So says regular panellist Milton Jones

Mock The Week is a tired format that’s had its day – and that’s according to one of its most prolific contributors.

In fact, Milton Jones, who has appeared in 38 episodes right up to the end of the latest series, the 16th, thinks the days are numbered for all panel shows.

‘I don’t think anyone who works on a panel show would argue otherwise,’ he said.‘They’ve been around a while, and there aren’t any new formats breaking through particularly…. Have I Got News for You or even Mock The Week looks quite over the hill, in terms of format. 

‘I think we’ll look back on the last 10 years thinking, Oh yeah, that was the time we did panel shows. ‘

In the interview with the Irish Times to promote his stand-up tour, Jones also said he felt that Mock The Week had lost its bite since he first appeared on it in 2005.

‘[It] began as the naughty show that people weren’t supposed to watch, because comedians like Frankie Boyle was going to say something horrendous,’ he said: 

‘This makes me sound really old, but when I started on it, it was alternative comedy. Now it’s really mainstream.’

And he said that the blandness of panel shows has filtered down to live comedy, which has lost its edge. ‘There needs to be a feeling where it’s like, "have you seen this guy? He’s not allowed on telly"  so there’s a live edge to stand-up. But comedy’s got homogenised into a big blob of nothing.’

The 53-year-old stand-up added that comedy needs a new breed of young comics to come along with a form of comedy that older people like him won’t understand.

Published: 10 Apr 2018