That Mitchell And Webb Look - Series 4 Page 16

I wrote this last night but resisted the temptation to post it mindful of the fact that some drink had been taken and I wished to see if I still felt the same today. I do...

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I watched the first one of these in the series and found it not too bad...but this tonight was bilge. What has happened since ep. 1? Never saw ep. 2 so can't comment on that. Was it any better? Surely it couldn't have been any worse than this one.

Tonight was (IMO) shockingly poor from the point of view of the quality of its material, and sadly for me, I just found it painfully unfunny, bereft of any decent ideas and bordering on the juvenile most of the 30 minutes.

The sketches, such as they were, seemed beaten into submission by spinning out gossamer-thin ideas and letting them run on for well past their sell-by dates.

It was very sad to see two excellent performers going through the motions, working with and contributing to the creation of woefully substandard nonsense.

Mrs Blenks commented that surely had M & W's friends and family seen this prior to transmission then they would have advised that it should never have been allowed to see the light of day.

An honest opinion is a beautiful thing, Blenks.

Again I thought the red button material had an edge on the show proper; particularly enjoyed Mark and Abi being bitter.

Still enjoying 'The Event' sketches. And I loved the Neil Armstrong sketch until the punch, the final sketch about the mad man with the rocket to the sun was far too long, boringly repetitive and just not funny enough.

I like the Didldidee bits.

Quote: zooo @ July 28 2010, 10:42 PM BST

I like the Didldidee bits.

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I don't. Except the land gull bit.

If I may Stott the rot so to speak.
There have been plenty of very good sketches in the new series but
there have been far too many misses.
So the programmes haven't really flowed that well and it's been much easier to remember the bad stuff.

Maybe Mitchell and Webb spread themselves so thinly they don't devote as much time as they should to making this as good as it could be.

I think there should be a behind the scenes sketch where Robert ask David how he is able to do so much TV work in such short periods of time and David reveals that there are clones of him and the real David does 'Peep Show' and he allows the inferior clones of himself to do things like 'Jam and Jerusalem', 'Would I Lie to You?' and 'The Bubble'. We know from past sketches that they don't mind slagging off their own work - they made a reference to Rob having been in Confetti and not enjoying it and there was that genius 'Hit and Miss' behind the scenes sketch from a previous series of this show.

Quote: johnny smith @ July 29 2010, 4:47 PM BST

I think there should be a behind the scenes sketch where Robert ask David how he is able to do so much TV work in such short periods of time ... and the inferior clones of himself to do things like 'Would I Lie to You?'

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Ha. That would be quite funny (although, actually, I think Would I Lie To You? is probably the best thing David does).

Anyway, to echo above, bit weak this episode wasn't it...

Quote: Steve Sunshine @ July 28 2010, 12:18 AM BST

The Boardroom sketch was great, but I'd also heard it on the radio show.

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That was probably the best sketch of the week... but, I agree, done better on the radio version. Where's their other radio hits though?!? e.g. the office with the stargate in it? It'd been better to spend the special effects budget on that proven idea rather than the jet packs I think.

Quote: Timbo @ July 28 2010, 10:17 PM BST

Again I thought the red button material had an edge on the show proper; particularly enjoyed Mark and Abi being bitter.

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It does surprise me that they've deemed some of the better sketches (with money spent on them) only good enough for the red button.

Quote: Mark @ July 30 2010, 11:56 AM BST

Where's their other radio hits though?!?

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Like the one with the Weather Brain, or that Zombie one.

Of all of the M&W I have seen, I like 2 sketches. the "are we the baddies?" Sketch from s1 and the "hit and miss" sketch.

I just.. don't like it. And I love them both as performers and TV personalities- I just this their sketch show is utter toss.

Quote: Nat Wicks @ July 30 2010, 1:43 PM BST

I just.. don't like it.

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Me too.

Quote: Matthew Stott @ July 30 2010, 1:20 PM BST

Like the one with the Weather Brain, or that Zombie one.

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That zombie sketch was a real stinker.

Quote: chipolata @ July 30 2010, 7:27 PM BST

That zombie sketch was a real stinker.

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I would not disagree with that statement. Though a better version was performed at The Works and apparently went down very well. The M & W version was basically a good idea that had yet to develop into a good sketch. Not that I care now, it was featured on the best sketch show on radio and I've currently been paid for it twice! It's a win!