Dan Patterson and Mark are in fact the producers and the writers.
Sniff, I think Whose Line was better, but Mock the Week is topical! Most of the guys in that are good as well
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Nah, Mock the Week is pretty poor I think. Maybe it's just me, but I can sit through an entire episode of MTW and not laugh once. That never happened with Whose Line!
Look at him! Look at Jeff Wode!
Both are good, though as a fan of The Jam I have to say Mock The Week has better theme music! ;-) I can't believe it took me until about a month ago to realise both programmes were produced by the same people, especially when some aspects of them are so similar...the improvisational parts, anyway (especially the stand-up round I can't remember the name of where performers have to come up with quick witty responses to the topic on the screen...I'm thinknig it's "Scenes we'd like to see" but I'm not certain...that's just "Scenes from a hat" without a hat!!)
shareI just think that the humour on Mock the Weeks is a bit schoolboyish - I mean, how many Brokeback Mountain jokes can Frankie Boyle make? I do like Dara though, and Hugh Dennis is pretty reliable for a laugh.
Look at him! Look at Jeff Wode!
The main difference between Mock The Week and WLIIA is MTW is obviously a lot more scripted - it's pretty obvious they tip the teams off on what news stories they'll be asking them to be funny about in advance.
Hugh Dennis ( who was never ever a proper solo stand-up comedian anyway )is probably the worst for trying to pass off pre-scripted material as stuff he thought of there and then on the show - Rory Bremner too.
Proper stand-ups like Frankie Boyle and Andy Parsons are genuinely good at real funny ad-libs though.
I don't think that 'funny' and 'frankie boyle' are words that fit into the same sentence. The only thing he is genuinely good at is humour that is questionable at best. Andy Parsons is certainly funny though - Frankie Boyle wouldn't know funny if it made a joke about gay sex in front of him.
Look at him! Look at Jeff Wode!
I don't think that 'funny' and 'frankie boyle' are words that fit into the same sentence
I think Mock the Week seems a bit rehearsed. I think Have I got News for you is a better for topical comedy.
shareThe problem with this topic is that it's kind of relative; making a thread about Whose Line on the MTW board would get the opposite response.
For my money, MTW is one of the finest comedy shows on television, improvised or not. In fact, we know it's not. But who cares, really? If that's a quality you hold against a show, I pity your television tastes. Frankie Boyle, Hugh Dennis and Andy Parsons are all fantastically funny (Russell Howard is a bit hit-and-miss but far less than Rory Bremner) and it's unfortunate that Dara doesn't do his opening stand-up segment in the more recent shows.
The only real problem I have with the show is the reuse of some of the comics' stand-up material in the show. I've heard Ed Byrne, Al Murray and Frankie Boyle all recycle their material to use in the show and I expect there are far more who do (in Frankie's case this might be the other way around though; MTW material used in stand-up).
As for Frankie's questionable material . . . I don't see anything really wrong with it. Of course there's something wrong with it but it's nothing that so many others don't do these days too. Everyone from Jimmy Carr to a show as popular as Little Britain have pushed the bar for decency and political correctness (as much as I hate the term). Because material is questionable doesn't make it unfunny. Unless you're Jimmy Carr (who, in my opinion, is far better on a show like QI as opposed to his rotten-to-the-core stand-up shows).
However, Frankie did do one Richard Hammond joke on MTW that really, really seemed like it went too far. It was edited out and shown in a later clip show but God, it was hilarious . . .
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I think it is an okay show, but once compared with it's predecessor, it's just not very good.
It is simply the love child of whose line? and have I got news for you, but lives up to nether, due to the absence of paul merton, brillant games like party quirks and the higher amount of scripting.
some of the games are very blatently taken from whose line, though. They actually do world's worst quite a lot.
Still, I use it as an inbetween as have watched all of the episodes of whose line now.
The only real problem I have with the show is the reuse of some of the comics' stand-up material in the show. I've heard Ed Byrne, Al Murray and Frankie Boyle all recycle their material to use in the show and I expect there are far more who do (in Frankie's case this might be the other way around though; MTW material used in stand-up).
I admit to watching Mock The Weak (spellcheck doesn't pick that 'mistake' up), but to me seems more similar to a second or tenth-fiddle Have I Got News For You than Whose Line. It's more immature than HIGNFY, perhaps partly due to the lower average age of the participants and it seems to aim for a younger audience, who apparently demand more risque humour and smugness. HIGNFY is much better at the mocking.
As for comparing the improv side in MTW to Whose Line, I think one is completely improvised and the other has no improv whatsoever, except for the few off-the-cuff comments, which are kept in for the final edit if reasonably funny or oddly if Russell Howard's said it. On 'Wheel Of News' or whatever it's called, the subjects are obviously picked for a particular comedian. It's easy to see why Greg Proops looked bewildered when he recently guested on the 'improvised' Mock The Week.
Comedy writing is rarely good these days, so I only seem to find shows with improv in funny. HIGNFY has that nicely within the set rounds, especially from Paul Merton. I'm mostly having to watch the repeats of Whose Line (UK & US), for a good laugh these days, along with Christopher Guest films, which are all great and partly improvised.
"who apparently demand more risque humour and smugness. "
And that's why Tony Slattery is cool.
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I can't stand mock the week. Everyone in it seems cocky and big headed and remind me of John Sessions on Whose Line.
I don't mind Jo Brand but Frankie Boyle really annoys me.
You're a Bloody Wonder!share
Whose Line - Better by miles.
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"Anyway think Mock the Week kinda replaced it?"
No. Dara is an okay-ish comedian, but a *beep* host. And instead of it being a performance show - MTW feels more like a bunch of comedians constantly trying to one-up each other and laughing at their secret in-jokes. Pain to watch, really.