With hosts Alie Ward, Zainab Johnson and Sammy Obeid, 100 Humans seeks to answer some of humanity’s more bizarre questions, with entertaining and amusing results.

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The premise of 100 Humans is simple. 100 human beings, of a range of ethnicities, ages and sexual orientations, are subjected to a variety of experiments to try and answer some common questions/adages. Is it particularly scientific? Absolutely not, but the results are still quite surprising, and definitely entertaining.

To give you an example of the kinds of things that are being investigated here, the first episode is entitled What Makes Us Attractive?. Within this episode, it is investigated whether being a good dancer is indeed indicative of whether you are more fertile; whether people in uniform are more attractive; if being attractive gets you a more lenient sentencing in court; and whether being funny makes you more attractive. They are interesting enough questions, especially for the first episode, and the answers are equally as fascinating, though obviously you have to take any conclusions that the show makes with a grain of salt. Further episodes also conduct experiments like “is criticism or encouragement a more powerful motivator?” and investigating everybody’s innate biases.

Accompanying each of the experiments are conversations with experts in the field who contextualise and explain the results in relation to how this would make sense within the brain. Coming from a psychological background myself, I did find this particularly interesting, even if it was fairly rudimentary and condensed science.

Some of the experiments are downright silly, and you do just have to laugh. Episodes revolving around what the best age is, for example, and which sex is more successful (though the multitasking experiment was particularly amusing) are meant to be more entertaining than they are to be taken seriously, but it’s still a dreadfully amusing and diverting watch.

At times, the show can be slightly uncomfortable. An experiment that examines the ingrained prejudices within the participants is almost shocking to watch in a way, and highly uncomfortable for the participants to confront, but it is certainly thought provoking to the audience.

What’s even more delightful about it is the sense of familiarity the viewer gets with each of the human participants as the time goes on. Even though there are 100, there are so many wonderful personalities that shine through, and you find yourself smiling at the TV saying, “Oh, of course Human 28 would do that. Human 28 is delightful.” Note: Human 28 is a genuine ray of sunshine, and if you don’t believe me, watch 100 Humans, and tell me that I am wrong.

In conclusion, 100 Humans is a genuinely enjoyable watch, which answers questions you didn’t even know that you had, and certainly gives you a lot of interesting information to digest. It is entirely for fun and does not take itself too seriously, which is a perfect tonic for all of us in these trying and stressful times. In case you’re in need of further convincing, or want a nice preview to what you will experience while watching 100 Humans, have a watch of the trailer below.