WTF! off

Back in July we noted the announcement of WTF!, a send-up of fast-paced entertainment news shows created by ex-Chaser member Charles Firth. We were fairly sceptical about whether this show would be any good or not, and after two weeks of episodes on GO! (and the thecompleteandutter channel on YouTube) it seems were right to be so.

WTF! isn’t a “unlike anything seen on Australian television”, as TV website The Tube claimed it would be, more an attempt at parodying entertainment news shows which is so cack-handed and unfunny that you’re left wondering if it’s entertainment news fan fiction. Sure, the sketches get the look and feel of the kind of bullshit celebrity news stories they’re trying to send-up right, but when people like Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton are out there in the real world doing far sillier stuff than WTF! seems able to dream up, then the question is why bother?

There’s also pretty much no attempt to satirise the facile dreadfulness and all pervading influence of celebrity news culture, but given that any attempt to go down that path would probably be as painful as the rest of the show, that’s probably a good thing.

Occasionally there’ll be some bit of background business from one of the performers that raises a smile, but overall WTF! looks like the sketches from Hungry Beast without the earnest reports about military robotics technology surrounding them. And that isn’t a sign of quality – that’s a waste of time.