As Alone Australia arrives on Netflix, and you inevitably start Googling the contestants, keep in mind that the 12-episode first season of this Alone spin-off originally aired in 2023 on the Australian network SBS. Because you don’t want to know in advance who won the survival contest and who tapped out via satellite phone, do you? Otherwise, the rules here are the same. 10 participants, with ten chosen items, plus their clothing and a bin full of cameras and microphones, will self-document their attempt to survive on their own in an unforgiving environment. There is no limit to how long this might last, and the person who beats out the competition walks out of the backcountry $250,000 richer. So who’s got what it takes? Will the rainfall, the cold temps, and the radical shifts in elevation of Tasmania’s west coast do them in? Or will it be the isolation that messes with their minds?
Opening Shot: As the Alone team delivers the ten contestants to their respective wilderness zones via flat-bottom boat, cameras capture the west coast of Tasmania in all its rough, mossy, riverine glory. “We’re strangers in a strange land,” one participant observes.
The Gist: This is all standard operating procedure for Alone, established over the flagship survival reality show’s 11 seasons, and the Australian edition’s competitors represent a mix of occupations typical to the series. They are hunting guides, bushcraft knowers, solo adventurers, biologists, rewilding facilitators, wildlife officers – all of them “trained survival experts,” as an opening disclaimer declares. But no matter the level of training, as they’re dropped on the marshy, muddy shoreline of a vast inland waterway, everybody’s boots immediately sink into the muck. Alone Australia, like the original, immediately leans into challenges of the land as a leveling agent.
Building a shelter is the first goal, getting a fire going second, and locating food third. (Shit gets real: everybody immediately notes the amount and type of scat in their areas.) All ten contestants included a ferrocerium sparking device among their chosen items, and fire is absolutely key. Not only for warmth, but to boil water for safe drinking. Thing is, though, it rains 250 days a year in western Tasmania. Everything is soaked, all the time, which includes the people and the wood that’s supposed to fuel their fires. No bow hunting allowed in Tasmania, either – only live trapping for food. Towering 500-year-old trees might drop deadly branches onto simple bough-and-tarpaulin shelters. And staying warm and dry is imperative, especially as each decision made compares to calorie count. Simply shivering consumes valuable calories that will need to be replenished through unpredictable exertion.
“The only way to truly be at home in the wild is to have humility,” says Gina, 52, “and realize that nature is going to break every single one of us open.” As shelters are fashioned, night sets in, and with it the onset of pelting rain and freezing temperatures. Michael, 43, spreads ferns as a bed. Beck, 42, worries about “where my head might go.” Peter, 31, reflects on his hunting skills as reason enough for him to win. And Chris, 39, calls the Alone experience a mind game as much as a survival game. Night-vision cameras capture contestants’ wide eyes as the Tasmanian devils begin to scream.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Alone Australia joins other international spin-offs for the reality series – Denmark’s Alene i vildmarken (“Alone in the Wilderness”) has eight seasons under its belt, while the franchise also has outposts in Norway, Germany, Netherlands, Finland, and the UK. But what if you were in the wilderness, but not exactly alone? In the Netflix series Outlast, competitors team up to tame the Alaskan wilderness.
Our Take: Neither the original Alone nor spin-offs such as Alone Australia give a crap about updating the format of this durable reality franchise. There will not be later players – ringers – added to the game. (Dr. Will Kirby isn’t gonna suddenly appear from behind a mossy tree.) There is no interaction with or even observation from any outside hosts. And in the Alone reality experience, the only challenges are what each contestant presents to themselves in their solitary quests for what is elemental to their survival: shelter, warmth, food, and fresh water. The bells and whistles that tend to be a part of the reality industry are nowhere in sight, and as viewers, we are rewarded by that silence. The environment these people have been dropped into asks the same of them as it does of us: You’re here, so now what? The only answer is to make it through the next night.
And that inspires questions as we watch the competitors. Their training has prepared them – but only to a point. As we see them succeed and fail in unequal measure, we can’t help but try and game the problems, too, and wonder how long we might last in such a competition. For a series with solitary existences at its center, Alone Australia is a remarkably full watch, because every victory is to be celebrated – starting a fire with wet wood is no little task – and every mishap becomes potentially massive. It’s no wonder most of the participants, no matter their wilderness savvy, keep close the sat phone that represents their extraction.
Sex and Skin: None.
Parting Shot: In scenes to come from Alone Australia, what permeates is a sense of contestants determined to endure their misery. “It’s like a camp trip from hell, where you just can’t leave.”
Sleeper Star: Chris’s cameras and mics capture his solo wilderness progress, but also his sense of humor, which seems irrepressible despite the conditions. [Chris, while listening to its incessant patter on his shelter]: “Go home, rain! You’re drunk!”
Most Pilot-y Line: “There’s no crew, there’s no producers, there’s zero contact with the outside world,” Mike says in a pre-taped interview. “I can’t believe that I’m gonna do this. It’s going to be so good, and so bad. Probably at the same time.”
Our Call: Stream It! The inhospitable wilds of Tasmania’s west coast present unique environmental challenges for the contestants on Alone Australia. They’re as prepared as they can be for the physical and mental rigors of surviving on their own. But nature is always ready to punch them in the face.
Johnny Loftus (@glennganges) is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift.
