The X Factor (ITV1)

He's Having A Baby (BBC1)

can see myself with my name in lights," said singer Sarah before her audition for The X Factor. Unhappily for her, it wasn't her name up there in lights but the sign saying EXIT as judges Simon Cowell, Sharon Osbourne and Louis Walsh put an end to her dreams of stardom.

She didn't take rejection well, dissolving into tears. Her mother, sister and fiancee fell to their knees and begged the judges to give her another chance. "They've just thrown my daughter's life away," said her mother melodramatically.

You'd think by now that talent show hopefuls would be prepared for the judges' often-cruel remarks. But no, they queue up in their thousands - 75,000 for this series - to be criticised, humiliated and told they're talentless. Even Tony Blair made an unexpected appearance outside the audition hall. He wasn't looking for another job once he gives up being PM, but what fun if he'd picked up his guitar and given the judges a song.

As he went off to a meeting in the same building, he left the would-be stars to their fate as the good, the bad and the nutters paraded before the judges who needs to find 50 acts to send to "boot camp", with just 12 earning places in the final rounds.

"If we don't find an international artist this year, I will have failed," declared Cowell. The signs of achieving this aren't good. It's easy to see why the judges get short-tempered and irritable. Faced with the shower on whom they have to pass judgement, anyone would get exasperated. "No offence, you're pathetic," Cowell told one contestant. A burly security man had to remove duo Spirit And Destiny after they refused to take rejection on the grounds that they were "great for cabaret but not for recording".

A 51-year-old dairy farmed called Justin was told he sang like a six-year-old girl, with Walsh adding that he'd like to see him sing in a dress. Next day Justin arrived as Justine, looking like a poor man's drag queen but winning a place in the next round.

Craziest of all was Howard who announced he would sing a duet with John Lennon. Walsh pointed out the flaw in this arrangement - Lennon was dead. Howard proceeded anyway. "You're barking," said Osbourne. Who wouldn't agree with her? What I couldn't go along with was her comment that the show is "not about us, it's about them", meaning the performers. The bickering among the judges is often more entertaining than the contestants. Cowell and Walsh have already had one falling out and I suspect - no, I hope - there will be more rows over the next 20 weeks.

We knew exactly what to expect from He's Having A Baby as it focuses on eight first-time dads. This enabled presenter Davina McCall to joke about following them from here to paternity, but the reason for the series eludes me. She promised "no singing, no dancing, no panel of judges and no-one is voted out". She might also have added that the show has no point.

The dads-to-be - described as "the unsung heroes of childbirth" - are given tasks to prepare them for fatherhood, including looking after a new-born baby for two weeks and watching film of a woman giving birth. Reducing fatherhood to a Saturday night entertainment show is neither desirable or interesting to watch.