My unsure anticipation was well founded as I managed to the first ad break and switched off.
With the assembled cast and David Mitchell hosting (was he the right person?) it should/could have been a lot better.
The Graudian summed it up neatly:-
"Outsiders: David Mitchell's desperate bid to outdo the genius of Taskmaster"
I was quite taken with it. I didn't see it as a new Taskmaster, as that's just setting it up to fail. The tasks themselves were not as interesting as the quarrelling between the pairs. Lou Sanders is genuinely frightening, while I thought Jessica Knappett and Jamali Maddix were the highlight. I could have done without the fifteen minute summing up of the previous hour we've just watched at the end though.
Chortle did make a similar, but not so strong comparison, and I suppose it didn't help when 5 of the 6 featured well in Taskmaster.
I may give it another look,
I know what you mean about the "waffle" though - it severely pisses me off when they say "And coming up", then show clips of what to expect - just show the episode FFS and stop all this padding, with a pathetic attempt to ensure you won't change channels. Well, if there's much more of it, I will be!!
I liked it a lot. Very enjoyable. They're a really good variety of people.
And note Mitchell isn't merely host, but co-creator.
A likeable cast makes it work .
Very funny. Lou and Ed are a particularly good pairing, and Jess is also proving consistently laugh-out-loud.
I hope there are more series on the way.
I agree with Herky. I lasted until the first break too. You can just tell that the pitch was "Like Taskmaster but outside". And too many Taskmasterers.
I also don't like that it features 6 people that aren't really into the outdoors and hosted by a person who dislikes everything about it, and that the humour comes from people doing things badly.
I might force myself to watch the rest of the episode, but I think it will just make me hate it even more.
I' caught five minutes yesterday by accident, surely the most annoying people on TV after The Richardsons, it would be funny if the contestants were doused in Caramel Frappucchino and made to sit on an ants nest, instead of mithering about birds and mud, and all the standard things that are the cliched bug-bears of urban dwellers. Dire.
I liked the first episode but I've gone off it. The format just seems so... pointless. At least Taskmaster has a good variety of things, this is just watching people who don't like camping go camping and deliberately doing things badly for comic effect. What I love about Taskmaster is how they try their hardest at the silliest things.
