Have I Got News For You

BBC One

Thursdays, 8.30pm

Have I Got News For You returned for its fifty gagilionth series this week. It’s still the BBC’s archetypal comedy-news quiz, with one host asking questions on all things newsworthy, while improv comedian, Paul Merton and Private Eye editor, Ian Hislop try to answer them in as funny a way as possible with the aid of one guest panelist each.

 

Hislop was paternered with 22 year old Scottish stand up, Kevin Bridges, while Merton had Nigel Farage of UKIP for company. UKIP being the UK Independence Party, a party who according to their website are a “Libertarian, non-racist party seeking Britain's withdrawal from the European Union”. If you feel the need to put “non-racist” in on your website, you’ve probably justifiably earned a reputation for being racist.

 

Lee Mack occupied the guest host’s chair, which has still not found a new owner since Angus Deayton was fired for doing naughty things in 2002.

 

The quiz consisted of three rounds. The first round sees videos involving the week’s biggest news stories with no audio being shown to each team, who have to guess what the story is. Obviously both teams got the answer correct, but this isn’t a very hotly contested competitition. It’s more an excuse to take the piss out of any political figures who have strayed into the press in the time between episodes. This week Tony Blair got it in the neck for giving a speech in support of Gordon Brown’s election campaign and five MPs got hammered for accepting money from companies in exchange for changing little laws that prevent them making money.

 

The second round was the picture spin quiz, which is focussed on the less publicised, more ridiculous stories in the news. This week a Hollywood-style sign for Basildon, health and safety measures preventing the Queen from walking down some stairs because she “had not been trained to use them”, the laughter of hiennas and a sign in Romania warning motorists of drunks in the road were mulled over. Here’s hoping it continues through the whole series.

 

Finally a very brief missing words round where contestants had are shown a sentence from a publication and have to guess a word which has been blacked out gave a Merton and Mack the chance to exchange a few improvised one-liners. Bridges tried to join in but he was outclassed by the senior comedians.

 

Bridges didn’t say much throughout the episode. He’s had a few telly appearences this year, but seemed to let the nerves get the better of him here. He did bang out one corker though, when he pointed out that a Tory billboard with the words “I let 80,000 criminals out early, vote for me” next to picture of Gordon Brown actually secured ol’ Brownie 80,000 votes.

 

Farage was a complete joke, and not in a good way. Merton, Hislop and Mack tore him to shreds with ease because of his party’s policies. All he could do was sit there chuckle along as he got called ignorant. He may have thought appearing on the show would make him look as if he wasn’t stuffy and had a sense of humour, but he wound up looking like a gormless gimp who thought taking a beating was funny. In the end he wound up making UKIP look even more out of touch with everyday Brittons. At one point he admitted to being a crooked politician, expecting the audience to laugh. They didn’t.

 

This series could be a little different to previous years. Normally the producers force the panelists to go quite soft on Labour, but with the upcoming election, they know there is a strong chance that the reds will soon be out of power, so took the oppurtunity to go for the jugular. Of course the Tories got as much of a battering. David Cameron’s hint that he may cut the licence fee may have caused the BBC to be fearful enough to take the kid gloves off with Labour, but he’s still a dick and Merton and Hislop seemed to relish the freedom to take everybody down a peg. The Lib Dems and UKIP got spanked aswell, so it was all very fair.