Rant 55 - 24/2/12 Subject: 'Comedy' quiz shows

Rant number 55


Todays rant was another that turned around at the very last minute. On returning from band and sitting down to write todays rant (on a related subject that I shall - doubtless come to later) I flicked the TV on for some background noise.

The channel it had been left on last was 4, and so I was presented with a new 'comedy quiz' - 'The Mad Bad Ad Show'

Now don't get me wrong, I actually quite like the comedy quiz format (thus the inverted commas in this rants title.) The thing is, its horribly overused, unoriginal and to be frank - most of the time just not funny.

QI for instance is a program that I have fallen out of love with. Its format started cleverly and full of great water-cooler factoids. The guests were intelligent (with Alan Davies in place as the staple fall guy) and actually tried to answer the questions with some modicum of thought.

These days though, the guests are just idiots! The answers always have to be 'hilarious' (in their own narcissistic opinion anyway.) As a result, the only person who actually seemed to want to answer the questions is Alan Davies!

Have I got news for you was always even worse. No-one is allowed to just answer a question with something sensible - because its all about the comedy apparently. As such, they have to put in an unfunny - overly scripted (shite) joke for every question. Maybe its just me - the audience just seem to love them (or its canned laughter, but it would be unfair for me to speculate)

Going back to tonight's offering, it was the missing news story format.
I am not sure if it was intended for any of them to attempt to offer up an answer to the question that was at all relevant - but either way, they didn't.
Instead, they each took turns to throw up ever less funny answers, in an attempt at some kind of masturbatory one-upmanship.

Maybe they need to come up with something new rather than dragging an idea to death or, at the very least make some effort to balance comedy & quiz.

Who knows, maybe I'm the only one who hates this shit?

Rant over.