Hit the Road Jack

In this show, we see Jack Whitehall travel the UK giving his take on each place through celebrity guest interviews, Beadle-esque hidden camera sketches and a night spent with residents of the host city. So far we have seen him visit both Cardiff and Newcastle.

I have to say, this surprised me greatly.

When channel four first started to laud the coming of this show, I was unsure as to whether Jack Whitehall could pull-off character work. Should you have read my review of Fresh Meat, you will see where I was coming from, I am sure. My concern at the time was that the character played by Whitehall was simply an extension of the persona he portrays onstage, so really showed little acting ability beyond any we were already seeing but I am happy to say that I really do feel the characters we see him play work.

In general, I am not a fan of the type of shows which have hidden camera pranks – even in the heyday of the format with the likes of Candid Camera I found it generally to be quite an immature, lazy excuse for comedy, although I was quite a pretentious teen! The modern wave of shows following the format seem to have an added quality of cruelty and general disregard for the people being duped which to my mind is completely unnecessary. Jack’s pranks don’t do that: they have an element of reality to them that does not leave the subject seeming (and I guess feeling) a complete tool for falling for them and as such we can just enjoy them for what they are. Ok, maybe they are not falling-about-on-the-floor funny, but entertaining-and-I’d-happily-watch-more funny… and there isn’t much more you could ask from a television show than that really, is there?

The other elements work well, too; the guests thus far have been very entertaining and taken on the spirit of the show whilst the sketches showing how Jack passed an evening with his hosts are also very funny.

You can catch the two episodes which have aired already on the 4od player by clicking the pic below:



Next episode is on Channel 4 on Tuesday at 10.35pm and obviously on +1 at 11.35… check listings for other repeats. No excuses for missing it; it’s well worth half an hour of anyone’s time!

Fresh Meat

C4, Wednesdays at 10pm


Created by Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong, the writers of (amongst many other credits) Peep Show, this series follows a group of students as they begin university life. From such a strong writing team and with a cast of established performers most people will recognise from other shows, expectations were always going to be high for this offering.

The show has been slated quite horrifically by most, but I doubt those speaking out most loudly against it are amongst the demographic anyway and whilst people are holding such high expectations there is precious little margin for error.

The first episode saw the new students arrive in their shared house, to find the brilliantly dark and sometimes sinister Howard, played by the fantastic Greg McHugh and struggle to fit in with one another.

Ok, the dialogue is stilted in some parts, but in reality this is to be expected anyway from a group of strangers being thrown together as these characters are. The maladroit sentences, often trailing off as the character becomes aware of the awkwardness were well delivered, feeling natural as the viewer cringes with the character rather than at them upon remembering the many times they have said something similar.

I was taken by some of the small observations; when we first meet Howard and he delivers a string of murmurs, having not spoken aloud for a while; the reaction of Josie (Kimberley Nixon) as she and JP (Jack Whitehall) are talking at the bar and he declares with such immense pride his somewhat geeky set of A-levels; Josie’s trip to the fridge to cover her embarrassment as JP makes his official arrival at the house. Whilst many have given the writers unwarranted criticism over contrived dialogue pauses and so on, it seems that details like this have been overlooked with the assumption that writing a script is only about putting words into the actors’ mouths.

Admittedly, this show gives little in the way of hearty belly laughs, but in all fairness I do not think that is the point. There is an overall sense of reality to the characters and the storyline, resulting in a very entertaining comic drama which does not challenge, does not make you have to think and does not insult the audience.

I personally am looking forward to the development of the characters as the series continues and shall be holding overall judgement until having seen a few more episodes.

If you missed episode one, or just wanted to wait and watch it once the hype died down, it is available on the 4od player for a few weeks. Episode two is on Wednesday 28th at 10pm with repeats on Mondays at 11.10pm.