Let’s Talk About The Nether Regions Series 1 News Posted by Ian Symes on 6th January 2022, 10:18 In a blaze of absolutely bugger all publicity, we’re excited to note that the first full series of The Nether Regions starts tonight at 11pm on BBC Radio 4. Written by Rob Grant and Andrew Marshall of Quanderhorn fame (and I believe they may have had some involvement in other sitcoms too), it’s a sketch show in the form of a Twilight Zone spoof, which is not only penned by everyone’s favourite relatively-new-comedy-writing-partnership-comprised-of-people-previously-associated-with-other-writing-partnerships, but stars them too, alongside Helen Cripps, Edward Rowett and Holly Morgan. And as per Quanderhorn, it’s produced by Hudzen 10 himself, the brilliant Gordon Kennedy. If you missed the pilot way back in 2019, or need a refresher given that it’s been approximately eighteen years since the heady days of 2019, it’s been archived here. And don’t worry if you’re not awake and in the vicinity of a wireless during the prime time transmission slot tonight, as it will be available on BBC Sounds or the show’s BBC programmes page immediately after broadcast. And when you’ve listened, let us know what you reckon on this very thread, which will serve as your Let’s Talk About for the whole four-episode series.
I liked a couple of the sketches, the last one was corny but probably the one I enjoyed the most to be honest. A lot of good ideas but execution was a bit off. A bit too much explaining-the-joke too, which isn’t a good thing because it’s bad. I’ll still listen to the next three though.
I quite liked it but not as much as the pilot episode, which I listened to again this afternoon. Mostly decent ideas for sketches, just felt a bit light on good jokes. It’s well performed. The whole “Nether Regions” conceit is tenuous and doesn’t really add anything.
It’s very nostalgic and old-fashioned, but that makes it an easy listen and quite relaxing to hear. I think it’s obvious that Rob is more of a writer than an actor and sometimes it sounds like he is reading the lines for the first time.
OK, I’ve listened to episode 1. I already knew what to expect because I listened to the pilot way back when, so to say I’m “disappointed” would perhaps be inaccurate. But it wasn’t funny, outside of a few moments. The sketches felt like a mix of “the concept is amusing, but nothing especially funny or surprising really happens as the sketch progresses”, “the concept would be amusing, if I hadn’t already seen/heard tons of sketches parodying the same thing”, and “the concept isn’t amusing”. A couple of other issues plagued the show for me: 1, they keep over-explaining the joke. Like, calling your dodgy legal company “Bogus Claims”. I get it OK, spelling it out doesn’t make it funnier. And 2, every time there was a character played by Rob Grant, him sounding like Rob Grant was just distracting to me. Love the guy, but he’s not quite Rory Bremner. Bonus 3rd issue that others have mentioned: the title and opening primes you for a show with some sort of paranormal throughline, where every sketch is a new Twilight Zoney bizarre situation, but what we get could be basically any sketch show ever made. I enjoyed “English Batman”, but even with that I couldn’t escape the fact that none of the comedy actually derived from the characters being English, it’s just “when you think about it, isn’t Batman kind of silly?” that’s been done so often it was the basis for one of the most popular TV series ever made, over 50 years ago. The 2 years since this same set up was in the pilot is nothing. And they ended the sketch with a fat joke… So, never mind eh. Any news on Quanderhorn 3?
This week’s was quite a bit better I thought. The recurring sketches were all stronger than in episode 1, and there were some good new ones as well. One of the trolls in the Points of View sketch was a simulant.
I’m curious, did anyone on here stick with this to the end? For all I know you could all be loving it, but just not have anything to say about it. I admit I totally forgot that this series was only 4 episodes. It seems unusually short. I was assuming the last episode would be happening today.
The last two were more of the same, really. Nothing much to write home about. World of Doors in the last episode felt very much like a poor man’s version of the cash register/doorbell shop sketches from That Mitchell and Webb Sound.
