Making a one-off funny show is relatively easy; making a long-running show is also fairly easy. Combining the two is where it gets a little difficult, and not just because of the generally held belief that a comedy that starts strong is bound to drop off quickly (aka the Fawlty Towers defense). So hats off... Read More »
After almost six months, we’re going to declare Tonightly with Tom Ballard a success. Not in terms of ratings… Tonightly, which aired four days a week on ABC 2, pulled low ratings during its debut run. An average episode got less than 50,000 people watching, which meant it didn’t make it into the top 20... Read More »
So it took maybe ten minutes into 2018’s first episode of Gruen for someone to say “doing no advertising is silly” and fuck, how did that massive foot-shaped hole suddenly get in our television screen? And this was during a segment on the current banking royal commission, which – from our half-arsed reading of the... Read More »
We’ve just sen the back of season eight of Shaun Micallef’s Mad as Hell, and seriously: is this show ever going to drop off? Australian television isn’t known for giving comedies long runs, but we’ve had almost ninety episodes of Mad as Hell now and the quality shows no signs of fading. How much longer... Read More »
Well, episode 6 wrapped everything up nicely. Which means we need never watch Sando again. Let the nation rejoice! Sure, it could come back (the resentful daughter’s taken over part of the business with her ex-fiance and current husband as lackeys and plans to take over from Sando one day, and the idiot son’s in... Read More »
Like we predicted, episode 5 of Sando was where the writers laid the groundwork for whatever spectacular finale’s going to happen in episode 6 of Sando, i.e. we’ll find out whether Sando gets her business back (and also her husband?). Super exciting. Meanwhile, there was a sub-plot about how Sando’s resentful daughter was born with... Read More »
Only two episodes left of Sando, which means we are past the worst of it…in theory. Episode 4 in an Australian sitcom is typically the one that’s a bit weaker than the rest of the episodes, with episode 5 being the one where the writers lay the groundwork for whatever spectacular finale is planned for... Read More »
If you like comedy quiz shows, good news: doctors are reportedly close to finding a cure. Oh wait, we read that wrong: we meant to say Australian television is currently flooding the air waves with your favourite kind of show, and with the looming (seriously Nine, just announce the air date already) return of Talkin’... Read More »
This week, Sando introduced a new dimension to the previously fairly-generic supportive-husband-of-the-daughter character Gary. Gary, due to issues in his childhood with his own parents, is addicted to skinny dipping. If he feels stressed, he whips off his clothes, jumps into the pool and everything’s fine. He’s safe, naked in the water. Aaaahhh… Being addicted... Read More »
Remember how last week, Sando only had two jokes? This week it had one. Which was also one of the jokes from last week: the list of fake suburbs at the end of the Sando’s Warehouse ad. And while we quite enjoy a comedy list of fake suburb names as much as the next person,... Read More »