Unless you’ve been living under a rock on a deserted island these past few weeks, you’re sure to have somehow stumbled across the nation’s most guilty obsession, ITV2’s Love Island. The fourth series of the highly successful reality show, pulled in a whooping 3.4 million viewers whilst on air at 9pm on July 4th, leaving ITV2 with it’s highest ever viewing figures on record.
So what’s so great about Love Island, isn’t it just another dating show?
Yes but it’s not your typical dating show, a group of carefully selected 20-something year old’s are placed into a villa in Majorca, Spain, for roughly 6 weeks where they get to know their fellow islanders, facing daily challenges, new faces and a TON OF DRAMA, in a bid to meet the love of their lives’. Every move they make in the villa is filmed and the public ultimately vote for their favourite couple to win the show.. Oh and the winning couple also bag themselves a whopping £50,000.
While the binge-worthy show has been extremely successful in becoming a daily ritual for it’s millions of viewers, for the past few years it’s thrived on being authentic and praised itself for it’s accurate represention of the islander’s day-to-day lives. However, this year, the show has recieved a lot of slack with claims the show is scripted, as clips of poorly edited footage have began to surface online, causing uproar amongst fans left to question how such a popular, high budgeted show, can make such huge mistakes when it comes to editing and continuity.
One of the biggest upset’s this year was ‘Kisssgate‘. ITV2’s Love Island also has a sister-show, Love Island Aftersun, also hosted by Caroline Flack, which airs straight after Sunday night’s episode at 10pm and involves a panel of celebrity guests reviewing the show’s weekly antics and catching up on the latest gossip from the villa.
On a recent episode of the show, eagle- eyed viewer’s spotted a massive error in continuity which involved two islanders, Jack Fowler and Georgia Steel. The pair were filmed on a date and involved in a soon-to-be controversial kiss that was apparently staged. Footage of them snogging was shown from completely different camera angles on both Love Island and Love Island Aftersun – so it had to have been filmed twice.
‘Kissgate’ has left producers in a tizzy and now a former contestant has added gas to the flames. Speaking to Daily Mail Online, Georgia ( who has now left the show) has admitted that the kiss was filmed twice with the following statement;
‘There was so much going on in the day I didn’t really know what was going on at that time I just kind of do what I wanna do and they get different angles,’
‘I honestly don’t remember. I have no idea because there’s so much going on then I’m just focusing on how many times I’ve gotta do whatever I’ve gotta do. Was it more than twice? Yeah,’
‘At the end of the day it’s a television programme but if anyone was real it that villa it’s me and I was completely how I am, I did what I feel.’
‘It is a TV programme, things have to get filmed in different angles to get put on television, that’s how television works. But, nothing is fake, nothing is said that is staged, it’s all to do with how you feel.’
Although the Love Island team have not yet released a statement, it’s fair to say that viewers have been left extremely unhappy. Lets hope that these findings aren’t detrimental to the future success of the show.
Maybe it’s time for us fans to come to terms that what we’ve thought to be genuine and real for the past month is actually fake and rehearsed ( slowly wipes away tears ). On a side note, it looks like Georgia will definately make her dreams a reality in pursuing a career in acting, this won’t be the last we’ll see of her that’s for sure! Much love!
