I’m with cupid: which is the best TV dating show to find true love?
You’re spoilt for choice when it comes to dating shows in 2021, but is there a formula to finding your perfect match on screen?
July 2020
Reality checked
Love is on the air: why we can't get enough of romantic reality shows
From First Dates to a glut of new Netflix releases, TV continues to woo us with a constant stream of couples dating, marrying – and even breaking up
February 2020
Names in the news
Emily Eavis: a fighter against the great rock’n’roll festival swindle
Rebecca Nicholson
No more likey, no more lighty! Farewell to the brilliant Take Me Out
October 2019
Brash, naff and brainless: why Take Me Out is the only dating show we need
Paddy McGuinness’s gameshow – which returns this weekend for its 11th run – remains a welcome relief from the real world
March 2019
Smut shaming: the grim future of 'educational' sex TV
With two new shows on the horizon, Sex Tape and Sex on the Couch, what TMI horrors might we expect next?
September 2018
Dogs, hypnotism and full-frontal nudity: how dating shows got weird
In the era of Blind Date, finding ‘the one’ on TV was a simple proposition. Now, in the digital age, things have become more complicated...
September 2015
From Blind Date to First Dates: how TV matchmaking grew up
Whether it’s the pulling sprees of Geordie Shore or the fly-on-the-wall intimacy of First Dates, today’s matchmaking TV shows go further than ever into the nitty-gritty of dating. Follow us on a journey to the Isle of Fernando’s – and beyond
January 2014
TV and radio blog
Take Me Out is still Saturday night TV at its best
Stuart Heritage: The sixth series of Take Me Out is a tonic for the most depressing time of the year – but the new twist is unnecessarily mean
January 2013
TV and radio blog
How Take Me Out became must-watch TV
Julia Raeside: It might be brash and in-your-face, but the clever format of ITV dating show Take Me Out makes it a worthy successor to Blind Date
March 2012
TV and radio blog
Take Me Out: Finding its heart at last?
TV review
TV review: The Love Machine; Take Me Out; Come Date With Me
January 2012
Take Me Out's tabloid attention fails to lift ratings
ITV's Saturday night dating show falls short of the 5 million mark despite rarely being out of the papers. By John Plunkett
Take Me Out: ITV urges review after man with assault conviction takes part
Broadcaster blames production company as escort appears on dating show just months after row over Red or Black? winner. By Mark Sweney
Take Me Out: backstage with Paddy McGuinness and the girls
Like Blind Date in its pomp, ITV1's dating show is fun pre-pub telly, and its contestants are refreshingly real
February 2011
TV review
TV review: South Riding, Sheila Hancock Brushes Up: The Art of Watercolours, Take Me Out
Sam Wollaston on the weekend's TV: Welcome to 1930s Yorkshire, where there's a sexual frisson in the cattle barn
January 2011
TV OD
Grace Dent's TV OD: Take Me Out
Take Me Out suggests that Saturday night dating fever has moved on a bit since Cilla sorted out all those blind dates in the 90s
December 2010
TV and radio blog
Take Me Out: worth a second date?
TV review
TV review: Take Me Out
January 2010
TV and radio blog
Take Me Out: making Blind Date look like Brideshead Revisited
Stuart Heritage: X Factor firmly established ITV as the home of Saturday night entertainment – so what could possibly dislodge its crown? Take Me Out perhaps?
