Terry Prone: How 'Operation Transformation' became unacceptable

The RTÉ series has been cancelled after 17 seasons. The factor that made it work was shame. Once it went soft and supportive, 'Operation Transformation' was dead on the weighing scales

Kathryn Thomas (centre) and the 2024 Operation Transformation team.

Operation Transformation was the TV equivalent of the classic photograph of a woman — 90% of the time it was a woman  —standing inside the jeans she’d worn when she was four sizes larger, holding out the waistband to demonstrate how big she had once been.

The factor that made it work, in the early days, was shame.