Englanding #22 : Funny Men

So, hi, well, yes. I remembered something that had changed when I went back to England, to wit: Comedians! YES! Apparently while I had been over here filling my head with Japanese comedians and celebrities in order to... oh, I dunno, facilitate my ascension to some kind of pop culture God-Node, a whole bunch of British comedians "came up through the ranks". Most of them seem to have started their careers while I still lived in England, but only to have come to prominence in the last two years. Also the show on which many of them seem to appear: Mock the Week, which I think I saw a couple of times before I left and thought was sort of crap, but seems to have found its feet and, y'know, can't argue with 7 series and counting, can you?

And there was a whole new stand-up show "Live at the Apollo"! Man, leave the country for two years, the things you miss out on. Here's Michael McIntyre, who is unfeasibly popular and whom I had never heard of before I left:

My parents were both like: "You've never heard of Michael McIntyre!?" Here's Russel Howard, whose name rings a bell but I don't think I'd ever seen:

And here's Frankie Boyle, who I had never heard of and now apparently he's famous enough to get his autobiography in Tesco. He's offensive!:

Which sadly seems to get in the way of him being funny all the time. That's a pretty spectacular one though.

Watching British panel-show comedies, it does strike me now that they do operate in a fairly similar way to a lot of Japanese comedy shows - essentially just acting as a showcase for stand-ups, but in a slightly different way (team based quiz shows as opposed to variety free-for-alls).

Oh, I should mention, all these guys seem to be pretty funny too! Good show!