Sometimes critics will heap praise on a television show (or book, or movie, or whatever it is they do down at MONA) because it does a good job of what it sets out to do. On other occasions they praise it for simply being smart, or funny, or exciting, or memorable. Sometimes an creative endeavour... Read More »
It’s got to be tough for Australia’s political comedians at the moment. Not only do they have to struggle with the whole “not funny” thing, but with a new Federal government in power they’ve finally got to come up with new jokes. Or do they? Remember last week’s The Weekly haha of course not. Here’s... Read More »
With The Weekly and The Cheap Seats now on the air, is Australia big enough to have two news summary shows? Fortunately for viewers, the two are aimed at two very different audiences. On the one hand, The Weekly has Charlie Pickering behind a desk shouting lines like “For a second there I thought I... Read More »
Two returning shows in the same week? We’re having an attack of the vapors over here. Over in the “if it ain’t broke” corner, The Cheap Seats managed to do pretty much what it was doing for most of last year’s run: decent news-adjacent comedy based on silly visual gags and banter. Yes, the banter... Read More »
One week into the official election campaign and… yeah. Remember when political satire was a central part of Australian culture? You do? Have fun down at Services Australia trying to claim the old age pension. Slightly less snarkily, these days any election campaign really drives home the shrinking opportunities for political comedy on Australian television.... Read More »
2021 was a year when Australians desperately needed a good laugh. Fortunately, we had Australian comedy to laugh at.... Read More »
Yesterday saw the ABC’s upfronts for 2022, their big opportunity to wow us with all the exciting new series and much-loved old favourites we can look forward to in the coming year. There were at least five deliberate mistakes in that previous sentence – can you guess them all? The big caveat here is that... Read More »
This year all the blame fell on Charlie Pickering’s shoulders. Who else was left? Even the regular guests only turned up for a handful of episodes across the season; otherwise it was, as the title had always said from the start, the Charlie Pickering show. And what a show it was. Wait, we mean what,... Read More »
The Weekly‘s been at least half a dozen shows over the years, each less successful than the last. So it shouldn’t really be a surprise the spinning contest wheel finally stopped on “year-in-review-but-it’s-a-week”. Not because it’s a good idea: a year-in-review works because 75% of the show is powered by “oh yeah, I remember that”,... Read More »
One of the good things about watching The Weekly is… ahh, nearly had you there, didn’t we? That’s right: there are no good things about watching The Weekly, just a slowly building puzzlement as your brain – a thing that exists in 2021 – struggles to figure out exactly why you are watching a news... Read More »