In an oddly jaunty new documentary, ‘plus-sized pilgrims’ travel the world to get dieting tips. It seemed like we’d put the years of shaming weight-loss shows behind us. Until now

In theory, over the many meetings that lead to television concepts coming to screen, a series about how the rest of the world consumes and relates to food should have had plenty of meat on its bones, so to speak. But you can probably tell from the punning title that Around the World in 80 Weighs is not that kind of documentary. It’s a shame, as the age of weight-loss television seemed to be behind us. After years of TV shows about what you should and shouldn’t eat, what your poo should and shouldn’t look like, whether you should get liposuction or not and here’s how to cinch your waist to look thinner, it felt as if this sort of television was over.

Yet here it is again, refashioned but not quite enough to disguise it completely. Six “larger than life” participants – the show’s words, not mine – are sent off on a 30,000-mile trip around the world, across four continents, where they are tasked with undertaking a “fact-finding mission”. The idea is that they will find out how food factors into the daily lives of people raised in nations with different attitudes to body image and appetite, when compared with the cultural norms of the UK.