10 O'Clock Live and a laugh of fresh air.

I've been meaning to type one of those posts about current events, world affairs and the ins and outs of all that is driving me nutty in the world. From the Con-Lib coalition helping to force us towards U.K. Corp (where we'll probably just have to be glad to have oxygen we don't have to pay for), to the stresses of the work and the madness of mankind. I know, old before my time, get a life, stop listening to Radio 4 at the age of 26, etc, etc, blah blah blah. The thing is, these things wriggle their way into my conscience each day and must rub my frontal lobe against my parietal lobe or something because it's an action that makes me want to facepalm, then get sorted on some plans to emigrate.

That dissipated a little last night however. After a trip to the Gym, dinner and a short marathon of Star Trek Enterprise, I happened to catch the second episode of Channel 4's new show 10 O'Clock Live. I had meant to sit down to watch the first one but never got chance and it turns out I've been missing out. It was just the shot of comedy on the right subject matter that I needed. As they rattled through their scripts it was great to know I'm obviously not the only one thinking how messed up the system is in this country and, well, the world. Although after watching, the system and 'democracy' in which we live still feels messed up, I don't feel so alone in holding the thoughts I was going to try and express. Thankfully my favourite comedian and his colleagues managed to say it in a better way than I could. Whoever writes it has my kudos flying their way.

Jimmy Carr, David Mitchell, Lauren Laverne and Charlie Brooker are four very smart and funny people who are also perfectly suited to indulge us in what I can only describe as The Daily Show meets a hybrid of Question Time and Mock the Week sprinkled with a hint of Spitting Image - the Spitting Image thing I think is just a feeling of the show, something in the realms of the similarity of the satire rather than the appearance of the hosts.

Unlike some reviews such as this one by Kevin O'Sullivan on the Daily Mirror website, where it was declared after the first show that, 'as of now, 10 O’Clock Live is dead in the water', I found the show oozes with great humour and intelligent chatter but best of all it doesn't hold back in asking the questions you don't seem to get on other shows, though it does poke fun at the tabloids somewhat. Having now seen the same show he reviewed, I think all I've taken from Kevin's review is that he may be missing two cents of humour short of a dollar of understanding. Maybe he'll change his mind when it becomes the must-view show that I'd say it is, going by what I've seen so far.

If you share my little worries, fancy a bit of comedic release and haven't given it a watch yet, I'd highly recommend taking a look over on the Channel 4 On Demand Website for the 10 O'Clock Live show where if you're in the UK you can catch up with the series so far and choose for yourselves. Other than that, it's on Thursdays at 10pm and then repeated on a Friday at 11.20pm. Episodes are around 45 minutes long. Happy laughing :)