Someone commented recently that Mitchell and Webb might have been the last decent sketch show. That and Armstrong & Miller possibly topped off the long stream of sketch shows from Python through NTNON to The Fast Show, Smack the Pony and Big Train.
But there are good sketch shows online. Foil Arms and Hog is good. The one that I can’t get enough of and which is really productive with new sketches and varieties is Viva La Dirt League.
Ostensibly for the gaming community, it really reaches beyond that bringing the culture and character development, in a similar way that Spaced did, albeit in Tick Tock length episodelets. A sample supercut will be posted in the first comment.
Let me know if you know/ like it or if you have any other favourites to recommend.
Here you go!
I think I may have oversold this. Who’d have thought?
I feel your pain, Sal. If you know the people/characters then the clip is probably great. As I am unfamiliar, I didn’t get it.
No, the clip is rubbish as an intro. I get that. The way they work, you get introduced to the characters in a drip feed way, which may not be immediately apparent in one clip, but let’s try:
Rowan – the slightly pouty, bullying manager
Adam – the weak, gullible shop assistant wearing glasses
Alan – the slightly less weak, less gullible shop assistant
Here’s a good episode – a shop scene with old school streetfighter online game aesthetics:
And here’s another awkward (GenZ) customer
Rowan – he’s a great manager:
I liked those sketches – thanks! I didn’t realise they were Kiwis! My daughter often adopts a NPC pose, so I am wondering if she gets that from this. I mean, the NPC one below.
Be proud of your own, BC! I’m glad you like them, and that your comment above prompted me to work a bit harder (better faster stronger) to provide decent content for the thread.
My ex wife’s niece Abbie has appeared in some of their work
She did SO good.
Did like, Rowan have a crush on her, or what?!
One other series they do is Epic NPC Man, which if you know anything about online role-playing games, might remind you of some of their foibles:
Nice work, Sal! I hope this thread has legs. hills There is gold in them there
For example, I am a very big fan of Foil Arms and Hog.
This is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in years.
And they are constantly brightening my humdrum life.
I was bowled over and rather baffled by that first clip by Viva La Dirt. But I liked it a lot and can see they’ve got something special.
There are a lot of very funny sketches coming out of Scotland.
This too.
Thanks, KFD! Foil Arns & Hog have a quick wit about them and create great sketches.
Other online comedians of a more political bent I like are Jonathan Pie, (of course), Michael Spicer’s The Room Next Door and Randy Rainbow, still going strong for this election.
Should anyone want more Karen, here is a rematch
This one from VLDL made me chuckle.
I was looking to find that one, thanks, KFD. Once I stepped back and looked at the VLDL output, I realised how much of it is based around online gaming, I mean, almost all of it. Like enough to put off the typical AWer totally. This was one of the ones I thought would more appeal. Yes, geek male, but not just geek gaming male.
It;s a lot easier to praise online sketch stuff because there’s a tendency to go by recommendations and consequently only what the best sketches. If you do that with ‘recent’ BBC sketch shows, then I think the best sketches of ‘Ellie & Natasia’ and ‘Lazy Susan’ stand up. The real problem (as far as I’m concerned) being repetition and some very weak ideas.
Only the best sketches? Luckily I spiked those guns by choosing a really bad example for the first clip above…
Most recommendations are of the best examples, aren’t they? Would you entice someone to listen to The Beatles by playing Mr Moonlight.
I’ll check out your recommendations – always good to try something new, thanks!
I’ve only recently discovered Key and Peele. Their sketches have a very high chuckle rate and have very high production values, unsurprising given Jordan Peele’s next career:
Thanks, TrypF! I’d forgotten about Key & Peele. They seemed to drop off the radar some time ago. I never connected them with ‘Get Out’, etc, but I can see the lineage now, quite clearly.
Always high quality, I especially liked the substitute teacher with his mispronunciations
“Jay-quell-een” etc.
The Onion was a sketch TV show from 2010 or so. It has since been sliced up and placed on youtube as individual segments. Watching them fifteen years later makes me realise the world hasn’t changed as much as I think it has. This clip is a morning show interview with the writer of the latest Fast and the Furious movie…
Thanks @Cookieboy! That is stupendous.
All so magnificently credible!
Thanks for the reminder of the fabulous Onion. It almost makes up for my bike being stolen today from behind our house.
Anyway, it gives me an excuse to (re)post my favourite Onion clip. Still funny, whenever I watch it.
Very sorry to hear about your bike being stolen, Sal. That is really bad news.
That Onion clip is hilarious!
Thanks KFD. It’s so annoying. I’d only just had the frame replaced, pretty much for the price of the orignal bike that I bought 15 years ago. I’m hoping house insurance will give me enough to buy a decent replacement – maybe even with disc brakes this time – a new toy to make up for the loss of ‘my old faithful road horse’.
Meantime, here are some more VLDL videos to distract me, and maybe others from the frustrations of life.