Aptly named.

[accy]

So I watched The Hollowmen last night. Being working dogs return to satire after years of doing light entertainment I had high expectations. Frontline is one of my favourite australian comedies and having them apply their satirical wit to the political scene filled me with anticipation. Of course they had a hard act to follow with truly excellent The Games and the totally fabulous Grass Roots coming before. Sadly though it disappointed. Rob Sitch and Santo Cilauro seem to effectively reprise there characters from Frontline, but unfortunately they were never the strength of Frontline but rather it was the other ensemble cast that really made it all work. Especially Tiriel Mora, Alison Whyte and the two EP characters. In The Hollowmen the supporting case, at least in the first episode, isn't as good. While Lachy Hulme puts in a very good performance as Murph, Merrick Watts is bland, and the dynamic of having Rob Sitch's character "Tony" in charge didn't seem to work. The rest of the cast really didn't get a change to impress themselves on you.

It also suffered from resonating with Grass Roots ( very similar background music used in a similar manner ) and The Games ( The trope of not showing the actual politicians was seemingly borrowed from there).

All in all the series started not with a bang but a whimper.