Welcome to the Australian Tumbleweeds Awards 2025. Our readers have been voting for the best and worst of Australian comedies of 2025, and you can find the results below, but first, here’s a reminder of the 2025 comedy year that was…
Every year with Australian comedy the baseline gets that much lower. We never really get a shocker of a year – there’s too many reliable favorites ticking along for that – but unless things get noticeably better, then they’re getting worse. Things did not get noticeably better in 2025.
Even in recent years, which were all average at best, there was usually something (often Fisk) that stood out from the pack. We need that kind of thing – something fresh and new that’s clearly head and shoulders above what surrounds it – every single year if Australian comedy isn’t going to slowly die. We did not get a show like that in 2025.
That’s not to say there weren’t good shows out there. But they’re all the kind of thing we should be building on: Have You Been Paying Attention? led to The Cheap Seats, which led to… a revival of Thank God You’re Here which seems to have been axed. Fair enough, that happens – but when that’s all that happens, things have gone off the boil.
We’re so used to Australian comedy being unexciting that we don’t realise that being unexciting is what’s going to kill it. The good shows are closer to the end of their run than the beginning; the new shows get axed before they can get better. Only Austin, which increasingly seems like a money laundering scheme for its UK producers, abides.
Part of the problem is television itself. Years ago we’d often (by our standards) be asked why we didn’t focus more on YouTube and other online outlets for comedy; the networks and streaming services clearly weren’t interested in new talent, so why not pay more attention to where the future was? And then it turned out that online comedy was as much of a dead end as far as developing talent went as everywhere else, shoutout to The Inspired Unemployed.
Much like big sporting events and nightly news programs, comedy as we know it is a creature of good old fashioned television. Online comedy is pranks, seven second sketches that rely on editing tricks, and fake newspapers with headlines like “Government Useless for Eightieth Year Running”; live performance is stand up and the occasional game show. You want anything beyond that, you need television – and television these days is pretty much rooted.
No only does Australian comedy have to work uphill just to exist on our televisions – maybe the ABC will get their act together but probably not; the second Ten changes owners that’ll be it for comedy on commercial TV – but the medium of television itself is on the way out. When it becomes a seamless transition from TikTok to YouTube to a streaming service that is legally required to make programming here but it doesn’t have to contain any local content, where does that leave comedy? And when comedy in 2025 still involves prank shows and Charlie Pickering, why should anyone care?
Seriously, even the spambots know what comedy fans need to make it through a year like the one we just had:
When we said we wanted the 80s back, this isn’t quite what we had in mind.
Worst Sketches
Runner-up
The Role of a Lifetime
15% of the total votes
Oh yeah, this happened. Remember a time when a decent comedy sketch could reverberate through society and give us a whole new way to look at something? Us neither.
Runner-up
The Weekly/The Yearly with Charlie Pickering
39% of the total votes
In the shithouse excuse for comedy that is The Weekly, those segments where Margaret Pomeranz reviews reality TV count as sketches. Enough said.
Winner
The Inspired Unemployed (Impractical) Jokers
56% of the total votes
On the one hand, at least most of the time the pranks being played here were being played on the other members of the group. Who all heartily deserved whatever embarrassing ordeal they had to go through, make no mistake about that. But on the other hand, these pranks didn’t just take place in public where innocent members of the community were dragged in and at times made to suffer – they were also recorded and broadcast to unsuspecting viewers all across the country. We can all agree that just wasn’t on.
What voters said about The Inspired Unemployed (Impractical) Jokers
I was about to name an extremely awful comedy show from Channel 31 but I decided not to because the show is made by a bunch of young student amateurs who are just having a go. But there is no excuse for The Inspired Unemployed… They are the perfect example of what might work online may not translate onto mainstream media.
If Ten’s going to insist on continuing with this Inspired Unemployed… thing, could they at least move the “un-” prefix back a word?
Failsons playing pranks on each other, it’s like living through outer suburban high-school all over again. This is a bad thing.
Worst Sitcom or Narrative Comedy
Runner-up
Optics
24% of the total votes
This show has been axed, so we’ll never find out how crack PR team Greta Goldman (Vic Zerbst), Nicole Kidman (Jenna Owen) and Ian Randell (Charles Firth) defend the reputation of their deceased, Jeffery Epstein-esque boss. Yes, that really was the plan for the show’s second series, with this plot foreshadowed, set up and comprehensively sizzled throughout season one. We’re guessing risk-averse executives at the ABC came to the conclusion that it wasn’t a great plan to renew a comedy where the heroes of the piece have to defend a sexual predator. Or maybe they just watched the first series and realised it wasn’t a very good show?
Runner-up
Austin
39% of the total votes
Austin, we fear, will never get axed. It’ll just keep taking money from the UK and various Australian funding bodies and try to come up with half-interesting plots. And that might be difficult for a third series, because they’ve already done the “Austin gets famous/gets screwed over by his advisors/quits fame” plot. And the plot where his father and stepmother break up and then get back together again. What’s left for a third series? Austin’s Mum’s politician boyfriend becomes Prime Minister, and suddenly Austin’s in the first family? Oh no…
Winner
Mother and Son
56% of the total votes
The second series of Mother and Son started well, with a genuinely funny episode where the family go on holiday to a resort. Then, later in the series, we saw the return of Jean Kittson as Maggie’s friend Heather for some drunken old lady fun. But by episode eight, they’d basically run out of plot, and, er, turned a joint birthday party for the pair into a kind of wedding. Because audiences like weddings, and having a birthday looks like a wedding is funny, right? And once again, we are reminded of why the ABC can’t make sitcoms anymore; there’s too much emphasis on creating special, dramatic moments, and not enough on simply delivering belly laughs.
What voters said about Mother and Son
Mother and Son was not supposed to be a remake of a classic but a star vehicle for Matt Okine who used the name to have people watch his unfunny violation of a show. To refer this abomination to the original classic should be brought up in a comedy court of law.
Comedy should make us laugh – and laugh a lot! Save the drama for the drama shows pls!
Matt Okine with less hair and more moustache does not make him more likeable.
Worst Panel, Game or Stand-up Show
Runner-up
Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation
22% of the total votes
10’s reboot of the reboot of the original noughties hit included new host Anne Edmonds, a person in a rat costume (no idea) and more than one panellist calling the most famous person saved in their contacts. But despite all the zaniness (Colourful set! Dunking machine!), the pace was slow, the laughs were few and far between, and the whole thing felt like background TV. It wasn’t much better when Shaun Micallef hosted, but at least they put the effort into making it watchable.
Runner-up
Crime Night!
35% of the total votes
This was actually pretty funny, but only if you realised that the ABC clearly greenlit a wacky panel show where comedians were going to make fun of the cliches of true crime, and then someone realised that what that would actually mean was comedians making fun of the victims of real-life crimes. Cut to ABC management saying “oh shit” very loudly and then presenting the nation with a series so boringly pointless there’s no concrete evidence they even broadcast the second episode.
Winner
The Inspired Unemployed (Impractical) Jokers
48% of the total votes
There’s a particular mindset out there amongst some comedy fans where they think the only “real” comedy happens in the moment. Planning, scripting, rehearsing: that stuff just gets in the way of the spontaneity that honest comedy requires. Whatever the set-up, it’s the natural, unscripted reactions that provide the real laughs, and generating those reactions should be what you should aim for. These comedy fans are idiots who usually spend their time laughing at harassment videos shot using Meta pervert glasses, and trying to lure them into watching broadcast television with the promise of more of the same old shit is both embarrassing and insulting.
What voters said about The Inspired Unemployed (Impractical) Jokers
The Uninspired Overemployed is humiliation based comedy – not funny.
The Inspired Unemployed… need to join dole queue incognito. Just woeful.
After doing a rinky-dink version of Impractical Jokers and a rinky-dink version of Wildboyz, not sure what these blokes can do next. A rinky-dink version of Workaholics, maybe?
Worst Topical or Satirical Show
Runner-up
Thank God It’s Friday
19% of the total votes
When ABC Sydney’s Richard Glover retired from hosting TGIF, who was the logical successor? The only person still doing weekly topical comedy at the ABC: our old friend Charlie Pickering! And while Pickering and co. have swept away the Boomer vibe of Glover’s TGIF, this version is about as funny. With so few comedians with any profile doing topical material these days, there aren’t enough people who can provide topical laughs for this show. So, it’s a ramshackle, largely improvised, meander through whatever talking points the team have picked up from old and new media, with few laughs and almost no bite.
Runner-up
Optics
31% of the total votes
This was topical and / or satirical? All these shows about the media and politicans and publicists are just a lukewarm mix of writers writing about the only thing they know and commissioning editors who think regular audiences are as interested in the media as they are. The fact the promo image shows the three leads all talking into their phones tells you everything you need to know about Optics: if you don’t live your life on your phone are you even a real person, and if you do then what are you doing watching a television show?
Winner
The Weekly/The Yearly with Charlie Pickering
60% of the total votes
People say we just relentlessly hate on Pickering and The Weekly, but c’mon: if we really held the man in contempt, would we still be using his older (and more youthful) promo shot? Oh yeah, the show itself: now little more than Pickering presenting news clips and then saying “whaaaaaaat?” while a series of comedy guests trot out some half-baked routine that still outshines the host like a parking lot security light outshines a pile of dogshit, The Weekly circa 2025 basically sums up the ABC’s approach to pretty much everything: keep it boring and inoffensive, have no firm views about anything unless it’s a mawkish belief that the audience looks to you for moral guidance in troubled times, and act like being on television is a right rather than something earned through, you know, being funny and entertaining.
What voters said about The Weekly/The Yearly with Charlie Pickering
I’ll say this for Charlie Pickering’s Jon Stewart cosplay: it’s still on the air.
Nothing worse than this pretend satire.
The Yearly… opened with a sombre Pickering advising us of “the healing power of laughter”. The Yearly… closed with Margaret Pomeranz talking about reality TV, and I felt sicker than ever.
Worst Comedy Film
Runner-up
Lesbian Space Princess
23% of the total votes
Look, we get that there’s only a handful of Australian comedy films a year and pretty much all of them are going to appear here. But sometimes that means we get a runner up that, while extremely obvious at times and not especially funny, is also not a particularly bad film taken on its own terms. Not this film, obviously, but you know, it does happen.
Runner-up
Kangaroo
25% of the total votes
You know the drill: jumped-up guy from the city (Ryan Corr) has no choice but to head out bush, where he finds a new way of living and makes friends with the zany inhabitants of the outback town he lands in. His new way of living, in this case, being caring for motherless joeys with a depressed schoolgirl mourning her dead Dad (Lily Whiteley). The cast is great – Brooke Satchwell, Deborah Mailman, Wayne Blair, Trisha Morton-Thomas, Geneviève Lemon, Emily Taheny, Roy Billing, Ernie Dingo, Rarriwuy Hick – but this film fails to get many laughs. Who knew plots about mourning and caring for animals weren’t particularly hilarious?
Winner
Bump: A Christmas Film
30% of the total votes
The biggest and best joke in this telemovie, which is literally a 2025 version of a UK sitcom movie from the 70s where the cast all go on holiday to somewhere sunny and foreign, is that the actual series ended with one of the main characters dying so they had to set this in some tiny sliver of time between the last and second last episodes. Will they return each year to cram more and more events into those increasingly cramped few months, each installment having an increasingly slender grip on the actual time period when it has to take place until they’re all just stumbling around a radioactive wasteland wearing silver jumpsuits and being attacked by waves of explosive drones while saying “I hope Donald Trump does not win the next US election because this is, of course, the year 2024”? Fingers crossed.
What voters said about Bump: A Christmas Film
I had to genuinely look up each film because I have never heard of any of the nominees. Do you remember when Australian films made a positive cultural impact? When people would queue up to watch? Didn’t we used to be better than this?
Bump is really the epitome of comedy in Australia. Vanilla and bland. Meh.
“The film is set in between episodes 9 and 10 of the fifth season”, Bump who do you think you are, Cowboy Bebop?!
Best New Comedy
Runner-up
Crime Night!
13% of the total votes
So, Crime Night! is both the third-best new comedy and the second-worst panel show of 2025? Sometimes we wonder about you people… We don’t usually reveal who got fourth place in these awards, but for this category, it was Optics. 2025 was that kind of year, we guess. Personally, we’d have put Son of a Donkey in here, but perhaps we’re underestimating the appeal of [SOME BACK-HANDED COMPLIMENTS ABOUT CRIME NIGHT]
Runner-up
Ghosts Australia
17% of the total votes
This local version of the UK (and US show) was a decent enough watch, if not big on actual laughs, although Peter Rowsthorn gave it a crack as awful neighbour Richard. But in comedy, it’s often the case that you can get more laughs by playing it straight, so maybe if some of the ghost characters toned it down a little, this would be less a frantic dramedy and more a funny sitcom.
Winner
Sam Pang Tonight
55% of the total votes
Absolutely no one saw a new comedy tonight show coming for 2025, let alone a second series of one – it’s like all our getting pushed into a Christmas trees came at once! And yes, it’s cheap and a bit shambolic, and leans too much into doing bad jokes, but at least it’s someone being funny every week on TV. What we need is more shows like this, where the talent gets the freedom and space to try out things. Where you can mix old and new talent together, and where the brief is to make people laugh. Guess that’s what Mick Molloy and Glenn Robbins also plan to do on their upcoming new “comedy chat show”. And if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then Sam Pang should feel very flattered indeed.
What voters said about Sam Pang Tonight…
Sam Pang Tonight. It’s not much but it’s something.
Perfect for 10. Cheap and it revels in it.
Sam Pang Tonight is a bit rough around the edges, however Pang-behind-a-desk is at his best when he’s confounded by what’s happening in front of him so perhaps make the edges a bit rougher?
Best Comedy
Runner-up
Tony Martin’s Sizzletown
32% of the total votes
In a world where bros rambling about nonsense is the go-to format for podcasts, it’s worth remembering that there is a better way to do things. Even if the podcast showing us that better way is one where bros ramble about nonsense. Why is Sizzletown the best comedy podcast in the country? Because Tony Martin and Matt Dower put the time in to create funny characters saying funny things, which are edited perfectly to make things even funnier. Long may the better way continue.
Runner-up
The Back Side of Television / The Last Year of Television
34% of the total votes
Honestly, the only reason we can think of why these shows didn’t win is because not enough people have access to Foxtel / Binge. Both were extremely entertaining, often laugh-out-loud funny, and at times even educational, though we won’t hold that against them. More than mere clip shows or nostalgia porn, they constantly used the (very funny) clips being served up to raise questions – usually about just how sleazy, stupid, vindictive or downright criminal Australian television could be (short answer: very). On top of that, host and driving force Mitch McTaggart is easily the smartest and most insightful commentator we have on Australian television at the moment; being extremely funny is just the icing on the cake.
Winner
Guy Montgomery’s Guy-Mont Spelling Bee
44% of the total votes
We’re not the world’s biggest fans of Guy Montgomery’s Guy-Mont Spelling Bee, but luckily we don’t have to be. And it’s clearly not a bad show! It’s the kind of thing that absolutely would not work with anyone else hosting (or co-hosting), which is always a sign of quality. Both Guy and Aaron Chen are excellent, the contestants are often pretty good for contestants on a comedy game show, and you don’t need us to tell you that the games and wordplay are of a uniformly high standard. If only it wasn’t a comedy game show, a genre that even on its best day never quite clicks with us. But hey, this is a well deserved triumph over a blog run by sour-faced grumps who spend half their time grumbling we never got a second series of Audrey’s Kitchen. Take a bow, Guy Montgomery’s Guy-Mont Spelling Bee, you’ve earned it!
What voters said about Guy Montgomery’s Guy-Mont Spelling Bee
I know the …Spelling Bee isn’t super popular around these parts, but it’s damn funny, the jokes are clever, it has a personality that’s often missing from these types of things, and the games are just the right level of fun and interesting. The panellists are a little more hit-and-miss than I’d like but that’s Australia for you.
I admit, …Mont-Spelling Bee is at it’s most charming when Montgomery seems bemused the show is even happening.
Enjoyable nerdy fun.
We asked our readers… What did you think of comedy in 2025?
Declining slowly.
Some old favourites still working well, and Sam Pang’s show a nice addition, but where is the innovation? In the live comedy rooms and on-line, it seems. Not on the telly.
If there was narrative/sketch comedy in Australia this year you really, REALLY had to look for it. Can the Disney-Netflix-Google overlords just invent happy pills already so we can laugh our tits off at the inevitable “Arse: The Movie”?
Could be sharper and have more of a bite.
Praying for Larry Ellison to never look at Ten in 2026.
I honestly can’t recall watching or being eager to watch a scripted Australian comedy show in 2025. Most of the better programs are panel programs or quiz shows with humorous content. This is an indication of how far we’ve fallen. Is it a lack of talent? A lack of proper training in the pubs and clubs? Talented people being ignored for the likes of Dave Hughes and Matt Okine? Who knows! All I know is comedy in Australian mainstream media is now irrelevant.
Network TV has never felt more on life support than it does now. Hyperactive ten second TikTok’s aren’t going to replace it. So where does comedy live now?
Pretty uninspired. The internet continues to be the place where Australian comedy shines. TV is dead to me. Film is too risk averse to ever make anything for anyone that isn’t a spreadsheet on a Screen Australia accountants computer.
Australian TV has become a stale wasteland for comedy. Including the ABC.
Utterly dire, and no one knows what they’re doing. I pitched a show to the commissioning editor of Binge who said it was the best pitch they’d ever heard in their life, then they said no. Maybe the third lead character should’ve been a dog.
Nowhere near enough of it.
Lisa Simpson comes to mind in her response to what it’s like to be a member of the MTV generation that feels neither highs nor lows – eh!?! with a shoulder shrug. That about sums it up for me.
Need more sketch comedy to return.
On TV? Pathetic! Same old faces, most of whom were not funny to start with.
I’ve largely given up on looking for it or expecting it.
Australia having pretty much the best non-Japanese version of Last One Laughing (bar the hosts), it’s clear why we’ve got Shaun Micallef hosting mild chat shows and documentaries.
It’s been firing on all cylinders. Bring on more!
About as good as the film industry. I.e. the worst for a long time.
God we need more funding for Australian comedy talent (but I would like to say that Haven’t You Done Well / Aunty Donna have been doing a solid job and need more mainstream recognition).
Getting there. An improvement on last year’s offerings.
Not enough episodes of the good shows.
No real terrible standouts, that’s rare
It’s a bit repeated tbh. Are there any new ideas? It could have been worse – we could have been dumped another Hey! Hey!… Daryl Somers special.
There’s green shoots. Kangaroo was a lovely film, Sam Pang worked. And 2026 looks more promising. The worry is ABC’s continually bad choices in what to invest in, and lazy celebrity casting in comedy and docos.
2025 felt like treading water – no real standout successes, for the most part people just chugged along doing what you’d expect them to do. When we look back on 2025, the general feeling will be “oh well”.
The above is a selection of the many comments we received. Thank you for voting and commenting, and we’ll be back soon with our thoughts on new comedy throughout 2026…
Got some opinions on Australian comedy in 2025? You’ve come to the right place. And this time, you get to be the judge…
Voting is now open in the Australian Tumbleweeds Awards 2025. And in a slight change to previous years, the categories are:
Worst Sketches
Worst Sitcom or Narrative Comedy
Worst Panel, Game or Stand-up Show
Worst Topical or Satirical Show
Worst Comedy Film
Best New Comedy
Best Comedy
So, head over to the voting form and tell us how awful/great Australian comedy was in 2025. And as always, all your funniest and most insightful comments will be featured in the awards announcement.
Voting closes on Saturday, 3rd January 2025, with the winner announced on or around Australia Day 2026. Vote now!
Did anyone have a 16-episode tonight show on their comedy bingo card this year? We sure didn’t. But Sam Pang Tonight defied expectations. Firstly, because it stayed on air. Secondly, because it was pretty good.
We’re not saying Sam Pang Tonight is charting new areas of comedy – and it’s certainly well aware that it’s not that. But it was reliably entertaining, it had some decent (and mostly interesting) guests, and, like other shows in the 10 comedy stable, it was enjoyable to watch.
Some of the jokes…weren’t that good? But that’s more of a feature than a bug in this show. And Pang was great at leaning into their crapness and wringing maximum laughs out of the weakest material. He’s also great at bringing the audience and his guests into his kinda shambolic world and getting laughs from that. Like The Mick Molloy Show briefly managed to do back in 1998 before it got ripped off air.
And like Mick Molloy, Pang is a genial and generous host, happily sharing the spotlight with other talented and funny people. On Sam Pang Tonight, these have ranged from veterans and legends like Shaun Micallef and Denise Scott, to younger comedians like Becky Lucas and Sam Campbell. Or just people doing interesting things that haven’t had much of a chance to shine before. Parody lounge singer Oliver Clark is now a breakout star, with his semi-regular segment “The News Lounge” swiftly becoming a fan favourite.
But best of all about Sam Pang Tonight? It’s coming back in 2026! Who expected that?!
The show probably needs a bit more budget to take it to the next level – imagine what they could do with “The Wheel of Segments” if they had more cash – but extra money might also see the show move away from its cheap-and-cheerful vibe. So, we say, don’t change a thing. Keep it a bit shambolic. Hey, go full The Mick Molloy Show, if you want to. And we know you want to!
Though you might want to Scotchgard the carpet first.
ABC is thrilled to announce the premiere of its brand-new six-part comedy drama, Dog Park, arriving Sunday 1 February at 8:30pm on ABC TV and ABC iview.
Co-created by and starring Leon Ford as Roland, alongside ABC favourite Celia Pacquola as Samantha, Dog Park boasts an outstanding ensemble cast: Brooke Satchwell (Mr Inbetween), Elizabeth Alexander (Clickbait, The Secrets She Keeps), Grace Chow (Good Cop/Bad Cop), Ras-Samuel (Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes), Florence Gladwin (Neighbours), Nick Boshier (Bondi Hipsters) and making their television debut, Ash Flanders.
The series is a Matchbox Pictures production, co-created by Executive Producer Amanda Higgs. Matchbox Pictures is part of Universal International Studios, a division of Universal Studio Group.
When Roland’s wife Emma leaves him with their teenage daughter Mia who barely notices him and Beattie, the dog he never wanted in the first place, he’s determined to cope brilliantly. But when Beattie disappears and turns up at the local dog park, Roland meets the unbearably optimistic Samantha and her mismatched, life-loving group of dog-parkers. As Roland begrudgingly keeps returning to the park, he comes to realise he might actually need a community to belong to.
Dog Park is a heartwarming tale of belonging, resilience, and the transformative power of connection – both human and canine.
Hey, it’s got the coveted “unfunny comedy” Sunday night slot! As if we weren’t already excited enough.
Oh look a trailer, all our Christmases have come at once:
A long, long time ago, comedy was for the young. Sketch shows were packed with performers fresh out of uni; everywhere you looked sitcoms were being written by young faces. And now? Uh, yeah.
Hey, let’s start off the holiday season with some good news, shall we?
Optics is not returning to ABC, ending its run at one season.
The series created by and starring Vic Zerbst and Jenna Owen centred around crisis management PR firm Fritz and Randell. It also featured Charles Firth, Belinda Giblin, Claude Jabbour and Bali Padda.
“Optics won’t be returning, but I do think Vic and Jenna are exceptional performers, and I would love to find another project that Vic and Jenna could helm,” ABC Head of Screen Jennifer Collins told TV Tonight
Is anyone surprised? Not just because it didn’t exactly set the world on fire – that’s standard operating procedure for ABC sitcoms – but because it was clearly a “youth” project installed by the previous regime. And when there’s regime change at the ABC, fans of Aunty Donna know all too well that the old guard’s attempt to bring in young viewers is the first to go.
It didn’t help that Optics was neither fish nor fowl. If it was about two young PR professionals, why were the funniest storylines often given to 50-something Charles Firth? And those “funniest storylines”? Not all that funny.
Which wouldn’t have been so big a problem if the ABC was giving sitcoms written by young people a chance to settle in, rather than shoving them out the door ASAP because Austin just won’t fuck off and die and they only have two other spare comedy slots for the year.
In contrast, Stan’s latest yoof dramedy He Had It Coming gets by almost entirely by fully committing to the bit in a way that the ABC can only dream of. Set at a hyper-polarised university setting where oafish mens’ rights activists and kill all men feminists clash, it’s basically a brightly coloured buddy murder mystery: when the local football rapist has his corpse dumped under some feminist graffiti on campus, our mismatched leads (a hustling influencer and an aimless artist) have to solve the crime before they get charged with it (they sprayed the graffiti).
Throwing around silly stereotypes while moving fast enough (love those half hour episodes) to keep things fresh even when they’re not all that interesting, it’s not quite enough of a comedy to deserve a full review but has enough laughs for us to mention it here.
It’s also a stark reminder that streaming services can and will make series like this because this is the kind of thing that people will actually watch and talk about. Does the ABC make series like this? And if not, is it because the last thing they actually want is to create something that attracts attention? Maybe they should have given Optics a second series after all.
And in our increasingly thankless job of keeping track of Stan’s yearly Christmas “comedy” movie output, we should note that this year’s effort is Bump: A Christmas Film. Yes, finally Australian television has revived the tradition of sitcom movies where they take the cast on a tropical holiday, where they do all the usual stuff only in louder outfits.
During her promo tour Claudia Karvan revealed that now Bump is done, it’s the first time she hasn’t been working on a series this century. We’re going to say… yay? Her particular brand of dull good taste has blighted the top end of town since Secret Life of Us and Love My Way, giving us decades of bland yet quirky dramedies instead of, you know, something actually funny.
That said, the otherwise totally forgettable The Time of Our Lives – seriously, once you hear Karvan is in a series you automatically know exactly how much of it was set around upper middle-class dining tables* – did feature Mick Molloy in the first season as a radio host (typecast much).
Hey ABC – it’s not to late to give him a spin-off: he definitely fits into the demographic you’re going for in 2026.
.
*According to Wikipedia, “The show follows the lives of the Tivolli clan, an Australian extended family in inner-city Melbourne. Aged in their thirties and forties, the characters are occupied with career advancement, home ownership, child-rearing and the vagaries of relationships.”
In fact, multiple press releases! The ABC announced a large chunk of their 2026 line-up a few days ago and it’s taken us this long to wade through it all. Let’s start with the big news:
Number 1 draft pick Sam Pang leads hilarious new ABC footy comedy
Today at the ABC 2026 Showcase, ABC, Screen Australia, VicScreen and Screen Tasmania were thrilled to announce a brand new six-part comedy series Ground Up starring the widely loved Sam Pang.
Produced by Gristmill (Upper Middle Bogan, Summer Love, The Librarians, Little Lunch) and created and written by Gary McCaffrie (Shaun Micallef’s Mad As Hell, Very Small Business), this sharp, satirical series marks the first lead comedy role for one of the country’s most beloved comedians.
Set in Tasmania, the series follows AFL administrator Hugh Shen (Pang), dispatched from Melbourne to establish the island’s first-ever AFL team. But there’s a catch: the locals must build a brand-new stadium and not everyone’s happy about the $1.13 billion taxpayer-funded spend.
Hugh’s mission? Win over a divided public, meet impossible deadlines, placate feisty protesters, and somehow find a coach, players, and a mascot that won’t offend anyone. Should be a piece of cake.
Comedian/Actor Sam Pang said “I’ve admired the work of Robyn and Wayne from afar for many years and never thought in a million years I’d get the opportunity to work with them. I’m very excited to try something new and coupled with Gary McCaffrie’s wonderful writing – I feel like I’m in good hands for this new challenge.”
ABC Head of Scripted Rachel Okine said, “We couldn’t have asked for a more perfect combination of talent that Ground Up will be showcasing to ABC viewers in 2026. Combining the creative powerhouse that is Gristmill, Gary McCaffrie’s superb laugh-out-loud scripts, and the inimitable Sam Pang helming an ABC show for the first time amongst a dream ensemble cast, this is comedy television in its finest incarnation.”
Screen Australia Director of Narrative Content Louise Gough said, “Award-winning Gristmill are ready to kick another goal. They have created a series that is a love letter to sports fans all around the world. Blisteringly funny and full of heart, audiences are in for a treat.”
VicScreen CEO, Caroline Pitcher said, “VicScreen is thrilled to support Gristmill, one of our most impressive production companies, as they team up with the hilarious Sam Pang and Gary McCaffrie to deliver a show that’s sure to have audiences roaring with laughter. This is exactly the kind of bold, locally made content that puts Victoria on the global screen map, and we can’t wait to see it kick off.”
Gristmill’s Robyn Butler and Wayne Hope said, “Turns out if you pester people long enough you get to make a show with them. We’re so very excited to be working with the brilliant Gary McCaffrie and promising young newcomer, Sam Pang.”
All six episodes will be directed by Wayne Hope (Upper Middle Bogan, Summer Love, Colin From Accounts).
Ground Up will air on the ABC in 2026.
Not only did the ABC drop an actual surprise announcement, it was for a show that sounds decent! And the surprises didn’t end there:
Urzila Carlson stars in new ABC comedy series from Warner Bros. International Television Production Australia
For immediate release
Sydney, 20 November 2025 – Warner Bros. International Television Production (WBITVP) Australia and ABC have today announced URZILA, a bold new comedy series fronted by one of Australia and New Zealand’s most celebrated comedic voices, Urzila Carlson.
URZILA invites audiences into the sharp, unpredictable world of a comedy powerhouse. The series fuses bespoke stand-up with finely honed sketches, delivering a format that’s fresh, fearless, and unapologetically funny. Each episode is anchored by Urzila’s trademark deadpan delivery and razor-sharp wit, with sketches inspired by her stand-up stories and starring a hand-picked ensemble of rising stars and comedy heavyweights, including Bron Lewis, Andy Saunders, Carlo Ritchie, Anisa Nandaula, Sam Pang and Julia Morris.
“I always hoped I would get the call but prayed I wouldn’t…. the call asking me to deliver a sketch show that Australians can watch and not slag off in the comment section. Panic set in but then I calmed down and remembered I know a lot of great comics and some very funny people and we can do this,” said Urzila Carlson
“We sat around a table and spent most of the budget on snacks and coffees to write my standup into sketches. We then proceeded for the next five weeks to record like our lives depended on it and we snot bubble laughed our way through the takes to bring you hopefully one of the funniest sketch shows you’ve seen in the last week or so!”
“URZILA is comedy at its most inventive. It’s smart, cheeky, and full of surprises. Urzila Carlson’s voice is unmistakable, and this series gives her the perfect stage to showcase her brilliance alongside a stellar ensemble,” said Johnny Lowry, Head of Original Content, WBITVP Australia. “We’re thrilled to collaborate with ABC to deliver a show that will keep audiences laughing and talking long after each episode.”
Rachel Millar, ABC Head of Entertainment said: “We’re thrilled to welcome Urzila to the ABC. She’s an absolute star, and her cheeky, laugh-out-loud stand-up has long struck a chord with Australian audiences. We know this clever new format will do the same. It’s fantastic to have WBITVP steering the ship and bringing Urzila’s vision to life.””
Could this really be an actual… sketch show? On Australian television? In 2026? Stone the crows.
From there the news settled down a little – here’s the relevant bits (which we mostly already knew about). Always Was Tonight sounds like it could be a bit of a wild card, but anything that shows The Weekly up for the boring reactionary conservative turd it is gets a thumbs up from us:
Heartwarming new series Dog Park, a feel-good story about finding belonging in a group of dog-owners; and beloved comedians Anne Edmonds and Kitty Flanagan unite for Bad Company, set within the crumbling walls of a theatre company on the brink of bankruptcy.
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A misfit crew of comedians return to the schoolyard in Class Clowns, where under the watchful eye of Principal Julia Morris, they tackle wildly ridiculous assignments based on classic school subjects.
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Always Was Tonight will decolonise news, one headline at a time. Hosted by Tony Armstrong and featuring a stellar cast of First Nations talent, this satire brings news with a bit more blaklash!
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After premiering at Melbourne International Film Festival, feature documentary But Also John Clarke comes to the ABC, weaving together personal anecdotes, archival gems and tales about the man behind the defining satirical voice.
And also of interest, as Shaun Micallef’s Eve of Destruction is pretty much the only series not scheduled to return in 2026:
Shaun Micallef Takes a Rational Look at Australia’s Gambling Obsession in New Documentary
The ABC and Screen Australia proudly announced today at the ABC 2026 Showcase that Shaun Micallef will front a new 3-part documentary series, Shaun Micallef’s Going For Broke.
Following the success of his acclaimed series Shaun Micallef’s On The Sauce, Micallef returns with a new documentary which tackles one of the country’s most entrenched habits: gambling.
In Shaun Micallef’s Going For Broke, the famous writer, actor and comedian taps back into his curious side and sets out to understand a national obsession he’s never quite grasped.
“Life’s a gamble anyway,” says Shaun. “Why would you go out of your way to risk losing something you already have? Particularly something as important as your money.”
Shaun has never understood gambling. He uses cold, hard logic when making decisions and always plays for certainty. But as viewers saw in On The Sauce, even a teetotaller can be swayed – Shaun spent one episode getting drunk to better understand Australia’s relationship with alcohol.
Now, he turns a sober eye to our love affair with gambling. Travelling across the country, Shaun meets punters, experts, and those affected by the industry to uncover how Australia became the biggest gambling nation in the world. From pokies in suburban pubs to high-stakes sports betting, Going For Broke asks: are we making a risky bet on our future?
Can even Shaun’s rational mind resist the lure of a “sure thing”?
ABC Head Documentary & Specialist Susie Jones says “We’re thrilled Shaun has turned his rapier wit and invitational curiosity to the subject of gambling. This series shines a light on an issue that effects Australians from all walks of life either directly or indirectly. Through Shaun’s journey we’ll come to better understand the ramifications of our national obsession and what it’s really costing us as a nation.”
Screen Australia Head of Documentary Richard Huddleston said, “Like it or not, gambling’s part of who we are — it’s in our national identity. Today, it’s increasingly complex with so many ways to have a punt, anytime, anywhere. There is no one better suited than Shaun and the CJZ team to take us through the wins, the losses, the highs, the lows and everything in between.”
Shaun Micallef’s Going For Broke will air on the ABC in 2026.
Especially interesting is the way the fifth paragraph clearly got a re-write between the press kit and the press release – here’s what the press kit says:
Mind you, he said the same thing about alcohol a few years ago in his documentary series Shaun Micallef’s On The Sauce and then this teetotaller spent one episode getting drunk.
Presumably it’s a stealth way to get a bunch of sketches on the air, as there’s no way Micallef is going to need three episodes to figure out that gambling is shit.
Ghosts Australia gets a lot of things right. Well, a lot of obvious things at least. The cast is good – a few of them are playing catch-up, but the lead character Kate (Tamala) is strong from day one. The mansion is impressive, which means the whole thing looks good. And the format is strong enough that, so long as you nail the basics, you’ll create something decent. So yeah, this isn’t a The Office Australia situation. Phew.
Ghosts Australia is a kind of show we don’t usually make here. This is trying to be cosy viewing, where the stakes are low, the characters likable, and the whole point of watching is getting to hang out with some TV friends. Does it work? We don’t know, that’s not why we watch comedy.
What we do watch comedies for is the comedy, which is a problem because the comedy here ain’t good. Most of the jokes in the first two episodes – which, to cut the show some slack, were both largely racing around setting things up – were of the “character who died in the 80s makes wild speculation about current events that is hilariously incorrect” variety. Whenever a scene needed a joke (because this is a comedy, right?), that’s what we got. Smoking! People thought it was good for you in the 80s wait no they didn’t.
Again, to be fair, it was the start of the series. Pretty much all we knew about the ghosts were that they were old and dead; not a lot to work with there. And if you’ve watched any of the UK or US versions you know that after a while the characters develop beyond their cliches and the whole thing becomes, well, cosy viewing.
There was still time to plant a few seeds. Some mild flirting between ghosts here, jokes about being incredibly stupid or borderline racist there, things could go anywhere. The old Irish pub owner never stops complaining about everything now, but eventually she’ll develop a second dimension. Right?
The first two episodes were basically an hour-long pilot. Episode three was focused on finding a gold nugget that the 1850’s Chinese gold miner had lost. Fingers crossed that’d knock an otherwise potentially dragged out subplot on its head. But before that, jokes about computers! Oh geez.
Seriously, lines like “it showed up during a penetration test using the back door” were about as funny as… well, the first two episodes. That’s where we learned that male ghosts can still get stiffies and the pub owner’s “curtains are practically canvas – they repel all moisture”. We can easily think of contexts in which this actually would be funny; our review of Son of a Donkey is right there. Ghosts Australia isn’t really one of them.
Again, and we’re really being generous here, it’s early days. Hopefully as the characters become better established, the range of jokes will expand beyond nob gags. For now, it feels like a show that’s being pulled in a number of different directions, haha we said “pulled”.
Ghosts is a format that doesn’t automatically require writers with a deft touch or personal connection to the material. It doesn’t even require a cast with long-standing chemistry: the US version is proof of that. It’s a solid sitcom structure with plenty of stretch to allow those involved to make it their own while still preserving the virtues of the original.
And some parts of this do actually work. Kate is a really good lead! Sean, her stumblebum IT partner, is an okay comedy foil. Michelle Brasier* is going for it as the 80s aerobics stereotype, and everyone else has… well, room to develop. It looks like a proper series, with flashbacks expanding things beyond the present day mansion, and… look, what else do you want us to say?
Australia has next to no opportunities for sitcom writers to hone their craft. Usually nobody cares, because the only sitcoms we do make are mostly written by the cast. But that means that when something like Ghosts Australia comes along – a format that requires local writers to stretch a little – things can sometimes get a little bumpy.
Or, you know, maybe audiences really do want a sitcom where the opening gag in one episode is that we see two people’s feet sticking out of a tent BECAUSE THEY’RE SHAGGING. Haha sex is hilarious.
We all remember the giddy joy we felt when we first heard about Crime Night! An ABC series where comedians made jokes about true crime cases? What the fuck? There was absolutely no way this was not going to be a massive car crash, and we were 100% there for it. Comedy is back, baby!
And then the actual show went to air and it was boring as shit.
Look, even we knew the ABC wasn’t deranged enough to put to air a show where comedians made jokes about the victims of crime. But Crime Night! is basically “what if we got the Gruen team to make crime boring?” How is it even possible to make crime boring? Glad you asked.
While Crime Night! features five panelists, it only needs two. That’d be the two experts, who provide all the information that is the only thing this show has to offer. Not interesting information like you get in true crime podcasts; boring information like you get in criminology textbooks.
Okay, that’s maybe a bit harsh. But think about it: what’s the thing that makes true crime so interesting? Is it the human element, the way people turn to crime when they’re greedy, or desperate, or pushed too far? Or is it a ten minute discussion on the scientific fact that people’s memories are basically dogshit and eyewitness accounts are trash?
Crime Night! is a panel show designed to provide information about how people examine and investigate crimes. Not information about actual crimes, though they do bring them up every now and again. Only really old ones though, back in your box lawyers.
Dry, fact-based, only one short clip from classic 90s game show Cluedo – there’s even actual experiments. It’s a wonder they didn’t get Doctor Karl on board. This is basically the kind of thing he blathers on about, only here the experts seem to know what they’re talking about. Finally, a murder-based version of The Curiosity Show. Only not as interesting as that.
And as for comedy? Forget it. Even by ABC panel show standards this is a stiff. Not that the comedians behind the desk get much to work with in the first place. They’re just there because in the ABC scheme of things comedians are one step above regular people, and this needs regular people to be impressed by the experts.
Future panelists include Claire Hooper, Rhys Nicholson, and Ryan Shelton, who must have a new agent as he’s turning up all over the place. Maybe they can find some laughs in this parade of horrors, who knows? We don’t, we struggled to make it through the first episode.
Even then, we spent much of the time asking ourselves “what are the chances this was called Crime Night! – and not the much more natural Crime Time! – because Crime Time! is already a semi-regular segment on The Cheap Seats?”
We’ve watched too much Australian comedy over the years to be picky about what makes us laugh. You want a prime-time program that’s a polished product with quality performances and absolutely no decent jokes? Our review of Ghosts Australia is just around the corner. While we wait, there’s Son of a Donkey, which is packed with dumb shit that made us laugh.
In the past we’ve praised Theodore and Nathan Saidden’s Superwog for coming up with comedy that only seems stupid. if you can get past the comedy accents, face pulling and physical abuse, there’s often been some pretty smart stuff going on. With the six-part Son of a Donkey, their first original series for Netflix, they seem to have decided it’s time to take things back to basics.
Superwog (now renamed Theo) and best mate Jimmy (Nathan) are on a quest to get back Theo’s car after a shitload of fines sees it confiscated by the cops. Earning money isn’t easy for these two, especially when an office job sees time going backwards and an attempt at begging soon has them trapped on the Illuminati’s pedophile island. Hang on, wasn’t that a plot on the final season of Fat Pizza?
Meanwhile Wog Dad (Nathan) has decided he’s going to get all his food from the dump. Unsurprisingly, this results in his kidneys exploding, sending him on a quest to get new ones. Theo’s kidneys, a random pig’s kidneys – it doesn’t matter. And Wog Mum (Nathan) has finally decided she’s had enough and (under intense pressure from her parents) it’s time to move on. Will massive amounts of plastic surgery help her find a new man?
So yeah, not exactly highbrow material. Previous series mixed satire and smart insights with a lot of shouting and getting smacked around the head. This has scaled back the satire while keeping the laundry basket labelled “poo stained undies” front and center. So it’s a step down? Yeah, nah.
Surprisingly for their biggest effort to date, this feels a lot more focused than their earlier stand-alone episodes. They’ve chosen to go all-in with the physical comedy. Nathan as Wog Dad is constantly re-defining the art of face pulling, seemingly fearless when it comes to trashing his dignity for a laugh.
Even if this kind of comedy isn’t for you – in which case you should take a good hard look at yourself – you’ve got to respect the commitment to the bit. Especially when the bit is playing some kind of primeval man-beast who is as at home mud wrestling pigs and demolishing his own house as he is assaulting random strangers and guzzling juice from smashed open trash fruit.
This time around the team are keeping it simple for the international* audience. The comedy targets are broad. We’re talking boring fast food jobs, boring office jobs, decadent rich folk (the Prince Andrew gags are pretty timely), creepy sex pests, online masculinity hustlers. In between there’s bum jokes, dick jokes, vomit jokes, poo jokes, lube jokes, and the occasional old lady giving the finger. You know, the classics.
Speaking of comedy classics, Google AI decided to give us the rundown on this series:
At least they got the Netflix part right. He’s holding a pig you gronk!
Things do start to flag a little around the middle stretch. The office job episode is a highlight; pedophile island not so much, even if the way you get there was pretty funny. By the end, when Theo and Johnny are on a quest to bash Dad Wog by the use of “superhuman semen power”, the whole thing has become a twisted parody of online masculinity. Only, you know, with a Skibidi Toilet reference.
Calling Son of a Donkey the best scripted Australian comedy of 2025 is not what you’d call high praise. Far be it for us to name and shame the other pissweak contenders for that title. But unless you’re the kind of comedy fan that values class above laughs in their comedy, you’ve got to admit: Son of a Donkey, for good or (very) ill, is the one to beat.
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*while the series is filmed in Melbourne, there’s occasional references to it being set in Sydney (there’s a Sydney rail map on a train wall in the final episode, even though they’re clearly on a Melbourne train). Maybe Sydney has more international appeal?
What’s the one thing that links many of Australia’s most average sitcoms of the last five years? No, it’s not that SOMETHING VERY DRAMATIC happens in the second-to-last episode. Although that does often happen too. *
The answer is that there’s a wedding – or a wedding of sorts – in the final ever episode. And having watched the wedding of sorts in the final episode of Mother and Son, it’s really starting to grind our gears.
In the final episode of series two, hopefully the last episode of Mother and Son ever, Maggie (Denise Scott) and Arthur (Matt Okine) have a joint birthday party, organised by their daughter/sister Robbie (Angela Nica Sullen).
A promo shot for Mother and Son not featuring any wedding-esque antics.
Robbie, it’s been established over the series, isn’t great at listening to what other people want or need, so she goes off, without consulting Maggie and Arthur, and hires a big church hall, organises decorations she thinks are nice and buys a massive cake. All of which sounds like a great set-up for the worst joint birthday party of all time. And it is, except not in a way that is funny or makes a lot of sense.
You see, Robbie’s organised what looks, to anyone who isn’t her, exactly like the kind of party you’d organise if you were organising a wedding. There are white decorations, including something that looks kind of like a bridal arch, a big sign at the entrance to the hall reading “Maggie and Arthur’s big day”, and the pièce de résistance, a three-tiered cake with little figurines of Maggie and Arthur on top of it. Dressed in wife and groom gear.
Obviously, this was all intended by the writers to be a funny situation that we, the audience, laughed at. But what it actually felt like when watching it was that the people who made Mother and Son had lost their minds. No one would deliberately order all this stuff and think it was suitable for their mother and brother’s joint birthday party. Robbie is insensitive, self-absorbed, and greedy, but she’s not stupid or ignorant of what a reasonable person might read as a celebration of incest. So, as a plot, it didn’t work.
But it got us thinking, why end the series with a sort of wedding plot? And why have so many other sitcoms gone down that route in their final episode recently?
Australian sitcoms ending with a wedding dates back to at least 2007 (Kath & Kim), but it’s in the last five years that shows have really embraced the idea. In 2021, Rosehaven ended its fifth and final series with main characters and best friends Daniel (Luke McGregor) and Emma (Celia Pacquola) playing bride and groom in a rehearsal wedding officiated by Daniel’s mother Barbara (Kris McQuade). Promos featuring scenes from the rehearsal wedding, which looked every bit like a real wedding, attracted a lot of buzz, and, we’re guessing, prompted a lot of network executives to think that sitcom weddings guaranteed ratings and good times.
They really do look like they’re getting married. Aaawwww.
Aftertaste’s second and final series (2022) included a wedding, although, in a twist, it was in the first episode of the series rather than the last. This was followed by final episode wedding(-ish) plots in Wellmania (2023), Colin from Accounts (2024) and now Mother and Son. And almost none of these wedding(-ish) plots resulted in substantial laughs, feel-good moments, buzz or ratings. So why do shows keep doing it?
One reason is that weddings are a great way to a) bring a lot of characters together and b) set up the kind of high-stakes situation where there’s tension, drama and the potential for things to go wrong. Also, and this is a lesson Rosehaven took from the world of soap operas, wedding plots are a great way to get media coverage for your series. Especially if the “wedding” involves two leading characters.
But as for any of this being funny – and as we’ve discussed many times on this blog, being funny isn’t the point of a lot of Australian sitcoms these days – weddings don’t actually deliver laughs. Unless the show’s gone down the slapstick route, and the bride ends up in a septic tank, while the groom’s been hog-tied to a truck heading for Darwin, a wedding’s more likely to deliver touching, feel-good moments. Based on the last five years of Australian sitcoms, they’re mainly used as a device to prompt several previously fighting characters to come together and realise they actually agree with each other. As happened in Mother and Son.
And while that’s not the worst way to end a show, it’s worth noting that none of the really good Australian sitcoms of the last 30 years ended with a wedding. They ended with something right for the characters. Like Frontline ending with Mike Moore missing a flight because he’s lazy, inadvertently saving himself from being killed in a plane crash. Or how The Games ended with John, Gina, Bryan and Nicholas getting out of Sydney before shit went down. Or how Frayed ended with the Newcastle earthquake and some of the main characters floating the corpse of a man who deserved to die out to sea.
Funny, true to the characters and not a wedding in sight. That’s how you end a sitcom.
