Farmer Wants a Wife and he may be handsome enough to find one too

Here we are for the 16 th season of Australia's favourite agriculture-related dating show, Farmer Wants a Wife . It's just not fair to the other ladies, especially when they bring the farmers home to visit. This year the hopes and dreams of the entire Illawarra region are being carried by Carly Foster. She's an IVF nurse which will come in handy on the landy - whether you're cropping or stocking, fertilisation is where it all begins. Her expertise will be vital this year as right from the beginning, we see some of the farmers don't know what they're doing. It's weird because for years FWAW has thrived on the duality embodied by blokes who are great on the land but a bit less polished with the ladies. Farmer Jason has a shaggy ... is it a cow or a sheep? This year it's been reversed: here's Dylan, who is described as a sheep farmer, and who leads off by saying "the cowboy life that I'm leading seems somewhat lonely". If he hasn't figured out how to tell the sheep from the cows I predict an extended period of loneliness ahead for Dylan. Next up is Farmer Jason, who likes being filmed with big machines. We think that's what he farms: rusty trucks. But he is perplexed - that old Land Rover Jason planted east of his house still isn't growing. Jason wonders why that Land Rover he planted still isn't growing. So he sits on it with his dog and dreams of one day sitting on it with a girl. Zac is an apple farmer who seems to have a particular talent for making fruit go away. He's borrowed a neighbour's orchard for some shots with apples. Then there's Alex, who's described as a "Beef and mushroom farmer". That's not a job, that's a dish. The young man farms pies. But fear not: he's from Queensland, not Gippsland. No beef Wellington massacre later in the series as Alex needs to clear some suitors. City cirls meet city girls. Everyone meets at some Hunter Valley wedding venue for the first round of speed dates and rejections. City girls meet girls with some high-pitched wooos and hugs like they have known each other forever. Country boys keep their distance from each other, leaning on things for a few rounds of cliche talk, giving nothing away. Situation normal. Intimacy, country boy style. These boys may not know a sheep from a cow but at least they're the best looking crop of farmers we have seen in 16 series. Jarrad swaggers in and sweeps Dylan off his feet. Dylan makes it clear he thinks Farmer Jarred is pretty handsome. Host Natalie Gruzlewski arrives and confirms these are the "hottest farmers ever". Handsome Alex meets Handsome Dylan. Jarrad has a similar effect on the ladies. Our Carly looks him up and down and declares him gorgeous. Farmer Alex is a creative type who likes designing grand gestures on dates. He loves working with mushrooms because they're weird. He later says he wants to concentrate on an "intellectual connection" with the ladies. Weird indeed. They all go off on some dates and walk past Alex's grave which is a sad way to start, at the end. Of this life. RIP Farmer Alex. That's his ghost leadng the ladies around. They come across a shaggy cow and no wonder Dylan gets confused. In fairness to the young fellow, he calls himself a cowboy because he's an actual bronco rider at rodeos. We see some "speed dates" from farmers Dylan and Alex. There's the blindfold chocolate testing and some leather armchair gravitas scenes. Dylan, Jason and Alex choose five ladies to take home for the real shenanigans to begin. But we're going to have to wait until the next episode to see how Carly goes with Farmer Jarrad. Some nice moments are teased but of course we have to draw this out for months. So, until tomorrow ... Farmer Wants a Wife screens on Channel Seven and steams on 7Plus.