Unmissable show?
The Walking Dead. The end of this mid-season I actually shouted at the telly, “What the!” It’s always a brilliant sign of how invested you are. I wouldn’t class myself as a horror fan, but then it’s so much more than a horror show. It’s my series. My wife’s gone to bed, it’s not suitable viewing for my son, it really is my bit of TV time. All the lights off, at night. I have more dreams about what to do come the zombie apocalypse than about anything else. I’m subconsciously planning for it. I’ve planned what we would barricade and where we would head for. I think that the family should all get motorbikes, because I do not want to end up as one of those cars stuck on the highway in the opening credits. That’s how much it’s permeated into my life.
I love Adventure Time too. It’s right up there as one of my favourite shows on TV. I love the visuals, I love the characters, I love the humour. I can’t believe what [the show’s creator] Pendleton Ward gets away with, the amount of adult humour that is snuck into a kids show. You can get so despondent when you’re pitching ideas, but you’ve got to keep plugging away, because things like Adventure Time make it through. It’s a classic example of not condescending to kids, and just putting it out there. It’s inventive, but also ridiculously daft. For me and my son it’s our essential viewing. There seems to be a lot of fans in our older comic community, which is a sign of how good it is.
Earliest TV memory?
Being terrified by a kids show called Ragtime. There was this manic puppet bird in it that would run up to the screen and it scared the hell out of me. I watched it to force myself to get over the fear but I just hated it. I’ve never encountered that bird as an adult. It could set me back 20 years.It’s bizarre what you latch onto. My lad’s fearless, but he had a problem with one of the characters in Numberjacks. It’s odd with what the brain identifies with danger.
There was also Michael Bentine’s Potty Time. All I remember was flashes of this crazy guy, talking to mad puppets, and mad sketches. I think he was involved with the Goons and Spike Milligan for a while. It was this utterly crazy show. It’s a bit like Milligan’s Q... series in that I’m aware of it and it’s had some sort of lasting impression but I struggle to remember any of it. I just remember thinking ‘this bloke’s off his rocker’. You wonder how it got commissioned, even then. It did things because it felt like it. There was not a single bit of educational value to it, or morality. Kids love to see adults be crazier than kids.
TV turn-off?
The talent stuff, the reality shows. I just cannot get over the manipulation factor of it. If it’s celebs I can’t help but go, ‘Who in their right mind would put themselves on camera for 24 hours a day’, and if it’s the public, half the time they’re just laughing at people. It’s that notion of how quickly these things chew people up and spit them out. The only thing in years that would have me watching TV on a Saturday evening would be Harry Hill’s TV Burp, my son loved it. It’s great when kids find shows like that. My son got into Futurama and The Simpsons quite early on. There’s jokes I’ll get that he won’t get, but he loves it. It’s great when you start to have a similar enjoyment and appreciation of certain shows. He’s got a really good sense of humour on him. But he’s still a sucker for the mainstream stuff..
Comfort TV?
I love Homes Under The Hammer. It’s my guilty pleasure but I’m not guilty. I’m just obsessed with property. Man V Food as well. On a Sunday, especially if you’re feeling delicate, you can just lose a whole day to it – living gratuitously through someone else. And Storage Hunters. My wife will actually pull a face at me for watching that one.
Pitch us a TV show…
Myself and Dustin Hoffman doing a real-life version of something like The Equaliser or The A-Team. Solving problems, getting mean when we need to and hustling when we have to. I’d be the tough guy. Dustin’s taken me under his wing and I think we’re doing good but all he’s really doing is seeking revenge against Russell Crowe who turned him over in a Malibu land deal. He never forgave him for it. Johnny Depp would play our snitch.
Drunk History airs Monday, 10pm, Comedy Central
