Australia's Taskmaster gets off to a strong start

Series remade with Tom Gleeson as host

The Australian version of Taskmaster got off to a strong start last night, coming third in its timeslot for audience numbers.

The show drew 360,000 viewers to Channel 10 across the nation’s cities – a decent showing against the ratings warhorse Married at First Sight, which attracted 704,000.

Tom Gleeson has taken over the title role established by Greg Davies with Tom Cashman as his sidekick, while the contestants are Jimmy Rees, Luke McGregor, Nina Oyama, Danielle Walker and Julia Morris.

Gleeson has already tried to dub his sidekick ‘Lesser Tom’ in a similar way that the 6ft 2in series creator is ‘Little’ Alex Horne in the UK.

In an interview with the Guardian this week, Gleeson said: ‘It feels a little bit like we were given the keys to a Ferrari that someone else had built and we just sat in it and drove it.

‘Often when you host a big TV show, usually there’s an element of stress or responsibility. But this just felt like a fun Sunday drive – in a Ferrari built by Alex Horne.’

The show has been remade in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Spain, Finland, Croatia, Belgium, Portugal, Canada and New Zealand – but the Australian cast have been set new challenges to stop them cheating by watching other versions.

Here's are a couple of trailers giving an idea of some of the tasks:

Do you think Nina Oyama outsmarted the Taskmaster?#TaskmasterAU premieres 7.30 Thursday on 10 and 10 Play. pic.twitter.com/WmlErIwzCg
— Taskmaster Australia (@TaskMasterAU) January 27, 2023

It's comedians vs balloon... Also lowkey impressed by @jimmyrees's lung capacity. #TaskMasterAU @_tomcashman @Ladyjmo #taskmaster #comedy pic.twitter.com/kZFjuW0Y3G
— Taskmaster Australia (@TaskMasterAU) February 3, 2023