From the Archives

In review: Totally Full Frontal – Series One

It’s crap. And with the obvious out of the way, let’s get down to business. 1998’s Totally Full Frontal was the third version of the by-now-a-full-decade-old Fast Forward franchise, where television and ad parodies mingled with single gag snippets and traditional comedy sketches to create an hour of, at the very least, television. When most... Read More »

Are You Being Re-made?

If, like us, you're often sceptical of Australian TV comedies then consider this: is it better to give comedy a try and not always succeed, or to give up entirely and just import it? All too often we get defeatist about it and chose the latter, but down that path dangers lies, for history tells us that when there isn't much original, locally-made comedy on TV not only do we get lots of imported shows, but local re-makes of British shows – and is that actually what we... Read More »

Full Frontal in “Now Available In Stores” Shock

It’s a sign of just how grim things have become that the long-awaited release of series four and five of Full Frontal can seriously be described as “good news”. Hell, even “long-awaited” is pretty depressing. But yes, finally these two collections are out there waiting to be purchased / fast-forwarded to the Shaun Micallef bits.... Read More »

Third Tuesday Book Club

In a new, and no doubt soon to be highly irregular, feature of this blog, Bean Is A Carrot trawls through her collection of books about Australian... Read More »

Some that glitters is gold

Eighteen or so months ago the news came through that a DVD of The Money or The Gun was in the works. It would feature compilations of six episodes and a commentary from host Andrew Denton, director Martin Coombes and producer Mark Fitzgerald. The DVD was supposed to be out in November 2009, was then delayed twice, and has still not appeared; EzyDVD currently list the release date as “unknown”. But when DVD companies don't come through with the goods the internet eventually does, and recently a number of full episodes have been made available online – they're a fascinating watch.... Read More »

Wherefore art thou, Full Frontal series 4?

It’s probably not the most anticipated comedy DVD of the year, but for those of us of a certain age – and a certain fondness for the work of Shaun Micallef – Shock’s announcement a few months back that they were finally going to be releasing series 4 of Full Frontal was very good news... Read More »

Chuck another dramedy on the barbie

Nothing makes a comedy fan’s heart sink more than the arrival of a new dramedy. Not because comedy and drama shouldn’t ever be combined, but because dramedies always seem to be either populist light dramas with little-to-no actual comedy (Packed to the Rafters) or sitcoms which turned out to be so woefully laugh free that... Read More »