Hair begins with a load of people telling us they’re, 'just so passionate' about follicle management, when, oddly, at least half of them are wearing hats. Would you trust someone to be good at hair if their own was such a disaster that they felt they’d better cover it up with a Tamera Mowry style joke shop bowler? I wouldn’t. But Steve Jones, who is both the Mel and the Sue of Hair is clearly much more of an optimist than me.
Hair could not rip off The Great British Bake Off any harder if it were called The Hreat Hritish Hake Off. Unfortunately it becomes clear quite early on that looking at bad barnets is nowhere near as fun as drooling all over a load of slightly burned concept macaroons. The first challenge is to make a quiff, which Steve Jones defines as, 'a thick lock of hair brushed away from the forehead that must stand at least 7cm high.' Bowler-hat wearing Kobi beams, 'I can definitely do a quiff to my standard,' inadvertently gesturing between his legs as he beams and implying that his standard is his special name for the contents of his pants.
Celebrity hairdresser Alain, who is qualified to judge because he’s cut David Beckham’s hair at some point, is judging the quiffs with a comb that was possibly used by wicked kings and cardinals to force peasants into pig theft confessions in medieval times. 'Careful, that model’s bleeding!' says Steve Jones as Alain prods forcefully, and we’re not entirely sure that he’s joking. The model belonging to Amy, a beautician who specialises in wedding hair, is one of the first to feel the sharp end of the comb. It’s clear that Amy’s ‘do, while beautiful, has more height and texture than a relief map of East Anglia. It’s the Hair version of Bake Off 's Howard accidentally using sand instead of Bicarbonate of Soda. The best Bake Off copy cat moment is the history bit when we all learn about Teddy Boys, whose widespread adoption of the quiff caused a moral panic in the early part of the twentieth century. I would quite like a whole BBC4 series on 'The hair that made people ANGRY!' covering everything from 17th century Euro wig decadence to pube maintenance. Commissioners, are you reading?
For the next challenge, the hairy huddle must have a go at one length hair. 'I am so glad she cannot feel, so I can be rough with her!' hisses scary Dominica. I quite like Dominica and her pom poms. Nothing says 'fashion maverick' like Christmas earrings that have clearly been purchased from a Shell garage. Nurse Annie is less confident. 'My hands are really, really shaky,' she murmurs. DUDE! YOU GIVE INJECTIONS PROFESSIONALLY! WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU? 'There’s no margin of error here,' she adds. BUT THERE’S A MARGIN OF ERROR WHEN YOU WORK IN A HOSPITAL AND YOU’RE TRYING TO MAKE SURE NO-ONE DIES? JESUS.
The star of the task is Marvin, whose Girls World head hair falls back into place immaculately no matter how hard Alain shakes it. He’s also given it a bloody brilliant blow dry. 'I think I’ve done the best,' he says sweetly, and he has. He wins the task, and the chance to choose his hair for the next round. 'We need you to use all the hair we have provided for you!' warns Alain, sounding most sinister. He’s a little bit Vidal Sassoon and a lot Brad Pitt in Inglourious Basterds going scalping.
The final task is a creative one. They have to use their models to create fairytale hair. Marvin’s is 'a princess of the woods, she lives in a tree house…' Self described ‘Disney character’ Laura’s is 'Snow Queen, Lord Of The Rings, Game of Thrones…' Guys, these sound lovely, but they’re not actual fairytales, are they? The creative bit of the task doesn’t start with making up your own fairy story. Kobi’s concept is my favourite - he’s gone for a 4ft unicorn horn of hair - but the judges aren’t impressed by the fact that his poor model can barely stand up because her head is now as heavy as her body. Annie’s stunning Snow Queen hair wins, and Wedding Hair Amy gets sent home because, as Alain gently points out, her quiff was flat, her straight cut was wet and wonky and her Rapunzel ‘do was just a load of flowers that had been wanged in the back of a bun. Amy graciously bows out, saying, 'it’s the right decision,' - but I feel sad for her because she won’t be on the next show, where they will be making hats out of hair. We leave them, hoping harder than we have ever hoped for anything, that Kobi’s bowler is not a £24.99 Topman job and is actually carefully styled and growing out of his own head.
Follow Daisy Buchanan on Twitter @Notrollergirl
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.