The Nine Network has joined the “synergy programming” approach to TV scheduling that has been dominated by the Ten Network. Ten is currently fattening us up this winter with MasterChef Australia (with an afternoon assist from Ready Steady Cook and Huey’s Cooking). Late next summer it will start another series of The Biggest Loser, where we can sit and watch others losing our weight for us, and the Dance Australia program, which will portray what fit, healthy young people can really do when they don’t watch cooking programs.

Now the Nine Network has programmed its new show Trouble in Paradise on Thursdays at 8.30pm, right after Getaway. Nine says the new program is “a gripping new docu-drama series that tells the stories of Australian travellers who have been subjected to terrifying experiences while on holidays in different parts of the world before escaping with their lives.” Will Getaway survive this trip to the dark side of travel? I bet trips recommended in a Getaway item won’t be mentioned on the new program. Will Nine go the whole hog and do a quasi legal reality show: ‘How I was stuck in hell when I tried to get my money back from Qantas?’ Would working for the Nine Network qualify as a Trouble in Paradise story?