks Wallaby. A chubby girl with thick northern accent sings “Summertime” from some musical. I don’t know which one as I’m not gay. It’s pretty bad. “I’ll try again,” she says. “No, forget about your dream” Simon says, possibly whilst stabbing a small voodoo doll in the heart under the table. The girl doesn’t understand. “I’ll come back,” she says. “No, don’t,” says Walsh.

Louis then does limericks. He rhymes “Simon” with “high, man” not releasing that this just sounds like “hymen”. Louis doesn’t know what a hymen is though, having had no experience with that sort of thing. It’s like asking a mechanic to fix your PC – they’ll just give you a funny look and scratch their head before attempting to jam a spanner in the disk drive. “It’s the end of the show,” announces Wallaby, Simon says “horrific” on the montage of the next show. I concur, Cowell. I concur.