Well you certainly can’t say it was not quick off the mark. Last week I was critical of ITV1’s new satire Newzoids for not being very topical. Ballot Monkeys featured gags about news stories I’d not even heard about they were so boxfresh. 1:0 to C4 in the election comedy race?
Having said that the format of Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin’s comedy was pretty straightforward, allowing them to drop in the up-to-the-second quips during today's filming. The cameras simply cut between colour-coded campaign battle buses where twonks, gonks and spinmeisters plotted, planned and were always a gaffe, a headline or a negative tweet away from a full-scale panic.
The gags soon flowed. “Are we allowed to mention Ed Miliband?” the Labour bus nervously wondered early on. Ben Miller’s lonely Liberal dreamt of “modest triumph”. UKIP’s communications man (Andy Nyman) said it was “quite quiet today, only had to suspend two people”.
As for the topicality, there were pithy lines about John Major's latest “recipe for mayhem” remark and Paddy Ashdown saying “bastard” seven times in one interview, which I had to google to confirm was a genuine story it was so up to date.
The programme was also not afraid to be a bit brave, with one line about abuse allegations affecting property prices and another about the African refugee tragedies. By and large though a lot of the humour was fairly Have I Got News For You generic satire, poking fun at policies, spin and Eric Pickles. They could have done more about the SNP but I'm sure that will come.
Even if the quality was not always brilliant though you couldn’t fault the quantity. And you couldn’t fault the cast either, which also included familiar faces Trevor Cooper, Sarah Hadland, Hattie Morahan, Hugh Dennis, Daisy Haggard and Esther Smith.
OK, so it wasn't as sophisticated as The Thick of It, but Hugh Dennis’s Boris rant was particularly priceless. If this felt a little like a first draft in places that’s to be expected. If the scripts had been written with pens the ink would not have even been dry by the time the closing credits rolled.
Ballot Monkeys, C4, Tuesdays, 10pm.
Read a review of Newzoids here.
