The Wrong Girl, aka Channel Ten’s latest attempt to force drama and comedy to breed together, is probably the closest the network is going to get to a sitcom any time soon. Lacking the dramatic heft of Offspring – c’mon, John Edwards and Asha Keddie are basically the Scorsese and Streep of Australian TV drama... Read More »
It’s been a long time coming, but that Working Dog animated series announced back in 2014 is finally within sight – especially if you’re the kind of person who’s okay with illegal downloads (and we don’t mean the Get This CD): Netflix is amping up its animated slate with a new comedy, “Pacific Heat,” hailing from... Read More »
Here’s all we know: No Activity is returning to Stan with new episodes on October 26th. As the press release says: Rose Byrne and Damon Herriman join Patrick Brammall, Darren Gilshenan, Genevieve Morris, Harriet Dyer, Dan Wyllie and David Field for more action, more romance, more… well, just more sitting around. We weren’t exactly massive... Read More »
There’s an argument that mass-appeal TV comedy is dead, and that broadcasters and streaming content providers should focus their attention on niche audiences. It would probably be a good thing for comedy if that happened; people who like edgy material can enjoy it, while its makers don’t have to have to worry about offending people... Read More »
So who knew Soul Mates series 2 wrapped last week? Not us, clearly – we bought the DVD when it came out last week and finished up the series by watching that rather than stuffing around with all that old-fashioned television bizzo. Yes, basic maths would have pointed out that a six part series was... Read More »
There’s a whole lot of ways you can try to make a television show funnier. Two of the more popular ones are a live audience and editing out the boring bits. So how is it that Have You Been Paying Attention? seems to know how to use both in a way that actually does result... Read More »
What is it with comedians getting all cathartic and emotional in their old age on shows like Anh Do’s Brush with Fame? Arguably, the rot started a decade ago with Enough Rope, where Andrew Denton asked famous people uber researched questions designed to make them cry. Most of them did (although props to Judith Lucy who famously... Read More »
One of the advantages sketch comedy has over comedy serials is that producers can re-order them easily. Got lots of funny sketches in episode 2 but less in episode 5? Move some of the strong material from episode 2 to episode 5! Sure, it doesn’t make the series funnier overall, but it at least it... Read More »
What kind of mangled, dead-inside, meths-drinking husk would you have to be to watch Gruen week after week? What possible joy could you have left in your life that watching an endless hategasm pumping black spooge over the very idea of “community” in the name of making a quick buck was worth your while? “How... Read More »
One of the things that’s probably too obvious to be worth mentioning but it’s a pretty dry period for comedy at the moment so here goes is that the days of single-theme comedy shows are all but over. Remember that nightmarish period where it seemed everyone was trying to do “Spicks & Specks, but with... Read More »