Duck Quacks Don't Echo

Joke's over: how the TV panel show fell from grace

In their day, there was something intoxicating about the no-holds-barred panel show back-and-forth. But there seems to be little room for it in a society that has begun to appreciate empathy - and neither, conversely, in a more brutal political climate that is not particularly suitable for dissecting for cheap laughs. Perhaps, when the world lightens up again, they'll be back.

Duck Quacks Don't Echo to have children's version

Sky is to make a children's version of Duck Quacks Don't Echo, the popular panel show hosted by Lee Mack.

Lee Mack's fact-checking panel show - a kind of GCSE version of QI - returns for a third series, continuing its ongoing quest to verify all manner of urban mythology. Tonight's series opener invites Jerry Springer, Emma Bunton and Jason Byrne to the Duck pod, each armed with a pet fact to be tested to quacking point. After proving to the world that dog urine glows under ultraviolet light and that toilets tend to flush in E flat, it seems that no scientific theory is safe.

Lee Mack does his bit to fill the chronic shortage of panel shows with this new series, in which obscure facts are put to the test before celebrities. Tonight, it's Stephen Mangan, Davina McCall and, of course, Paddy McGuinness. Some cheap gags aside - early round "Fact Off" sees the resemblance between fact and another word starting with f pointed out - this is a pretty entertaining concept, exploring, among other issues, methods of blocking tickles and why men's mental skills go to pot after meeting attractive women.

Final episode of the series for the Lee Mack-fronted panel show, which looks and feels a bit like QI with a dollop of How 2 chucked in for good measure. As if to prove that comparison correct, this week's guests include former How 2er Carol Vorderman who, along with Jimmy Carr and Terry Wogan, will be hoping to put to bed an argument older than the cosmos itself: are women better than men at remembering directions? If you can get past the migraine-inducing set dressing, it's diverting enough viewing.

Radio Times review

You've tittered at QI. You've guffawed at Would I Lie to You? So how will your sides cope with a brazen fusion of both formats?

That's obviously the thinking behind this derivative panel show, in which Lee Mack asks a team of celebrity guests to provide hard evidence for their seemingly outlandish claims. This week's unlikely facts include: dogs can "catch" their owners' yawns; shrimps are fitter than humans; and an adult male will never be shorter than his mother.

Padded out with pop-science facts, whimsical practical tests and based in a weirdly cramped, overly busy set - it looks like it's filmed in a stationary drawer - it has the whiff of a project cobbled together during a busy executive lunch. But it passes the time affably.

Mack's guests are Olivia Colman, Rhod Gilbert and Paul Hollywood, who gamely leaves his Bake Off comfort zone to see if it's possible to scale a wall using household vacuum cleaners.

Approach any panel show that promises to put "wacky" facts to the test with caution. In this new series, host Lee Mack is joined by a celebrity panel comprising Ruth Jones, Dara O'Briain and Mel C, who brings to the table her claim that dog wee glows under UV light. Fortunately, a cute pack of puppies are on hand to test that particular theory. There are light laughs to be had and a few surprising titbits to be learned, and Mel C gets glued to the ceiling, so it's all quite entertaining, really.

Radio Times review

Lee Mack is a past master at the panel show game, but his new show is a very different beast from Would I Lie to You? It's a much looser, far less competitive affair in which guests propose some unbelievable facts - eg touching anyone's upper arm will help you get what you want from them - which are then put to the test.

Today's guests are Dara O'Briain, Ruth Jones and Melanie C, whose suggestions afford Mack the opportunity to show off his quicksilver wit - as well as the obligatory gag about the Spice Girls, he also deduces that the inside of Jones's mind is like a Disney film.

The best bits are those impromptu moments: Mack riffing about the baldness of a stagehand and an unexpected camera shot a lesser man would have left on the cutting-room floor.

Review: Duck Quacks Don't Echo, Sky 1

Lee Mack's new panel show about improbable facts needs more substance to support the jokes.

Lee Mack reveals the shows he's said no to

"There was one show I was asked to do where you had to jump off a diving board and into a swimming pool..."