Bear Grylls: Mission Survive – what does Bear think of the celebrity contestants?

Bear Grylls has offered his famous survival skills to a new ITV reality show, Mission Survive, which could be summed up as Man vs Wild meets I'm a Celebrity - with added danger.

The first series has eight celebrities face a challenging 12-day rainforest expedition in Costa Rica. Below, Grylls gives his verdict on each contestant.

VOGUE WILLIAMS (DJ and model, 29)
“She arrived with the biggest vanity case, and a few of the crew were saying, ‘She’s not going to make it!’ But she’s actually tough and incredibly bright. She’s very practical and didn’t have an ego — those things count for so much in the jungle.”

EMILIA FOX (Actor, 40)

“She did herself very proud. When she arrived, I thought, ‘She’s going to die!’ But she had an incredible steely determination. In fact, out of everyone, she never hesitated in the big moments. Ask her to eat a tarantula, and she’d do it — bam, bam, bam!”

LAURENCE FOX (Actor - and Emilia’s cousin - 36)

“He’s a classic old-school Brit. His sort of character is the reason we won the war. He’s a stoic with a wonderful dark sense of humour. When times were very tough, that sustained him and others. He’s a quiet, understated character, a leader and a real morale-booster.”

JAMELIA (Singer, 34)

“You’d think Jamelia would be out of her depth in the jungle. She arrived with all sorts of make-up. She was thrown in at the deep end and had a lot of fears to face, but never once did she back down.”

TOM ROSENTHAL (Actor/comedian, 27)

“He was such a fish out of water, but he’s the nicest guy in the world and has an amazing sense of humour. When it was very grim, he made everyone laugh. He also learnt very fast. So though he lacked confidence he improvised and overcame his problems.”

MIKE TINDALL (Former England rugby captain, 36)

“He’s a great team player. He’s humble and hard-working and has a great brain and heart. But you make assumptions about people with big muscles at your peril — the jungle doesn’t work like that. If that’s all you’ve got, look out!

MAX GEORGE (Singer, 26)

“He’s young and very fit. He has a great recovery rate, which matters. He could keep going like the Duracell Bunny. But his greatest asset was his enthusiasm. He’d grown up loving these sorts of shows and thought, ‘Bring it on!’”

KELLY HOLMES (Former athlete, 44)

“She’s a former soldier who is tough and fit. But she had never been to the jungle before, so she was well out of her comfort zone. But she was cheerful and worked very hard. She used the qualities that had taken her to the top of her field.”

Bear Grylls: Mission Survive begins on Friday 20 February at 9pm on ITV

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