Earth’s Wildest Waters: The Big Fish, BBC2, review: Great British Fish-off is kept afloat by the contestants

The premise of the program presented by Ben Fogle and 'legendary' fishing expert Matt Hayes sucks – the show doesn't

Ben Fogle presents BBC Two’s enjoyable ‘Earth’s Wildest Waters: The Big Fish’ (BBC)

If I was to make a list of things I don’t ever want to do, it would most likely feature the bullet points “gouge my own eyes out” and “choose which friend to eat first in order to survive”. And, until last night, “watch a TV show about fishing” would have fallen somewhere between those two.

But that was before I’d seen Earth’s Wildest Waters: The Big Fish.

Presented by Ben Fogle and “legendary” fishing expert Matt Hayes, it’s a sort of reality TV fish-off. The premise sucks. But surprisingly, the show didn’t. The series began last week with a fly-fishing contest in Iceland, which saw one amateur angler eliminated. This week, they travelled to Cuba for some of the world’s “most extreme” fishing – and, as it turned out, weather.

From blazing sunshine to electric storms and full-on downpours, Cuba had it all.

It also had spectacular landscapes, crystal clear waters and a plethora of exotic fish. This week’s competitions included catching bonefish on salt flats, going out into the Bay of Pigs on local tyre tube boats, and trying to catch giant tarpon (known as the silver king) on the Atlantic coast.

Each challenge starts with Fogle shouting for the contestants to “go fish”, then they have a set time to catch as much as they can. Expert Matt and his local guides then judge them on technique and catch, and at the end of the show someone is sent home.

It is definitely the people and not the premise that kept this show afloat (ahem). Matt, with his broad West Midland twang, was endearing and engaging. And Geordie contestant James was a delight. A giant of a man, covered in a selection of questionable tattoos and piercings, his eyes literally lit up with excitement every time he so much as mentioned a fish, never mind caught one.

I liked Emma best of all though. A woman so posh she makes Ben Fogle look like Ray Winstone, she sounded like Clarissa Dickson Wright’s younger, better-educated sister. She also described herself as a Wangler (that’s Woman Angler). And Jo was awesome. She fished in hot pants and flip-flops and rarely seemed to catch anything. But hey, she looked good doing it.