Remember Danger 5, SBS’s period spy spoof series where a group of secret agents had to kill Hitler? There were two series of Danger 5, the 2012 series set in the 1960s and the 2015 series set in the 1980s, and since then, nothing. Now the team are back with Danger 5 Stereo Adventures, an... Read More »
As seems only fitting in these unsettled times when we’re all scrabbling for the smallest snippet of certianity, Mad as Hell series 11 ended with host Shaun Micallef letting us know that he and the rest of the team would definitely be back later in the year. They also spent much of the episode hammering... Read More »
The ABC just announced a big chunk of their line-up for 2020, so you know what that means – press release time! Teetotaler Shaun Micallef explores Australia’s drinking culture in new documentary for the ABC ABC and Screen Australia today announced a new 3 x 60’ documentary, Shaun Micallef’s On The Sauce, to be hosted... Read More »
TV Tonight’s recent article on the all-time best Australian TV comedies got us thinking…what are the all-time worst Australian TV comedies? Having been blogging about this for more than a decade, we think we have the answers. First up…sketch shows! If you grew up pre the late-90s, sketch shows were something you saw on TV... Read More »
No more Bill Zingers? How will we go on? It’s another three years of (roughly) the same old crew doing (roughly) the same old stuff – how will Shaun Micallef’s Mad as Hell keep the laughs coming? Oh yeah, right: by actually making jokes with political content. Sorry, after three months of The Weekly we... Read More »
This isn’t strictly a like for like comparison, but we’ve had a few thoughts about Have You Been Paying Attention? and Talkin’ ‘bout Your Generation. Both shows, on the surface, are the same kind of show: a game/quiz hosted by a 56-year-old white male comedian, in which celebrities compete against each other in amusing ways.... Read More »
Having Mad as Hell on our screens is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it’s the best Australian comedy – and probably the best in all categories including drama, arts coverage and religious programming – television program currently airing. It’s definitely the only thing currently going that could legitimately be called “world class”, and... Read More »
Remember that story six months ago about that Tonightly sketch that upset the Minister for Communications Mitch Fifield, Cory Bernardi and various others, and inspired several complaints to ACMA and the ABC? Well, late last week, ACMA cleared the show: Today ACMA has found no breach by the ABC, noting the comedic context rather than... Read More »
And so Talkin’ ’bout Your Generation 2018 died the way it lived: as a show that was probably too good for Channel Nine, and so didn’t do enough good for Channel Nine. But if the show itself was good – which in its own way it most definitely was – then why did it fail... Read More »
When you look at who and what won Logies this year, it says a lot about the state of TV comedy in this country. Comedy is there to sweeten the pill. The pill, in the case of the Logies, being hours and hours and hours and hours of industry backslapping, product promotion and…well, that’s all... Read More »