Charlie Brooker's 2010 Wipe.
First broadcast 27th December 2010.
Charlie Brooker
Doug Stanhope
Grace Dent
Charlie Brooker
Doug Stanhope
Grace Dent
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00Hello, I'm Charlie Brooker and you're watching 2010 Wipe, a programme all about things both
00:24real and televised that happened this year.
00:27And it was a year of confusing and unexpected events.
00:30Our bewildered nation experienced a general election which nobody won, had its holiday
00:35plans thwarted by an Icelandic volcano and saw bemusing footage of revered author Salman
00:39Rushdie answering showbiz questions while playing ping-pong on The One Show.
00:43Britain or X-Factor?
00:44X-Factor.
00:45EastEnders or Coronation Street?
00:46EastEnders.
00:47But we start, as years often do, with January.
00:55Yes, January, and just as predictable was the annual Winter is Cold story in which Britain
01:01gets twinned with Narnia and everyone gets a few days off work aside from a legion of
01:04unfortunate current affairs foot soldiers who had to stand outside like cheerless snowmen
01:09gazing forlornly at the viewer like tramps staring through the window of an upmarket
01:13restaurant.
01:14Largely, though, it was an excuse to turn the news into a screensaver consisting of
01:16pretty snaps of Britain coated in magic pixie dust.
01:19Mind you, anything looks nice with a bit of snow on it.
01:22A gallows, a dead dog, Michael Gove.
01:26And thanks to the icy pavements, there was also plenty of hilarious slapstick on offer
01:30to liven up the news reports.
01:31All they had to do was point a camera at a street and wait for some painful moments of
01:35comedy.
01:37It's still dangerous for Dublin pedestrians.
01:41But not everyone found it quite so funny.
01:43The pavement should be gritted like the roots.
01:46People leave their cars at home because they can't get off their drives and so forth and
01:49so on.
01:50It must be gritted like the roots.
01:52All right, sniffle guts, cheer up.
01:54But the roads weren't gritted enough either, thanks to an acute grit shortage which farted
01:57some much-needed drama into the story, which the news was quick to exaggerate.
02:02Without grit, even Britain's largest and most important roadways will deteriorate into almost
02:07impassable death traps.
02:08Throughout the snowfall, the news seemed keen to paint the whole thing as a nationwide disaster,
02:13although the public selfishly enjoyed it.
02:15What about this travel chaos, the misery across Britain, snowbound Britain?
02:21Doesn't matter, does it?
02:23Sticking with icy fun, there was the return of celebrity fracture factory Dancing on Ice.
02:28The appeal of Dancing on Ice is that it's effectively amateur Formula One.
02:32These people can't do this and one of them might die.
02:35Or lose an index finger.
02:36I mean, that's the least they could do.
02:38Someone who's presumably keen not to lose any other parts of her body was competitor
02:41Heather Mills.
02:43Quite possibly a last-minute replacement for Radovan Karadzic.
02:46Also in January, the nation was delighted by the launch of a wonderful new advertising campaign.
02:51Can I have your car keys?
02:55It's incredible, really, to find yourself pining for the good old days of Howard.
02:59I suck, I suck, baby.
03:01Who's supposed to listen to this station anyway?
03:03I would genuinely rather hear the four-minute warning coming out of a radio than any of this shit.
03:08Witnessing this bumwash, it's worth remembering that the Halifax part of HBOS was bailed out
03:12for the tune of £25 billion by the British taxpayer in 2009.
03:16So basically what I'm saying is you funded that commercial, you bastard.
03:21But not all TV was awful in 2010.
03:24Some of it was good.
03:27For instance, the reimagining of Sherlock Holmes tucked away in the summer schedules
03:31when everyone is assumed to be outside having water fights was fantastic.
03:34Gleefully written, carefully made, lovingly performed and just the right side of Panto.
03:38I will stop you.
03:40No you won't.
03:42Also, the US channel that brought you Mad Men served up some dead men instead
03:46in the shape of thunderous doomy epic The Walking Dead
03:49which featured more shuffling cadavers than the House of Lords.
03:52And fans of period costume were catered for with ITV's classy and imposing Downton Abbey.
03:58Downton Abbey, that was quality.
04:01It was about these medieval people who lived in a house with antiques in it.
04:06But they didn't know they were antiques because it was the past.
04:09So they were still new.
04:11The house was massive.
04:13You'd have to be like Trevor Nelson or something to afford a house like that.
04:17And the people who owned it were like royal-ish.
04:20And they had these slaves who did all the DIY and baked eggs for them and stuff.
04:25It was beautifully shot I reckon.
04:27They must have had at least two cameras filming that with really good filming them.
04:32Sometimes the camera was still and sometimes it'd move.
04:36So you never knew what was coming next.
04:38And you could hear what everyone was saying really clearly.
04:42My first cousin and his son are almost certainly dead.
04:48So they had really good microphones too.
04:51Anyway, I'd put it on and just soak up the atmosphere.
04:54You know, like, ahhh.
04:57You know, that's what the license fee's all about.
05:00In January, an earthquake struck Haiti,
05:02filling our screens with scenes of unimaginable suffering.
05:05The news reporters covering the story remained remarkably stoic
05:08in the face of events that would traumatise anyone.
05:10Modern news always needs to fashion events into a compelling narrative
05:13and the Haiti story was no different.
05:15Once it had shown us distressing scenes of overrun hospitals
05:18and rubble for several nights, it needed a fresh angle.
05:21And so began the search for signs of conflict.
05:24Obviously, a massive aid effort organised at short notice
05:27in a country whose infrastructure has been destroyed
05:29is going to be a logistical nightmare.
05:31And there was much coverage criticising the slow distribution of aid.
05:34But one of the things holding up the aid was the fear of violence,
05:37which the news also seemed fascinated by.
05:39The moment footage of sporadic but inevitable scuffles arrived,
05:42it was seized on as evidence that the whole of Haiti
05:45was about to descend into barbarism.
05:47But with aid struggling to get through,
05:49the country is spiralling out of control.
05:51Haiti now is not just a tinderbox
05:54of simmering desperation and anxiety.
05:57It's possibly just one step from something very ugly indeed.
06:01At times, the news seemed to frame the threat of violence
06:03as not just a possibility in any society
06:05that's hit by a massive disaster,
06:07but as something endemic to Haiti itself.
06:09But there's this ugly undercurrent, sadly, within Haitian history,
06:14which has the ability to turn,
06:16it has the ability to quite literally fight for survival.
06:19Hence, you're seeing not just doctors and aid workers on the streets,
06:23but riot police too.
06:25Oh, the ugly undercurrent in Haitian history
06:27presumably distinguishes it from, say, Britain,
06:29a country whose own history
06:31consists of millennia of uninterrupted peace.
06:33Still, whatever, here's some angry foreigners.
06:36What have you done, motherf***er?!
06:38I'm a f***ing guy right here now!
06:40That's Haiti now!
06:42You know I'm not a f***ing Spanish right here!
06:44What he says is hard to understand.
06:46It almost doesn't matter.
06:48If you say so.
06:49In February, the residents of Albert Square went live
06:52and TV critic Grace Dent couldn't get enough of it.
06:55I actually thought that the East Enders' 25th live anniversary
06:58was one of the best things on BBC One this year.
07:00I didn't actually give a damn about who'd killed Archie.
07:03I just wanted to see how much they could arse it up
07:05in the space of 28 minutes.
07:07We saw Max Brannan dramatically stick his fingers down his throat.
07:11We saw a supposedly dead Bradley's hand strangely moving.
07:17I think the best part of it was probably Jack Brannan
07:20slurring and stuttering over his lines.
07:23You got a motive, Bradley, all right?
07:25You found out what she...
07:27I didn't care who was involved.
07:28The biggest mystery was what the hell he was going on about.
07:31You held the fact from the...
07:32Look, it's a motive.
07:33You've held it against the public.
07:34Look, we all have.
07:35I think the lesson we learned from the live episode
07:38is that things aren't actually better live.
07:40I mean, they're exciting, but not for the right reasons.
07:43One of the best things on East Enders this year
07:45was possibly Phil's descent into crack.
07:47What I need is crack.
07:50It was always a mystery to me
07:51why nobody had ended up on crack sooner.
07:54It's such a depressing place.
07:56I can't believe it's taken until 2010 to resort to it.
07:59The thing is with Phil's usage of crack
08:01was that he seemed to spend a lot of the time at a party
08:04completely off his head, listening to The Who.
08:09Phil's life was immeasurably lifted by using crack.
08:12I mean, in fact, this wasn't anti-drugs,
08:14this was an advert for crack.
08:18Apparently addicted to a different sort of crack
08:20was golfing legend Tiger Woods,
08:22one of several high-profile sports stars
08:24who got caught tit-handed this year.
08:26Woods had had sex with so many women
08:28he had to issue a worldwide apology
08:30comprehensively broadcast live on Sky News
08:32in unflinching, uncomfortable and apparently unending detail.
08:35I want to say to each of you simply and directly...
08:42..I am deeply sorry
08:44for my irresponsible and selfish behaviour I engaged in.
08:49You know, I'm detecting a slight air of penitence from this.
08:52I once heard, and I believe it's true,
08:56it's not what you achieve in life that matters,
08:59it's what you overcome.
09:01Or come over, in your case.
09:03I know people want to find out
09:05how I could be so selfish and so foolish.
09:09Yeah, that and they want to know
09:11how come you didn't squirt yourself inside out.
09:13Of course, what Tiger is actually doing here
09:15is addressing his sponsors who require him
09:17to fall on his pork sword cos they need
09:19someone spotlessly clean to hawk their goodies.
09:21In fact, it's surprising no-one capitalised on it
09:23by creating a range of apologising Tiger dolls.
09:26I am so sorry.
09:28Before long, the incident had become an advertising opportunity
09:31with Tiger appearing in a bizarre and sombre Nike commercial
09:34in which the voice of his dead father
09:36could be heard quizzing him.
09:38I want to find out what your thinking was.
09:42I want to find out what your feelings are.
09:48And did you learn anything?
09:50Yeah, never mind did you learn anything,
09:52did you take any photos?
09:54Of course, ironically, it's possible that Tiger
09:56used to imagine his dead father talking to him
09:58to delay orgasm.
10:00One thing you couldn't get away from this year on TV
10:02was ridiculous physical motion.
10:04Jigging was everywhere,
10:06as if some North Korean scientist
10:08had snuck in and unleashed a dance virus.
10:10From the gaudy enthusiasm of Sky's Got To Dance
10:13to the gittish street jerking on Britain's Got Talent,
10:16it seemed everyone wanted to be a singing, dancing twit.
10:18I blame Glee.
10:20Yeah, that's right, Glee, a sugary kitten fart
10:22of auto-tuned karaoke nothingity
10:24the nation quickly clasped to its easily impressed bosom.
10:28What you need is a big strong hand
10:31to lift you to your higher ground
10:36Essentially an ironic reboot of the Mickey Mouse Club,
10:38it centred on the can-do adventures
10:40of a yodelling clump of high school outcasts,
10:42all of whom were suspiciously screen-friendly
10:44taut-bummed outcasts.
10:46And that's basically my problem with this.
10:48These people are not proper outcasts.
10:50Proper outcasts don't groove along
10:52to feel-good pop songs.
10:54They sit in the corner, silently plotting revenge
10:56on people like this.
10:58Apart from a brittle turn from Jane Lynch
11:00as a domineering P.E. teacher,
11:02it was almost indistinguishable
11:04from the stuff it was meant to be parodying,
11:06complete with inspirational homilies
11:08and can-do bollocks.
11:10I had to find this new person inside of me,
11:12the one that was okay with what happened.
11:14Who made all those bad choices,
11:16who ignored the signs.
11:18He's gone.
11:20What an exhausted nation needed after that
11:22was a good old-fashioned fly-on-the-wall documentary
11:24about everyday people doing everyday things.
11:26Pineapple Dance Studios
11:28was Sky's gritty, unflinching look
11:30at life at the sharp end
11:32of absolutely sod all squared,
11:34and it was narrated impossibly by Michael Burke?
11:36Monday morning, an artistic director,
11:38Louis Spence, is getting ready
11:40for another hard day in the office.
11:42I think Burke's voice meant that you kept expecting
11:44it to suddenly cut to a starving child
11:46with flies round its face,
11:48whereas what you actually got
11:50was somehow more harrowing than that.
11:52Twirling at the centre of this vacuum
11:54was obligatory flamboyant docu-soap show-off
11:56Louis Spence, the sort of lisping, mincing caricature
11:58that Richard Littlejohn is presumably assaulted by
12:00in his nightmares and confused by in his dreams.
12:02God, it's like an episode
12:04of Britain's Neediest Man.
12:06If you look away from him for one minute,
12:08he will die.
12:10There's nothing wrong with working in Sainsbury's
12:12or Asda Packet. There's nothing wrong.
12:14But imagine me down the aisles.
12:16Rats and gizzards!
12:18Baked beans!
12:20I mean, you know, it's not going to happen, is it?
12:22Yeah, I know he's one of those great TV characters,
12:24but imagine trying to, I don't know, talk to him.
12:26The song and dance continued
12:28into March with the launch of
12:30Over the Rainbow, a Saturday night audition epic
12:32which saw a studio full of wannabe budding Judy Garlands
12:34battle it out in front of Charlotte Church,
12:36Albert Square, Terence Stamp
12:38and Admiral Ackbar in a bid to don the ruby slippers.
12:40Basically, it's teenage girls
12:42singing to impress a lord.
12:44It's like a scene from I Love 1784.
12:46Although, given the way he looks at them,
12:48it's actually more like a scene from Jaws.
12:50Each week, it basically boiled down
12:52to a tantalising sing-off between the two
12:54lowest-placed Dorothys.
12:56Wasn't it good?
12:58Wasn't it fine?
13:02Oh, it's rank hypocrisy, really.
13:04You know, it's apparently fine for the state-funded
13:06BBC to make two British teenagers
13:08fight to the death on Saturday night television,
13:10but when I get two Eastern European
13:12ones to do it in the privacy of my own
13:14Thunderdome, the nanny state steps in
13:16and before you know it, I'm the South
13:18London monster.
13:20Each week, one Dorothy was dismissed
13:22in a bizarre cult-like sequence where they handed
13:24back their shoes to their lizard handler,
13:26then flew away on the moon while the remaining
13:28contestants desperately tried to mask their delight
13:30with tears.
13:36April,
13:38her first
13:40love.
13:42If Judy Garland could see this, she'd
13:44thank God she was drunk.
13:46April was a good month for things
13:48gushing out of the ground.
13:50First, an Icelandic volcano threw a
13:52geothermal shit-fit, causing a cloud of
13:54holiday ballsing ash to drift across northern
13:56Europe. Thousands of planes were grounded,
13:58causing outbreaks of amusingly unfocused
14:00xenophobia during live news reports
14:02from airports.
14:04No doubt, when you got to the airport,
14:06you didn't know in your hotel.
14:08Ahi Iceland!
14:10Ahi Iceland!
14:12Meanwhile, down in the Gulf of Mexico,
14:14the Deepwater Horizon oil rig did a passable
14:16volcano impression and blew up, damaging
14:18a wellhead down in the SpongeBob department
14:20which started vomiting a horrifying amount of crude
14:22oil into the sea.
14:24Tony Hayward, played by Michael Sheen,
14:26because that's how fast the turnover is these days,
14:28quickly became the Fred Goodwin of oil
14:30and made a dick of himself in Congress,
14:32interrogated by Lon Chaney
14:34and the cast of a 30s horror film.
14:36Many Americans were distinctly unimpressed
14:38with the whole affair, none more so than
14:40US comic Doug Stanhope, who joins us now
14:42for a bit of fun complaining.
14:50I'm Doug Stanhope, and that's why I drink.
14:52Your hatred
14:54of American culture
14:56culminated with
14:58you spilling
15:00millions of barrels of oil
15:02into the Gulf of Mexico.
15:04And I understand, yes, you don't like
15:06America, and we don't have a worldview
15:08and we think everything revolves around
15:10us, but
15:12it was a shitty thing to do.
15:14The entire summer was BP
15:16oil. 81 days in, with BP
15:18still using dispersants, the first
15:20glimmer of the price that will be paid.
15:22Another day of the BP oil
15:24spill. Round the clock
15:26coverage of oil leaking.
15:28We have cameras
15:30on the oil spill
15:32and now let's look at a close-up
15:34of the camera of the BP
15:36oil spill. Everybody's angry.
15:38Angry about the oil spill.
15:40Man, you got to get down here and take control
15:42of this. Put somebody in charge of this thing
15:44and get this thing moving. We're about to die
15:46down here. They have coverage
15:48of boycotts, people
15:50protesting BP
15:52gas stations.
15:54You're irresponsible.
15:57BP's oil spill's got to go!
15:59Hey, hey! Ho, ho!
16:01You fucking drove to that
16:03boycott
16:05the car. Unless you're boycotting
16:07petroleum, you're doing
16:09nothing. I have a
16:11list of things that I'm concerned
16:13with, and the oil spill
16:15is not going to make the list. There's
16:17a lot of other problems in the world.
16:19Maybe someone, Kevin
16:21Costner, is concerned
16:23about the oil spill. He built
16:25a machine. The news picked up
16:27on this stupid story and
16:29ran with it. Meanwhile, that clean-up effort
16:31along the Gulf Coast, that is getting some star power.
16:33It is called the Kevin Costner
16:35Solution. Every day
16:37was just unending coverage.
16:39Those with a science background will find our
16:41machines easy to understand. They are designed
16:43to separate oil and water.
16:45Don't they do that by
16:47themselves?
16:49I'm going to build a machine that makes
16:51cats hate dogs.
16:53Don Dish Soap
16:55exploited this
16:57to a level that I found
16:59obscene. Don Dish Soap,
17:01just some dish liquid,
17:03had a commercial where they came
17:05out showing
17:07ducks or waterfowl of some
17:09kind coated in crude
17:11oil.
17:16And if you see the commercial,
17:18you see a duck covered in oil.
17:20Unless you're a complete
17:22sociopath, you're probably
17:24pro-duck. You're rooting for
17:26the duck. But you think the commercial
17:28it's an environmental
17:30concern? Saveaduck.com
17:32throw us a
17:34dollar. No!
17:36It's for Don Dish Soap!
17:38We get your silverware
17:40sparkly clean and then we save a duck
17:42in our off hours.
17:44How obscene,
17:46how vulgar is that to exploit
17:48a tragedy of this
17:50level just to promote
17:52some dollar store
17:54dish soap? Is that
17:56not exactly the same as
17:58using a rape victim to
18:00promote a feminine hygiene
18:02wash?
18:10On screens in April, a dramatic
18:12paper towel commercial starring a singular
18:14turd.
18:16Yes, this kitchen zorro
18:18is supposed to be sexually attractive, even though
18:20his name sounds like a bowel movement.
18:22This is why they call me One Sheet.
18:24I suppose it's an unfortunate pronunciation
18:26but he probably couldn't give two sheets
18:28about that. One Sheet
18:30does plenty.
18:32Spring was also a time for new beginnings.
18:34Doctor Who returned, played by
18:36Lance Percival, played in turn by Matt Smith
18:38together with his 200ft tall
18:40redhead assistant, Amy Pond.
18:42And as Britain said hello to
18:44one big-faced BBC icon, it said
18:46sayonara to another as thumb-in-a-suit
18:48Adrian Charles hopped away from the One Show,
18:50abandoning his role as curator of Europe's
18:52and finally, Mountain.
18:54Having sneaked what he thought might be one last look
18:56at his co-presenter's tits,
18:58he skedaddled
19:00to ITV, where he and Christine
19:02turned up several months later in a cheerful morning
19:04pick-me-up.
19:06When Daybreak came along,
19:08some people didn't
19:10like it because they're afraid of change
19:12and progress and being bored
19:14and stuff. But I thought it was really
19:16clever, you know, like a TV
19:18experiment. Like someone at ITV
19:20had gone, what would happen if we
19:22took the One Show and hid it
19:24somewhere where no one could
19:26see it, like first thing in the morning?
19:28But the set was a bit depressing
19:30though because, you know, there were these big
19:32windows where it was often really dark
19:34like the sun had just died of leukaemia
19:36and so it all felt a bit
19:38like you were stuck at an airport at
19:40four in the morning with some people who
19:42just wouldn't shut up and were just
19:44talking and smiling and talking
19:46and going on and on and
19:48pointing at stuff and laughing and
19:50smiling and talking and laughing
19:52until you just think, I hate
19:54this world. I hate it.
19:56I hate this world. And that probably
19:58isn't the sort of tone they were going for.
20:00There was a trend this year for
20:02absurdly physical game shows which
20:04disguised their lack of questions with
20:06shenanigans. ITV
20:08did their bit with the whole 19 yards
20:10and fewer than half a dozen precious questions
20:12stretched across an obstacle course in which
20:14Vernon Kay insisted was a general knowledge quiz.
20:16Welcome to a brand new
20:18general knowledge quiz. Yes, well
20:20it certainly borrows from all the classics
20:22of the form. It's exactly like the
20:24famous blindfold tumbling round
20:26from Mastermind. There they've copied the
20:28University Challenge Lego Wall of Death
20:30and I'm pretty sure Blockbusters
20:32used to end with Bob Holness wanking himself
20:34backwards up a flight of stairs.
20:36You've got to feel sorry for the contestants really. By the time they'd
20:38made it across that obstacle course they were well and truly
20:40buggered.
20:42Later in the year the BBC
20:44would try something similar with their very own
20:46Guantanamo Strike It Lucky on an oil rig
20:48101 ways to leave a game show.
20:50You'd have thought after the late late breakfast
20:52show the BBC would be wary of introducing
20:54gravity into a Saturday night show, but
20:56no. The gimmick here was that
20:58answering incorrectly led to you plummeting
21:00a long way. Monica Salads.
21:02No!
21:06I haven't seen that many bodies dropping from a scaffold
21:08since the grand finale of the Nuremberg Trials.
21:13May heralded the general election.
21:15Everybody went voting mad.
21:17This was to be a three way fight, not that
21:19you'd guess that from the preliminary coverage
21:21which focused on Dave V. Gordon.
21:23Nick Clegg seemed so unimportant
21:25Sky News apparently sent a child to interview him.
21:27Are you nervous about tonight's
21:29TV debate? I'm a little bit, yeah.
21:31The first debate was staged
21:33by ITV on a set resembling a cheap
21:3590's game show and was moderated
21:37by the understated Alastair Stewart
21:39who'd carefully considered his presentational
21:41style in advance as he revealed during
21:43a thoughtful interview on Sky News.
21:45The best analogy that I've come up
21:47with so far is
21:49a kind of conductor of an orchestra
21:51and some of the greatest conductors
21:53you see very little of. They're almost
21:55self effacing. He certainly pulled that
21:57off. Don't know about you, but I hardly noticed
21:59he was there. Mr. Brown. David Cameron.
22:01Nick Clegg. Nick Clegg.
22:03Nick Clegg.
22:05During the debate the three contestants did their best
22:07to appear human. The incumbent
22:09Gruffalo Brown creeped out a few smiles
22:11and tried the odd gag.
22:13Now be honest with the public because you can't
22:15airbrush your policies even
22:17although you can airbrush your posters.
22:19Off the cuff gagsmanship comes about as easily
22:21to Gordon Brown as break dancing does
22:23to a chair. Humanoid David
22:25Cameron regaled us with anecdotes about some
22:27of the clubs he'd stood near.
22:29I was in Plymouth recently and
22:31a 40-year-old black man actually made the point
22:33to me. He said, I came here when I was 6.
22:35I've served in the Royal Navy for 30 years.
22:37I'm incredibly proud of my country.
22:39Right, so this 40-year-old black guy must have been 10
22:41when he joined the Navy. Where was he stationed?
22:43The Good Ship Lollipop. But it was
22:45mysterious stranger Nick Clegg who impressed
22:47most by referring to members of the audience
22:49by name, like a teacher taking morning
22:51register. Whether it's on the questions
22:53from Alan on care,
22:55Lynn on crime, Helen
22:57on politics, Joel on
22:59schooling, Robert on the
23:01deficit. I believe we can
23:03answer all of those questions.
23:05Afterwards, rather than relying on our own silly
23:07minds to work out what we thought about the debates, the
23:09news had gathered representative viewers and given
23:11them hand-held widgets that let them register
23:13their approval or otherwise on a second-by-
23:15second basis. Watch as
23:17David Cameron says immigration is
23:19too high these last 10 years
23:21and it does need to come down.
23:23I think the pressures that we've put on
23:25housing and health and education have
23:27been too great. All of which effectively
23:29turned the whole debate into a sort of reaction
23:31surfing video game.
23:33This obsession with the opinion worm
23:35marked the point at which the news media finally
23:37gave up pretending modern politics is about
23:39anything other than how you come across in the
23:41immediate moment. And to sledgehammer that
23:43point home, on the BBC's flagship political
23:45fart kitchen this week, Louis Spence
23:47turned up to talk about how the debates had gone.
23:49I've never voted in my life, but
23:51the one who gives the best performance is Clegg.
23:53You can't pay for that sort of expertise.
23:55Except it's on the BBC,
23:57so you did.
23:59Someone who was displaying the polar opposite of showbiz
24:01zhuzh was Gordon Brown, a man apparently
24:03allergic to luck and for whom smiling looked
24:05as painful as lifting a heavy weight.
24:07Throughout the campaign, Brown was repeatedly shown
24:09shuffling around, engaging in awkward small
24:11talk with the public, often with a microphone
24:13on.
24:15Well it's terribly unfair on us to just listen
24:17into conversations. Well that attitude didn't
24:19last long. Yes, because during
24:21a meet and greet, Brown encountered Gillian Duffy,
24:23a lifelong Labour voter who wanted to
24:25talk about immigration. Anyway, having
24:27dealt with her relatively smoothly, Brown
24:29got in the car. And then made the politically
24:31suicidal mistake of speaking his
24:33mind while the public could hear.
24:35Just a sort of bigoted woman.
24:37This was as close as the news gets to pulling
24:39off a Knowles House Party gotcha.
24:41And it was delighted, breaking the news to a
24:43startled Duffy with great comic timing.
24:45What did he say? Well,
24:47you might not like this, but he said,
24:49what a disaster. Who got me to talk
24:51to that woman? She's a bigot.
24:53Or words to that effect. And we want to know
24:55your response to that. You're joking!
24:57Meanwhile, Calamity Brown was on the
24:59Jeremy Vine show, having the recording played back
25:01to him. And he reacted by trying to crawl into his
25:03own hand to die. Come the big
25:05night itself, the news crews moved into the
25:07biggest, most bombastic spaces available.
25:09It was a good night for silly graphics,
25:11such as ITV's comedy Xbox
25:13live avatars, shown here depicting the leaders.
25:15But no amount of whizzy visuals
25:17could disguise the fact that no concrete
25:19result was coming at all. It was as though
25:21democracy itself was hopelessly
25:23constipated. On Sky News,
25:25Alastair Campbell knocked heads with
25:27political correspondent Adam Bolton.
25:29Campbell claimed the coverage of walking
25:31gaffe Magnet Brown had been slightly
25:33negative in tone. Get off your high horse
25:35for two seconds. You started this.
25:37I'm entitled. You're the one accusing
25:39the television media of being biased against you.
25:41Adam, you're great at giving it,
25:43but you can't take it. Oh, fight.
25:45Fight. Fight.
25:47Maybe we could have a more sustained dialogue
25:49about it, Adam, in the future. Yes, maybe
25:51you will. With no
25:53clear winner, the news was stuck in an existential
25:55limbo, with presenters and reporters
25:57left up for days in the political
25:59equivalent of a four-day narcotic
26:01bender. While Labour and the Tories
26:03both tried to woo Clegg behind closed doors
26:05outside, everything seemed to be going slightly
26:07mad. Sky News experienced two
26:09on-air meltdowns. First,
26:11Alistair Campbell did his bit to sex up
26:13their coverage by winding up Adam Bolton
26:15during round two of their ongoing
26:17grudge match. Adam, you're obviously upset that
26:19David Cameron's not part of this. I'm not upset.
26:21You are. You probably are.
26:23Don't keep casting aspersions.
26:25I am commenting.
26:27Don't keep saying what I think.
26:29This is live on television. No, don't keep telling
26:31me what I think. This is what you do.
26:33You come on and say no-one won the election.
26:35Fight. Fight. Fight.
26:37Talk to me. I'm fed up with you telling
26:39me what I think. I don't care what you're fed up with.
26:41I don't care what you're fed up with. Then Kay Burley
26:43interviewed a proportional representation
26:45protester in feisty and some might say
26:47unshut-up-able fashion.
26:49We're protesting for something and what we're protesting
26:51for is a change to
26:53politics, for fair votes. That's what
26:55they're negotiating at the moment. So why do you need
26:57to protest? That's what we really hope. They're already doing it.
26:59You might as well go home and watch it on Sky News.
27:01Of course, the problem with talking all over
27:03protesters is that a bit later the protesters
27:05might decide to talk all over you
27:07with embarrassing results.
27:09People are worried about
27:11trade-offs,
27:13negotiations behind closed doors.
27:15How do you
27:17get together and try
27:19and organise some sort of pooling
27:21as far as this is concerned?
27:23Finally, after forever, the deal was done. Brown left Downing
27:25Street, magically transforming himself into a
27:27human as he went, and Clegg and Cameron
27:29cosied up and went all Brokeback Mountain
27:31in the Rose Garden.
27:33It's good, right, having a coalition government
27:36because instead of being run by a load of
27:38MPs who all agree with each other,
27:40it's like Britain's being run by a sort of
27:42supergroup of two totally different
27:44musical acts, like if Boney M and
27:46Razorlight got together. You know,
27:48challenging. It's a bit odd now
27:50they're together for the good of humankind
27:52and that. It's like when two
27:54lonely people who've never found love
27:56decide they might as well get together as a
27:58couple and force themselves to have sex.
28:00But the coalitions
28:02laugh, right? They put this little boy
28:04in charge of the money, he's called
28:06George, and he's like 14.
28:08He's mental, right?
28:10He's basically, he's wheeled out this
28:12spending review thing, which is like a
28:14list of all the things we can't afford anymore
28:16like, you know, schools made of
28:18gold, or scroungers, or
28:20basic human dignity. The politics
28:22used to be boring and stable,
28:24but the coalition, like, kept you guessing.
28:26Like Clegg said, he'd scrapped
28:28tuition fees, but completely.
28:30And now he's raising them.
28:32So you don't know what he's gonna do next, which is brilliant.
28:34Because he might, like, Luke Cardiff
28:36or, I don't know, like, stick a new potato
28:38up his arse on Newsnight.
28:40You just don't know. It's genius.
28:42He's like Freddie Star or something.
28:44You know, mad!
28:46Equally exciting to juveniles was the unexpected discovery
28:48of 11 Russian spies living in deep cover
28:50in the USA.
28:52The spy saga had something for every teenage boy
28:54including old school spying techniques
28:56and a foxy lady, gorgeous
28:58pouting Anna Chapman.
29:00Much like the wanking man's Tori Amos.
29:02The coverage treated Chapman
29:04as though she was the most beautiful woman on earth.
29:06Endlessly regurgitating a ready supply
29:08of vaguely saucy Facebook snaps
29:10on a daily basis.
29:12In one plaintive report, Sky News asked a guy
29:14who'd known her back in the day what kind of
29:16spark there was between them.
29:18Anna is a unique woman. She has great
29:20interpersonal skills. She's a really
29:22good communicator. Yeah, whatever.
29:24Could you draw a picture of her tits on this
29:26envelope? Of course I found her
29:28attractive. She didn't attract a lot of attention
29:30from men, but she was too
29:32immersed in her business to act on it.
29:34But by October that had changed
29:36and the story reached its logical conclusion
29:38as the redhead under the bed starred in steamy
29:40photoshoots and raunchy online videos
29:42for Russian ladski mags.
29:44Then the World Cup arrived
29:46bringing with it an opportunity for the
29:48world's thickest millionaires to kick a sphere
29:50around a lawn. In case you missed the action
29:52it basically looked and sounded like this.
29:54In July, the world
29:56oohed and aahed to the release of
29:58Inception, a dream-based blockbuster
30:00with ideas above, below
30:02and beside its station.
30:04Whatever that means.
30:06Drenched with impressive expensive set pieces
30:08and a surreal visual style, Inception's
30:10basic plot was complex enough to require
30:12its own diagram.
30:14It's so complicated the screenplay was probably
30:16printed on a dodecahedron.
30:18It followed a man called Cobb, played by
30:20Leonard D. Apricot here, as he attempted to plant
30:22an idea inside the dreaming mind of another bloke
30:24played by Killian Blue-Eyes
30:26at the behest of a third bloke played by
30:28Ken Wannabe.
30:30The story involved Cobb and his team
30:32carrying out an unreal Russian doll-style heist
30:34as they invaded a dream, then induced another
30:36dream, and then entered that dream within a dream
30:38to kick off another dream, which was a dream
30:40within a dream within a dream.
30:42It was essentially the motion picture equivalent
30:44of a smart-ass little prick dancing around
30:46going, oh look I'm over here, no I'm not, hoo-hoo
30:48I'm over here, for 300 hours.
30:50It was also a bit like playing three different
30:52video game levels at once, including
30:54inevitably a boring snow stage, which you
30:56immediately want to end the moment it starts.
30:58Still, despite being really quite annoying
31:00for about 40% of its running time,
31:02Inception did include some really interesting
31:04ideas, such as dreams
31:06are weird
31:10and
31:12it had some great action sequences
31:14including this mind-bending
31:16gravity-defying punch-up, which doubled
31:18as a pretty accurate simulation of how it feels
31:20to get apocalyptically drunk on a cruise liner.
31:22There was also a spooky
31:24and spectacular sequence in which
31:26Juno Girl makes the French capital fold up
31:28like so much concrete origami, using
31:30the power of her dreaming mind.
31:32Well, I haven't seen Paris bend over like that
31:34since I downloaded that video.
31:36I'm so funny.
31:38Summer means festivals, and this year
31:40there were loads. Glastonbury, the Isle of Wight,
31:42Tea in the Park, the Edinburgh Fringe,
31:44the Hay-on-Wye pretension fate,
31:46and, of course, the big current affairs
31:48street party in Rothbury.
31:50You remember that.
31:52It started with a guy called Raoul Moat.
31:54Yes, when former doorman Raoul Moat
31:56recently released from prison, shot his ex-girlfriend,
31:58killed her new boyfriend, and then shot a policeman,
32:00he immediately became Britain's most wanted man.
32:02The only people who wanted him more than the police
32:04were the nation's journalists.
32:06Before long, police were on Moat's tail
32:08and had sealed off the village of Rothbury.
32:10Sky News up sticks and left London behind
32:12for a summer holiday on its outskirts.
32:14Here, Kay Burley and co. hung around
32:16the picturesque landscape, watching impressive
32:18graphics whoosh from one tranquil, uninteresting
32:20scene to another tranquil, uninteresting
32:22scene viewed from a slightly different angle.
32:24We just see a couple of anglers
32:26who don't look as though they've caught much,
32:28do they? With not even any hot fish
32:30action to speak of, they had to content themselves
32:32by probing Moat's mental state, reading aloud
32:34from his letters like something from a
32:36particularly sociopathic edition of
32:38Points of View. I'm a killer and a maniac
32:40but I ain't no coward. I'll say you
32:42ain't no coward. This whole letter is just devoid
32:44of wit. Also of interest
32:46was the subject of Moat's physique,
32:48which the news speculated could have been the result
32:50of steroid abuse, which we were told
32:52could turn him into a kind of angry superman.
32:54If you are a hairy male,
32:56you become more hairier.
32:58If you are an impatient male, you would probably become
33:00more impatient. If you're an angry male,
33:02then you may be a little bit more angrier.
33:04Yeah, and if you're a wistful man, you'll get a
33:06bit more wistful-ier. And if you're good
33:08at darts, you'll get a bit more darts-ier.
33:10It just amplifies whatever makes you a man.
33:12Yeah, so it's basically a man-plifier.
33:14But despite the media's best efforts,
33:16the public didn't seem quite scared enough
33:18of this man-plified bogeyman.
33:20Which was a terrible shame, because the news
33:22seemed to be banking on his box office appeal.
33:24Sky News were even using him to promote
33:26their new HD service.
33:28The net is closing on Britain's most wanted man.
33:30Watch continuous coverage
33:32on Sky News.
33:34Trouble is, seeing that, you could be forgiven for thinking
33:36that if you tuned in, you'd see car chases,
33:38cops running around, that sort of thing.
33:40Whereas instead, what you actually got
33:42was more like a curious cross
33:44between an episode of Wish You Were Here
33:46and Crime Watch, as
33:48Jeremy Thompson took us on a guided tour
33:50showcasing Rothbury's genteel charm
33:52while simultaneously asking its residents
33:54if this was all a bit scary.
33:56A bit scary, all this? Yeah. Just a little bit.
33:58A little bit? Oh, these two aren't scared
34:00at all, unless they're grinning with terror.
34:02Quick, find someone else.
34:04Well, from the bakers to the local butchers,
34:06and Morris Adamson open for business today,
34:08everything looks back to normal,
34:10but I bet just
34:12below the surface things are, don't they?
34:14Yeah, I mean, things are still a little bit tense, you know.
34:16A little bit? Well, I suppose he wouldn't
34:18be that worried, he's got a rack of knives on the wall.
34:20Anyway, so far we've had the butcher,
34:22the baker, so here's the candlestick
34:24farmer. Mike, it's
34:26must be a bit unnerving to have
34:28a gunman at loose around here
34:30in this remote area.
34:32It is a little bit. A little bit?
34:34So basically, so far, it's been a little bit
34:36scary, a little bit tense, and a little bit
34:38unnerving. And now here's a little bit
34:40of advice for Raoul Moat.
34:42How easy is it for a man to hide
34:44out here? He would hide as easy as
34:46anything. He could last for days out
34:48here. Nobody would ever know where he
34:50was. Yes, the focus was now
34:52moving to Moat's ability to survive in the wild
34:54like the UK's most dangerous squirrel.
34:56And you could be forgiven for thinking the news
34:58was deliberately broadcasting a guide to evading
35:00police in the wild specifically for Moat to
35:02use. Any feral maniacs
35:04watching would learn loads.
35:06You'd learn what to eat. Eating raw
35:08food that's cold
35:10will affect his digestion.
35:12Hot food? His
35:14critical need
35:16is not food. It is
35:18water. Ah, water.
35:20Right. On the
35:22informative GMTV, you could learn
35:24where to hide. Now, Glen, as regard to
35:26hiding from the police,
35:28there can be no better place than that.
35:30And there's lots of that around here.
35:32So, hide in that.
35:34Whatever that is.
35:36Trees. As well as forests
35:38and lots of derelict buildings we have
35:40around here. Lots of caves.
35:42Caves. Deep cave system
35:44is actually very warm as well.
35:46Deep caves. If it gets cold
35:48and it gets wet, it will be warmer in a deeper cave.
35:50Wet, warm, deep
35:52caves. Oh, I never knew survival could be so
35:54sexy. But not as sexy as
35:56this hot Arsenal action. Yes,
35:58it's Call of Duty. Hack Ops.
36:00As an anchor provides on-the-run viewers with a
36:02handy guide to what weapons the cops tote.
36:04Presented by a journo palpably trying to
36:06stifle his arousal.
36:08You can see the sights on there.
36:10The ammunition clips that go in
36:12to that part of it. Go on. Squirt off a
36:14few rounds. You know you want to. Fortunately,
36:16the desk was there to mask his erection.
36:18Drop it! Meanwhile,
36:20Britain's fantastic newspapers were subjecting
36:22Raoul Moat's childhood snaps to sneering
36:24knuckle-headed scrutiny. So, a strikingly
36:26benign photo of young Moat was labelled
36:28cute baby, but two-month-old Moat clenches
36:30his fists. Surprised they didn't show
36:32a photo of him breastfeeding and call him a tit-biting
36:34madman. They also ran a front-page
36:36story claiming his mother had said he'd be
36:38better off dead. And this kind of coverage
36:40hadn't gone unnoticed by a certain Raoul
36:42Moat. He left a dictaphone message for
36:44police claiming to be upset by the coverage
36:46and threatening to kill a member of the public in exchange
36:48for each inaccurate report.
36:50A bit like an armed extremist wing of the
36:52Press Complaints Commission. As a result, the police
36:54requested a media blackout on stories
36:56relating to Moat's private life. Which left
36:58the news with even less inane speculation
37:00to string out, because there was still no sign
37:02of the man himself. Jeremy Thompson
37:04was reduced to hanging around in the undergrowth
37:06with a tracker, foraging for bullshit.
37:08He didn't find Moat, but he did find some
37:10traces of Moat, or possibly litter.
37:12It was hard to say. From here
37:14I can already see
37:16a recently discarded Argos carrier
37:18bag. God, I bet that Argos
37:20bag would look amazing on Sky News
37:22HD. Thankfully for
37:24everyone's sanity, things came to a head on
37:26a balmy Friday evening as Moat was spotted
37:28on the outskirts of Rothbury. Stiff
37:30rule-following police immediately warned residents
37:32to stay in their homes, but the reporters
37:34ignored that in favour of creating an impromptu
37:36media carnival in the middle of the High Street.
37:38The coverage soon showed people pouring
37:40out to see what was going on, and occasionally
37:42wave at their relatives back home.
37:44Speaking of relatives, the BBC's John
37:46Sobel encouraged a woman visibly upset that her
37:48mum was in the sealed-off area to
37:50ring her live on air, even telling her how to operate
37:52the phone to do it. Can you put your mum on the
37:54speakerphone?
37:56That's a bit impersonal.
37:58Good job she
38:00didn't have an iPhone, he'd ask for a go on Angry Birds
38:02next. Can I have a quick word with her?
38:04Can the guy speak to you?
38:08Hi, how are you doing?
38:10Moat, we learned, was lying down with a gun
38:12pointed at his head, but the news couldn't quite
38:14see that from where they were standing. Reporters
38:16tweeted that they were trying to get close, but were prevented
38:18from doing so. Instead, they had to make do
38:20with broadcasting photos of some pissed-off-looking
38:22marksmen. So finally,
38:24they got what they'd come for. Although rather than
38:26getting images, they captured audio of Moat's
38:28shotgun going off, which they inevitably played
38:30again and again and again, even cranking
38:32the volume, because it was important we should hear it.
38:34Listen to it again, we're going to really push
38:36these levels for you. You know, I think they all
38:38pushed it, on all sorts of levels.
38:40Also in July, the big society got
38:42a hand in the form of Channel 4's fairy job
38:44mother, aka Hayley Taylor, a sort of
38:46super nanny state. She was an off-the-peg
38:48troubleshooting tele-body who pre-empted
38:50the government's bullying of the bone idol by
38:52several months. The format was simple, find
38:54some feckless, jobless people who
38:56seemed unemployable, and then get the
38:58fairy job mother to drag them out
39:00of the demotivating benefit trap
39:02and onto the meaningless wage-slave
39:04treadmill. The targets of
39:06the programme's advice seemed more depressed than
39:08anything, but that was overshadowed by a blizzard
39:10of patronising empowerment exercises.
39:12Right, I want to talk you through this.
39:15We're on this journey, yeah?
39:17Hopefully, leading off far into
39:19the distance and over there's a job, okay?
39:21But at the moment, we're here.
39:23Apparently the best way to make someone grow up and
39:25take responsibility for themselves is to treat
39:27them like they're four.
39:29Good morning, my name's
39:31Dean Peterson, made for a 10 o'clock interview.
39:33Well done!
39:35Cinema in 2010 was dominated by
39:37the need to wear these things, 3D
39:39glasses. The craze really came into its own,
39:41of course, with the ultra-successful
39:43Avatar, a visually spectacular
39:45epic about a tribe of sanctimonious
39:47blue wankers selfishly attempting to
39:49halt mankind's progress for the
39:51sake of a poxy tree. Don't know if
39:53you saw it, but it was basically the equivalent of having
39:55a smurf on a stick shoved in your face
39:57for three hours. Not that 3D was
39:59confined to cinema, Sky launched a 3D
40:01TV service so viewers could experience the
40:03crushing mundanity of their programmes in three
40:05dimensions, with Sky News helpfully showing
40:07how it worked with graphics that weren't at all misleading.
40:09Technology continued its dominance
40:11over mankind throughout 2010, but it wasn't
40:13all plain sailing. First,
40:15in a thrilling online press conference, Steve
40:17Jobs unveiled the iPad, which aimed to
40:19revolutionise the way mankind stroked
40:21overpriced rectangles forever, and as
40:23if that wasn't enough, Apple also unleashed the iPhone
40:254, a device so advanced the human hand
40:27was almost too old-fashioned to use it.
40:29Video games continued their ongoing
40:31renaissance with superb titles such as the
40:33sprawling western epic Red Dead Redemption,
40:35happy-go-lucky platform action in the dreamlike
40:37Super Mario Galaxy 2,
40:39happy-go-lucky indie platform action in the nightmarish
40:41Limbo, handheld physics
40:43fun with the seemingly ubiquitous Angry
40:45Birds, and ghoulish interactive
40:47movie shenanigans in the cinematic Heavy Rain,
40:49which included an astonishing sequence in which
40:51you had to make your character cut one of his own fingers
40:53off via a method of your choosing. I've gone for
40:55pliers. Hee hee hee.
40:57Of course I'm so desensitised to violence, I can just play this
40:59while having a snack.
41:01You have three minutes and thirty seconds
41:03left.
41:05Gaaaaah!
41:09But games weren't all
41:11nasty. Some were so charming they could only
41:13be advertised by lovable boy band
41:15Jalouse. What's really interesting about this
41:17advert is that it graphically simulates how it
41:19might look if JLS held a wanking
41:21contest.
41:27Yes!
41:29One day in August, Britain woke up
41:31to footage of a woman putting a
41:33cat in a bin.
41:35These tragic images
41:37dismayed everyone.
41:39And it's really sad because it's a rescue cat, so
41:41it's had its fair share of trauma.
41:43And now this happens.
41:45The footage had been posted on the internet. Before long, it went
41:47global. A woman in England has
41:49caused quite a controversy after dumping
41:51a cat into the trash.
41:53Round and round the world it went, being shown
41:55again and again and again in different
41:57languages.
41:59But with a similar
42:01reaction everywhere.
42:03Then she opens up that garbage
42:05bin right there.
42:07Oh no!
42:09And dumps the cat right in there.
42:11The first thing everyone wanted to know was
42:13who was this woman?
42:15The woman we showed you last night dropping a cat
42:17into a wheelie bin has been identified.
42:19But her motive hasn't.
42:21Yes, as Alastair Stewart had somberly
42:23indicated, cat bin ladies' motives were
42:25a mystery to everyone.
42:27I mean, why would you do that?
42:29Why would you put a cat in a bin?
42:31Why is she doing this?
42:33I mean, why? Why is she doing this?
42:35Why? Why is she doing it?
42:37Why put a cat in a bin?
42:39I mean, why? Why do it?
42:41Why? Seriously, why?
42:43Why? I mean, why?
42:45Eventually, the news had her cornered
42:47and all they wanted to know was why?
42:49Why would you do it, Mary?
42:51People might just understand, Mary, if you just tell us.
42:53Yes, we might understand. Just tell us.
42:55Just tell us.
42:57Why did you do this, though?
42:59Why did you do it, though?
43:01Can you just tell us why you did what you did?
43:03Just tell us why you did what you did.
43:05Mary, if you just speak to us for a few seconds
43:07we can go away.
43:09You know, actually, I can't help thinking there isn't really going to be an explanation
43:11that's going to satisfy everyone.
43:13And sure enough, she eventually issued a statement
43:15saying she could not explain her actions.
43:17And so our world was left revolving in the
43:19cold, dark universe, knowing only two things.
43:21One, that there are some cruelties that can
43:23never be adequately explained
43:25and two, that we are all alone.
43:27Not as alone as a cat in a bin,
43:29but alone.
43:31Fucking prick.
43:33When the
43:35X Factor came on, all glitzy like,
43:37they'd done this really clever thing, right?
43:39Because usually, when the audition
43:41are singing, even the good ones
43:43aren't as good as proper stars like
43:45Leona Lewis or JLS or something.
43:47But this year,
43:49they used a computer to make them sound
43:51like sort of electric space people
43:53like if Robocop
43:55was singing at a wedding.
44:05What was really good was the shit ones
44:07who got laughed at, didn't have
44:09the false voice thing put on.
44:13So when you were laughing at them,
44:15you knew you were really laughing
44:17at like, the very core of their being.
44:19You know, cackling at their souls.
44:21Loads of people moaned about it,
44:23but what they didn't get was that
44:25the X Factor had to make
44:27the good ones sound good with a computer
44:29because otherwise they might
44:31have sounded shit.
44:33And that wouldn't have made sense because the judges
44:35put them through. I mean, think about it.
44:37I mean, how are you meant to know
44:39they're a good singer
44:41if they keep it in wrong notes?
44:43September and Sky News began
44:45triumphantly trailing a forthcoming
44:47The Pope is extravaganza
44:49More than 4 million fans in the UK
44:51Lady Gaga
44:53First tour in 28 years
44:55Mark Boland
44:57Glasgow, London, Birmingham
44:59Status quo
45:01The Pope is coming. Live coverage on Sky News HD
45:03Yes, superb
45:05and exhaustive full-colour news coverage
45:07depicted the ghost of Ernie Wise
45:09futting round the regions in a vertical hearse
45:11with the windows up in case a protester threw a condom
45:13or a choir boy at him.
45:15The Pope's call played several expertly covered
45:17stadium gigs including this one where his support acts
45:19were Susan Boyle doing her hit
45:21I Dreamed a Dream and Our Lord Jesus Christ
45:23Well, it's nice to see Jesus
45:25going down so well. Last time they crucified him.
45:27The event was a dream
45:29to dream come true for Subo
45:31who'd always wanted to meet an internationally revered
45:33messianic embodiment of hope other than Simon Cowell
45:35What did the Pope say to you?
45:37I just kissed his ring
45:39Well, I hope you brushed your teeth
45:41September also saw two brothers
45:43joined together in a desperate struggle
45:45for survival. A sort of human
45:47Milliband. Action Milliband
45:49and My Little Milliband went up against
45:51Edney Spheres, Four Micah Man
45:53and the Nutty Professor to win the leadership of the
45:55only party not running the country
45:57In a surprise finish, Baby Milliband
45:59emerged victorious thanks to the sort of
46:01voting process that could confuse the guy
46:03who solved Fermat's last theorem
46:05As ITN depicted in revealing
46:07scenes, Ed seemed more relieved
46:09than pleased to have come first
46:11Just spend a few moments now
46:13watching Ed Milliband's face
46:15at the climactic moment
46:17God do I have to. In the aftermath
46:19the news seemed more interested in staring at
46:21David to see if he'd suddenly hulk out
46:23and start smashing stuff up in a fury
46:25But disappointingly he didn't crack
46:27apart from a catty aside
46:29Turning to Harriet Harman, he appears to
46:31ask her angrily, you voted
46:33for it, why are you clapping?
46:35Which left the news having to explain who
46:37this new dweeb was. As
46:39ITN showed us he was a man
46:41A man who'd once been a comedy nerd
46:43behind Gordon Brown, but now
46:45was like all important and stuff
46:47The British public don't know you that well
46:49What sort of a leader are you going to be?
46:51I will be a leader
46:53who in the first instance
46:55is a responsible leader of the opposition
46:57It's going to be a boring one
46:59Another contest with a shocking
47:01twist took place in Australia as the 400th
47:03series of Next Top Model shuddered to
47:05a climax in a live spectacular announcing
47:07It's you Kelsey
47:11But even as Kelsey celebrated
47:13it transpired that due to a small technical error
47:15the result was out by a factor of 100%
47:17At the moment the host
47:19Sarah Murdoch learned the truth in her ear
47:21you could study what happens to the human face
47:23when it's owner realises it's about to become a
47:25YouTube laughing stock
47:27I don't know what to say right now
47:29I'm feeling a bit sick about this
47:31I don't know what to say
47:33You might as well just say
47:35This is not, this is a complete accident
47:37I'm so sorry, it's Amanda
47:39I'm so sorry
47:41It was fed to me wrong
47:43Oh that's right, yeah
47:45Blame the supporting infrastructure that's supposed to feed you
47:47information so you can do your job properly
47:49Like that's going to excuse you, you monster
47:51Absurd capitalist squabbling
47:53contest, The Apprentice returned again
47:55tossing a fresh phalanx of blue chip bell ends
47:57into each other's faces until they screamed each other
47:59to death to win a chance to work in the accounts
48:01department of a Walkman factory
48:03Wiping the apeshit off the walls as usual
48:05was Goblin King Alan Sugar
48:07presiding over proceedings like a grumpy Ferrero Rocher
48:09While the candidates
48:11were the usual easy to hate bugger tongues
48:13My first word wasn't mummy
48:15it was money
48:17Amongst the wannabes this year were Gok Wan
48:19Dolph Lundgren, Tanita Tikarum
48:21a Polish cleaner, John Sargent
48:23a woman with eyes so large she can see through time
48:25and Teddy Edward
48:27I was made redundant recently, you know, so I need this
48:29Ah, unemployed head of communications I see
48:31Well, by those rules
48:33I'm the unemployed king of Spain
48:35Star of the show was arguably Stuart Colostomy Baggs
48:37People aspire to have a flash sports car
48:39maybe a house in the country
48:41I've got all that already, where's my glass ceiling?
48:43I don't have one
48:45I am Stuart Baggs the brand, I'm confident
48:47I'm unique and I'm successful
48:49A man so full of shit he's basically just a bowel
48:51with a haircut
48:53As ever the tasks tested virtually none of the skills
48:55anyone would need to sell consumer electronics
48:57and seemed chiefly designed to humiliate and divide
48:59leaving them bickering like drunks trying to assemble a deck chair
49:01This is a personal attack
49:03No, it's not
49:05Guys, listen to yourselves
49:07Listen to yourselves
49:09This is ridiculous
49:11We got no sales
49:13No, excuse me Paloma, at the beginning of the pitch
49:15This is not why we didn't get any sales
49:17This is like watching a bunch of
49:19bloody amateurs
49:21I thought that was the premise of the show
49:23Beleaguered reality TV pioneer
49:25Big Brother had finally waved a
49:27faintly subdued goodbye to the nation this year
49:29but reality hadn't ended completely thanks to this
49:31broadcast
49:33There was this thing on right called
49:35The Only Way is Essex
49:37but I didn't really get it
49:39It was like real, with real people in it
49:41doing real things
49:43except it wasn't like totally real
49:45and the people in it
49:47didn't look real
49:49but sort of like computer simulations
49:51of massive arseholes
49:53It was like if Big Brother
49:55was being done as an American film
49:57and instead of a script
49:59it just had these people
50:01sort of saying
50:03absolutely anything
50:05Hello honey
50:07What have you been up to?
50:09Can you come and see me quick?
50:11So I went down there, I was swimming for ages
50:13and he's like can me and you help out at the dorm
50:15It was all sort of pink and orange
50:17and then they'd cut to something green
50:19just to fool you and then go back to the pink and orange
50:21I don't know, I did what I did
50:23This year in Chile
50:25a mine collapsed leaving 33 miners
50:27underground. All hope seemed lost
50:29when dogged rescuers began their 8th attempt
50:31at drilling a hole to see if any of them had survived
50:33in scenes which resembled a colonoscopy
50:35of the earth itself
50:37Actually it's a bit like the old Doctor Who titles
50:39the grey green tunnel complete with the face
50:41looming up eerily at the end
50:43Yes, against the odds all 33
50:45of them had survived and were holed up
50:47downstairs in hot claustrophobic conditions
50:49which closely resembled 4am in a
50:52gay nightclub according to the coverage
50:54But the initial jubilation turned to
50:56trepidation when it became apparent the men
50:58might not be rescued for up to 4 months
51:00long enough for them to evolve into
51:02moles or worse turn
51:04Welsh. As the relatives eagerly
51:06awaited the return of their loved ones
51:08news crews established a media village
51:10beside the hole of hope. Of course
51:1233 miners is a lot to remember
51:14So Sky came up with a useful Top Trump
51:16style guide to the men highlighting their
51:18characteristics. So we learned that Mario
51:20was a bit of a character and that one of them
51:22had been caught out having an affair
51:24He has his wife waiting for a few answers
51:26because he's also got a mistress waiting for him
51:28as well. Then in the dead of night
51:30the moment arrived and the world peered at
51:32tense coverage of a hole in the ground waiting to see
51:34if this little girl's daddy would pop out of it
51:36And charmingly he did
51:38Cheers and shouts here
51:40down at the cantina
51:42of Campo.
51:44This little girl
51:46crying as she sees
51:48her father for the first time
51:50her father in 69 days
51:52just look at these faces around here
51:54Oh that's genuinely lovely
51:56And then the next miner came out
51:58Hey it was Mario the character
52:00Actually this is starting to look
52:02like a Big Brother eviction
52:04without the booing and the miners
52:06just kept coming. There's the third one
52:08Yeah! Oh and the fourth one
52:10Yeah! Here comes the sixth
52:12one and we'll see
52:14the seventh. Yeah!
52:16And another one
52:19Give it another one
52:23Oh stop milking
52:25In November we got a bit of lovely news
52:27as we learned that Prince William
52:29and Kate Middleton had got engaged
52:31Aww! In a break with tradition
52:33the royal prince had married a girl whose dad
52:35was a humble millionaire
52:37They're great fun to be with and we've had a lot of laughs
52:39together. In heartwarming news
52:41coverage we learned that he's nice and she's nice
52:43and they're a nice couple and they love each other very much
52:45and everyone thinks it's wonderful
52:47And there'll be lots more blanket coverage of this as we approach the special day
52:49and we'll learn all about the ring and the dress
52:51that she's wearing and we'll probably find out what kind of shampoo
52:53she uses. There'll be coverage of the ceremony
52:55and there'll be coverage of reactions to the ceremony
52:57But distracting us from this, some of our nation's favourite
52:59elimination festivals were being dominated
53:01by spectacular displays from
53:03authoritarian women
53:05On sinister synchronised mass population
53:07distraction festival Strictly Come Dancing
53:09Anne Widdicombe was this year's
53:11John Sargent, albeit a bit less
53:13sexy. Highlights included her aerial
53:15entrance to the tango in which she floated
53:17across the studio like a feather-like bull
53:19and an arresting sequence which
53:21left her dance partner Tony Beak
53:23looking like a man using a flamboyant
53:25industrial floor polisher to buff the
53:27dance floor before the proper acts arrived
53:29Meanwhile on light-hearted jungle
53:31torture endurance ordeal I'm a celebrity
53:33notorious bracken-eating poo-watcher
53:35Gillian McKeith cemented her place
53:37in the nation's hearts by whining
53:39complaining. Can't do it
53:41There's a spider in front of me
53:43I can't go any further
53:45And in a shocking scene apparently
53:47fainting on live television
53:49We'll explain it all, don't worry
53:51We'll explain exactly what's going on, OK
53:53Better get Bob in
53:55Oh my God, is there a doctor in the house?
53:57I mean, not Gillian, obviously
53:59By the time we got to the end of the year, everything
54:01was starting to resemble a kind of greatest hits
54:03compilation of everything that had gone before
54:05There were fresh spying allegations
54:07fresh snow and most exciting of all
54:09fresh coverage of grit
54:11I'm standing on top of half a million quids
54:13worth of grit. You don't even want
54:15to know how long it took me to climb up here
54:17No, I don't
54:18And thanks to harrowing, nightmarish Christmas
54:20commercials like this, familiar phrases
54:22even made a comeback
54:26I hear Iceland
54:28For several months after the election
54:30the coalition government had a fairly
54:32easy time of it. But the honeymoon
54:34couldn't last. Partly because this is Britain
54:36proud homeland of moaning
54:38Partly because the government's spending review
54:40was making a lot of people feel a bit despairing
54:42and irritable, putting them in a kind of
54:44bollocks to everything frame of mind
54:46Particularly angry were students, partly because
54:48back in the pre-coalition era
54:50Nick Clegg had pledged to scrap tuition fees
54:52in earnest online appeals
54:54To raise the cap on tuition fees is wrong
54:56We will resist, vote against
54:58campaign against any lifting
55:00of that cap
55:01And in informative considered interviews
55:03I really think tuition fees
55:05are wrong. I think it is wrong
55:07to saddle young people
55:09with £25,000 of debt
55:11before they've even taken a first step
55:13in adult life. And he promised not to
55:15renege on promises in persuasive political
55:17broadcasts. I believe it's time to do
55:19things differently. I believe it's time
55:21for fairness in Britain
55:23I believe it's time
55:25for promises to be kept
55:27But once in power, he realised
55:29that not all promises could be kept
55:31and it's fair to say many students weren't too
55:33impressed. Come November, a student
55:35memo over education cuts started out
55:37shouty and then went a bit Oliver Reed
55:39as it marched past Millbank, which symbolised
55:41the Death Star to this ragtag rebel alliance
55:43Just like Luke Skywalker
55:45they valiantly kicked ten shades of glass shit
55:47out of a window before bravely jumping back
55:49when it almost fell on them. Which is probably
55:51what Han Solo would have done
55:53They also nicked a Stormtrooper's helmet
55:55and danced around in hoods like the Ewoks
55:57at the end of Return of the Jedi
55:59At times the coverage looked like an Ibiza foam
56:01party and at others like something out of Mad Max
56:03Anyway, things had got distinctly unfunny
56:05by the time someone decided a lob a fire
56:07extinguisher off the roof. Inevitably
56:09come the night time bulletins, the coverage was
56:11dominated by violence, so although the focused
56:13anger of the main demonstration was mentioned
56:15it was vastly overshadowed by hot ruck
56:17action. It started with this
56:19and ended
56:21with this
56:25And this was just ITV
56:27the BBC's coverage was even more
56:29shocking. The violence had gone a bit
56:31too far but
56:33You know, actually, I think that's the first time
56:35the BBC's flagship news bulletin has
56:37broadcast an interview with somebody with the word
56:39fuck written on their face. Anyway
56:41a few weeks later it all kicked off again
56:43This time angry protesters picked a fight
56:45with a dumb, terrified machine
56:47Still it looked pretty nasty in the midst
56:49of the scrum. So nasty in fact that only
56:51a man as big and tough as Nick Robinson
56:53could possibly survive in there
56:55Inside the kettled in crowd he discovered
56:57two girls so desperate to
56:59escape that one had disguised herself
57:01as someone from 1983 and the other
57:03as a cat. Are you trapped here?
57:05Yeah, if you know that's how. He also made
57:07friends with some cheery college scarf
57:09wearing types. Why are you covering your face?
57:11Because the police are watching us for no reason
57:13Yeah, it's not like you've got weapons
57:15What's that you're carrying in your hand?
57:17It's a Rasklart weapon
57:19Oh right, yes, an authentic Rasklart weapon
57:21as traditionally used by the Rasklart
57:23noblemen of King Bumbaclart's
57:25court. Nice to see a student
57:27who's done their historical research
57:29Come the day of the crucial vote itself
57:31it all kicked off again with further ugly
57:33scenes in Parliament Square. Although at least
57:35Father Christmas showed up. Now Father Christmas
57:37there somewhere in the middle raising
57:39his arms up. Hello Father Christmas
57:41Once again the police kettled
57:43the protesters into a confined area
57:45for ages. Meanwhile the cameras were
57:47drawn towards outbreaks of vandalism with the
57:49magnetic fixation of a squaddie's eyes
57:51being drawn towards porn. Police tactics
57:53were questioned but what really exercised
57:55the media were the vivid scenes as a group of
57:57protesters got near the royals culminating in this
57:59chaotic, startling, endlessly repeated
58:01Facebook snap of the year. All of which meant
58:03that while allegations swirled about protesters
58:05being dragged from wheelchairs or struck with truncheons
58:07the media was far more interested debating
58:09whether or not the Duchess of Cornwall had been nudged
58:11with a stick. Are you in a position
58:13to confirm that she was actually
58:15poked with a stick?
58:21Well, I think I understand
58:23I'm not sure about the term
58:25poked with a stick. I understand
58:27there was some contact made.
58:29All in all it was a delightfully festive end
58:31to a wonderful year. Anyway that was
58:332010. People who enjoyed this year
58:35might also enjoy 2011 coming soon
58:37to a reality near you. Now
58:39get out!
58:47Rapper Tinchy Strider is the first
58:49to get the short end of the comedy stick
58:51and never mind the buzzcocks next
58:53Then, life on a lighthouse
58:55we're going round the twist with the goodies
58:57at 11.30
59:13What I think people probably aren't aware of
59:15is the amount of sheer effort
59:17that goes into locating just the
59:19right bit of archive. What you're looking for
59:21is that moment, that image, which
59:23really crystallises what you're trying to say
59:25so perfectly that you yourself don't
59:27actually have to say anything. It's as difficult
59:29as conducting keyhole surgery
59:31only possibly two or three times more important
59:33than that. Charlie, you, um
59:35here you are. Huh, he's got tight blue
59:37pants on. He's got blue pants on.
59:39Precision Engineered Comedy
59:41from BBC Two