Scallywagga
I've become increasingly suspicious of people who do things "ironically" lately. Too often this concept of irony is held up as a kind of rhetorical ejector seat, propelling someone to safety when they've said something they shouldn't and don't want to take responsibility for it. In TV shows this is often a free licence to say what you want; that might be all well and good if you actually are being ironic, but otherwise it just ends up looking like a tool for provoking laughter from imbeciles. Take BBC3's The Wall, a pisspoor variety show of unsigned "comedy" acts, one of which was a woman reading out all Bernard Manning's sexist jokes - but it was all right, you know, because she was a woman and was acting moved. Here's a case of "irony" being used as an excuse to use someone else's material verbatim, and look, all these fashionable kids with their jaggedy haircuts and their flat caps (worn ironically of course) are laughing, so if you're not you can't be part of the cool crowd.
Which brings me to Scallywagga. I'd seen trailers of this and thought it looked crap, but finally gave in to my curiosity last night and watched a whole episode. It was, quite sincerely, the worst thing I've ever seen that wasn't presented by Davina McCall.
Scallywagga, for those of you mercifully outside its blast radius, is a sketch show that's just finished its first series on BBC Three, a digital freeview channel frantically and desperately marketed at a yoof audience. Over time BBC 3's output has become more and more psychotic as it frenetically chases the kind of youth who only exists on TV anyway, the walking subculture in the aforementioned flat cap whose entire character and personality is governed by that one defining feature. It has gone so far as to ask viewers to record their own programme announcements on their webcams for use on the channel. It's finally given birth to this programme, which is a perfect example of the kind of show that thinks it's being ironic: it's self-conscious enough to ensure that the word "irony" is mentioned prominently in its title theme, for one thing. It has a large cast of young actors and all its sketches revolve around the central theme of youth subcultures, possibly becase in the Scallywagga world youth subcultures are all that exist anyway.
It is, quite simply, utterly dreadful. It's a comedy show with all the funny bits taken out, almost as if someone has identified where the laughs are and then consciously removed them in the edit suite. You end up with jokes that end just when you think a punchline is about to come in, easy cracks about obvious targets (one involves goths who don't go out in sunlight...geddit?!?) and, worst of all, endless catchphrases. The one I'm thinking of is a girl who pops up in incongruous places (such as a children's play area) and asks people if there's a Greggs (a bakery franchise) nearby. As I've only seen the one episode it's merely an unfunny joke, but as a catchphrase it's unbearable. Even more obnoxious is "CHILLYMONDO!", which the show's web site encourages people to shout out in public, record on their phones (because apparently "Scallywagga is all up on your mobile" - their words) and send in. Here's an example of an (unedited) Scallywagga joke:
I haven't quite worked out whether there's no laughter track or whether it's just that nobody's laughing.
But the show merely being unfunny isn't grounds for me to sit here talking about it in this manner. Ordinarily a short comment would be in order, and then I'd forget about it. But there's an altogether more sinister aspect to the show, a disturbingly misanthropic undercurrent where the bullies win, the villains are celebrated and ordinary, inoffensive people are routinely terrorised. That clip I posted is an example, albeit a minor one, ending with the loiterer shaking his head dismissively at the sucker who's doing his business for him. The episode I watched - part six - has an extremely unpleasant sketch detailing how a young lottery winner uses his millions to orchestrate a campaign of torment against someone else. Two things strike me: firstly, that the victim is a character who doesn't belong to the "in crowd" fashionista society that populate most of the sketches, but is instead an ordinary man of nondescript appearance. Secondly, like most sketches, there's no real punchline or payoff at the end, meaning that the intended laughs come not from the subversion of an idea - a key concept in comedy - but from the sight of someone with a "TOSSER" sign held behind their head as they walk down the street.
Of course, the show's justification is that it's being ironic. But with such an astoundingly unfunny show that justification dies on its arse, especially as it doesn't have the guts to actually stand up for itself. One sketch involves a shopping centre security guard who chases a gang of hoodies out of his store by following them around reading a history textbook at them, because "chavs hate learning". There's the kernel of a funny idea there, but as soon as the gang are out through the doors the guard ceremoniously chucks the book in a bin. Because we can't have the lead character in one of the sketches being genuinely different from the simplistic "yoof" cliches the show gives us as a matter of course, can we? Not with the target audience this show thinks is out there.
So go on, watch it if you want. It isn't often I'm compelled to rant like this, but a show as ghastly as Scallywagga requires more than a thumbs down on Youtube.
Which brings me to Scallywagga. I'd seen trailers of this and thought it looked crap, but finally gave in to my curiosity last night and watched a whole episode. It was, quite sincerely, the worst thing I've ever seen that wasn't presented by Davina McCall.
Scallywagga, for those of you mercifully outside its blast radius, is a sketch show that's just finished its first series on BBC Three, a digital freeview channel frantically and desperately marketed at a yoof audience. Over time BBC 3's output has become more and more psychotic as it frenetically chases the kind of youth who only exists on TV anyway, the walking subculture in the aforementioned flat cap whose entire character and personality is governed by that one defining feature. It has gone so far as to ask viewers to record their own programme announcements on their webcams for use on the channel. It's finally given birth to this programme, which is a perfect example of the kind of show that thinks it's being ironic: it's self-conscious enough to ensure that the word "irony" is mentioned prominently in its title theme, for one thing. It has a large cast of young actors and all its sketches revolve around the central theme of youth subcultures, possibly becase in the Scallywagga world youth subcultures are all that exist anyway.
It is, quite simply, utterly dreadful. It's a comedy show with all the funny bits taken out, almost as if someone has identified where the laughs are and then consciously removed them in the edit suite. You end up with jokes that end just when you think a punchline is about to come in, easy cracks about obvious targets (one involves goths who don't go out in sunlight...geddit?!?) and, worst of all, endless catchphrases. The one I'm thinking of is a girl who pops up in incongruous places (such as a children's play area) and asks people if there's a Greggs (a bakery franchise) nearby. As I've only seen the one episode it's merely an unfunny joke, but as a catchphrase it's unbearable. Even more obnoxious is "CHILLYMONDO!", which the show's web site encourages people to shout out in public, record on their phones (because apparently "Scallywagga is all up on your mobile" - their words) and send in. Here's an example of an (unedited) Scallywagga joke:
Click to viewI haven't quite worked out whether there's no laughter track or whether it's just that nobody's laughing.
But the show merely being unfunny isn't grounds for me to sit here talking about it in this manner. Ordinarily a short comment would be in order, and then I'd forget about it. But there's an altogether more sinister aspect to the show, a disturbingly misanthropic undercurrent where the bullies win, the villains are celebrated and ordinary, inoffensive people are routinely terrorised. That clip I posted is an example, albeit a minor one, ending with the loiterer shaking his head dismissively at the sucker who's doing his business for him. The episode I watched - part six - has an extremely unpleasant sketch detailing how a young lottery winner uses his millions to orchestrate a campaign of torment against someone else. Two things strike me: firstly, that the victim is a character who doesn't belong to the "in crowd" fashionista society that populate most of the sketches, but is instead an ordinary man of nondescript appearance. Secondly, like most sketches, there's no real punchline or payoff at the end, meaning that the intended laughs come not from the subversion of an idea - a key concept in comedy - but from the sight of someone with a "TOSSER" sign held behind their head as they walk down the street.
Of course, the show's justification is that it's being ironic. But with such an astoundingly unfunny show that justification dies on its arse, especially as it doesn't have the guts to actually stand up for itself. One sketch involves a shopping centre security guard who chases a gang of hoodies out of his store by following them around reading a history textbook at them, because "chavs hate learning". There's the kernel of a funny idea there, but as soon as the gang are out through the doors the guard ceremoniously chucks the book in a bin. Because we can't have the lead character in one of the sketches being genuinely different from the simplistic "yoof" cliches the show gives us as a matter of course, can we? Not with the target audience this show thinks is out there.
So go on, watch it if you want. It isn't often I'm compelled to rant like this, but a show as ghastly as Scallywagga requires more than a thumbs down on Youtube.