Wine and...TV: TASKMASTER Series 1 (2015) w/ Mike Shea and Kevin Jospeh

In this episode we tackle the British "comedy panel" show where different celebrities (mostly comedians) compete to accomplish a number of creative tasks in the most outlandish and/or embarassing ways possible. We cover all of the first "Series" (what the Brits call a "season") which ran 6 episodes back in 2015.

We're joined by special guests, comic creators MIKE SHEA (Miskatonic High) and KEVIN JOSEPH (Tart) who currently have a crossover between their two books being done as a narrative trading card set! Make sure to check that shit out!

DAVE'S WINE PAIRING:
NV Bolney Bubbly Sparkling, Sussex, England
Blend of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Muller Thurgau
A challenge worthy of the Taskmaster himself - make a wine in Britain that competes on the world stage! Thanks to climate change, this is actually happening, especially with quality sparkling wines. This gorgeous blend comes with all the crisp apple, yeasty brioche notes, and tingling effervescence you'd expect from a top quality sparkler.

DALLAS' WINE PAIRING:
W&J Graham's 20 Year Tawny Port
Amber, golden tawny color. An excellent bouquet, with a characteristic "nutty" character, such as almonds, and delicious mature fruit with hints of orange peel. Rich, sweet and smooth on the palate, it is perfectly balanced, with a long and lingering finish. Graham's 20 Year Old Tawny Port pairs extremely well with vanilla ice cream or crème brulee. Serve slightly chilled to appreciate the full complexity and sensuous pleasure of this wine.

MIKE'S NON-WINE PAIRING:
"Suicide" Soda Float aka Dentist's Lament aka The Amputator
Speaking of ice cream: something to match both the sweet zaniness of Taskmaster and the same of the comic card crossover between Mike's Miskatonic High and Kevin's TART, the "Suicide" (a name only us asshole Gen X'ers could have come up with) is when you pour a little of every soda at a soda machine into the same cup. Add ice cream. Et voila! Instant health issues.

KEVIN'S BEER PAIRING:
Black and Tan (Harp's Lager + Guiness, 50/50)
Ingredients: Harp pale ale and Guinness stout
Preparation: Fill a large Irish pint glass halfway with Harp, then slowly pour Guinness over the back of an upside-down spoon into the glass. The Guinness will settle on top of the Harp due to its lower density.
Taste: A good black and tan blends the stout's robust flavor with the pale ale's refreshing taste.

Chapters

• 2:44 Kevin and Mike's Crossover Trading Card Set
• 15:29 Brtish Comedy Panel Shows
• 20:39 Why Taskmaster?
• 30:20 Brief History of the Show's Origins
• 44:42 Mike's Non-Wine Pairing
• 46:52 Kevin's Beer-and-Beer Pairing
• 51:32 Dallas' Wine Pairing
• 54:43 Dave's Wine Pairing
• 1:00:37 What Was Our Favorite Challenge?
• 1:12:25 Who Was Our Favorite Contestent?
• 1:18:21 Our Favorite Overall Episode?
• 1:22:06 Wrap-Up!

Transcript

0:06

and we have opinions on just about anything. Sometimes they're on point and sometimes they go down better with a glass of wine. Join us. This is the Wine and Podcast. Welcome back everybody to Wine and the podcast where we pair wine with entertainment, dilute ourselves into thinking you want to hear what we have to say about different pieces of pop culture and art, but know for a fact that you need to hear what we have to say about wine because man, who knows anything about wine? We sure don't. That's not true. We actually totally do and we can help you find the perfect pairing to whatever it is you're planning to read, watch or listen to. Now, before we get started, please make sure to hit that follow button and subscribe. It does help this podcast grow and reach new listeners. Also, please leave a rating and or review. At least do so if you love us because we want a five star rating, please. If you don't love us, just send a nasty ass email to wine and pod at gmail.com. Wine the letter N. pod at gmail.com. will take your feedback into serious consideration. If we don't improve on your feedback, then leave that nasty review. That's fair. And if you can also, not if you can also, but you can also find us on sub stack, winan.substack.com, where you will be the first to know when new episodes drop. Get in depth show notes, sometimes uncut versions of these episodes, bonus pairings, articles, chats, pairing directories, winan.substack.com. Be a cool kid, drink the wine cooler aid. Join us on Substack. Now today, everybody, we are joined by not one, but two very special guests, Kevin Joseph, Florida man and writer of the Indie Comics Darling Tart created by Ludovic Sal or Salé. How do you pronounce his last name there, Kevin? Actually, I go I go as close to Salé as I can, and he accepts it. don't think I get it perfect. But as close as I can get it, he's okay. Saleh. Well, the comic book series Tart, which is created by Ludovic Saleh and Kevin himself, Tart follows the adventures of our lead character, Tart Acid, and her friends in the toxic fruit organization as they travel through time to defend the history of the world against demons intent on creating chaos. That sounds an awful lot like a Saturday morning cartoon from the 80s. But believe me, that is a gross oversimplification of the story. So if you like complex, auteur comics, Tart is one you need to take a crack at. We are also joined today by Mike Shea, writer and co-creator alongside Orion Mendoza of the comic Miscatonic High, a comic series about teens who take on Lovecraftian Monsters and their small town high school. And they're not sure which. is worse. Tart has had a 16 issue run thus far and Miskatonic is currently crowdfunding its 24th issue. And we have both gents on today because at the time this episode drops, they will be kickstarting a crossover book between the two series, which should be a perfect place. You can correct me if I'm wrong, guys, but I believe it should be a perfect place for readers to sample both books without needing to have read any of the previous books. Welcome, Mike. Welcome, Kevin. Welcome to Wine and and let's let's actually start. Mike, why don't you start us off here just so we go in order? But tell us a little bit about this upcoming book of yours. Right. So the crossover, the one that we're crowdfunding right now. the 24th issue of Miss Katana Kai. OK. Yes, of course. Sorry. The first time I have two going on, I have no idea what to talk about. Issue 24 is the second issue of our fourth season, essentially. Yep, we're calling our back to school season. The kids have gone through time, they have taken on all kinds of monsters, they've gone to various dimensions, and now they are back and have to deal with bio homework that they Yeah, so the series basically delves into the idea of kids taking on Lovecraftian monsters and their small town high school and When we were coming up with the comic, idea was, know, Lovecraftian horror is the idea that there's no God, no reason. There's just these crazy things out there that we don't understand. They're either trying to kill us or they just don't care. And when we started thinking about it, we thought, you know, that sounds exactly like high school. So we sort of went through that. yeah, it's it's every issue is basically a standalone issue. It's designed to be easy to jump in. Just read that one issue, sort of get get a flavor for it, and then if you want to come back and read more, can, and if you don't want to, you don't have to. So yeah, so 24 is a great place to pick up. We also have catch-up rewards so that you can catch up on the 23 other issues. All right, beautiful. And Kevin, where did this idea to crossover come from? Why don't you tell us the story behind the inception of deciding to cross the two over? Well, know, years ago, I see this, Upstart comic coming up this misketonic whatever it is and I'm like it looks kind of interesting, you know But I don't know who these guys are and then like three months later They're back on Kickstarter with issue two and then like two months later three months later. They have three I'm like, these guys are serious. So I think I hopped on to I feel like Tart is the tortoise and Miskatonic is the hare in this race. They're the hare that has not Wait a minute, I don't think I like that, I keep trying to distract him. That's actually what this crossover is about, is me trying to put a landmine in his way to slow him down. But after like four issues, I was like, well, I think I better check this out because these guys are serious. Let's find out, you know. I could see the style on the Kickstarter page. Let's see if there's substance in the book. And I'm happy to say that when I got it, I was like, this is fun. We've got six kids, they're relatable and that they're not always likable. They're not always doing the right thing. In fact, often they're selfish, they're petty. And I was just like, this is fun. So I've been with them since the fourth, fifth, sixth issue, whichever I jumped on. And then I got to... you know, know Mike on social media, you know how that kind of goes. And I don't remember who first said, hey, I think there's enough overlap here that maybe someday in the future we could do something. And during the pandemic, Mike came to me and said, I've got an idea of how I want to tell a crossover story, but I don't have a story. Would you want to do something crazy? And that's when I was in. When he said, do you want to do something crazy? was like, yes, I want to do something crazy. And then Mike, you can tell what the crazy thing you brought to me was. Right. So to back up just a tiny bit. you know, when, when you're starting kickstarting your comic, you look around to see who the big boys on the block. yeah. You know, and yeah, you know, cause you want, you want to know who's out there, who's doing it the right way because you know, it's When you do these things, you want to model yourself after somebody who's doing things the right way, the way that you want to do it. If you're not a professional yet, model yourself after that professional until you become that person. And Tart was obviously a book that was well established at the time. You know, you could see it coming a mile away. It looks like nothing else in the Indie comic universe. It's just so beautiful. And then once you pick it up and you start reading, the stories are so good. The characters are good. it draws you in. And the thing that I fell in love with more than anything else is the way that it tells its story one at a time. So each each issue is like a standalone, it feels different, but also the art feels different. The story feels different. They adapt themselves to what they're doing. There's so much creativity there. So when I was thinking about doing this crossover and thinking about ways to do it, I needed to find somebody who wanted to go crazy, who would be willing to go crazy. And There's a lot of great books out there that have their style, have their things, and that's perfectly fine and they're wonderful. But you want to get with somebody who's going to bounce things off you and go in directions that you're not going before. Because if all you're going to do is the same thing, how are you different than what people can find in their comic shop? You know, be something different, offer them something different, be creative, because that's really what we have. that other people don't is the license to be creative because there's no rules. We're writing them. There's no company. There's no editors telling us we can't do things. So yeah, so I went to Kevin and I said, Hey, look, neither of us really wants to do a standalone book. You know, that's a lot of work. You know, we're both hip deep into our continuity. Right. What if we did something very different? What if we told a story with trading cards? You know, think about I don't know if you guys have seen it, the old Mars attacks cards where they have the Martians attacking America. Remember? wait, yes, yes. Yes, they made I was thinking a movie tie-in, but no, guess, right, right. Yeah, but before that there was Mars attacks. And what they did was they had the artwork on the front and they told the story on the back. And somewhere along the way that sort of fell off and people weren't doing it anymore. And I thought... This could be really cool. I know I've been following Kevin, I've been backing his books for a long time. I know he doesn't do trading cards. This would be a cool way that he could do trading cards for his characters, maybe give them away, maybe sell them, do whatever he wants with them, but find a way to give trading cards to people. But rather than just on the back, they're number nine for magic and number two for intellect and number three for popularity, whatever it is, what if we told a story? And so then we started kicking around and said, What can our story be? That's awesome. Yeah. So how many cards, grand total, is this story? Does this story run? When we started, I think we thought we were going to tell a story in nine cards. And it grew to 24. It grew to 24. Yeah, I like that you almost went to a standard comic page count for the cards. Sort of, yeah. Yeah, when we were when we found our artists so again back up a little bit. So once we came up with the idea of How about if our characters meet at a convention, know crazy things can happen at a comic convention at an anime convention you know, it's a perfect place because Anything that happens there can be written off as that crazy thing that happened at a convention or know It was probably cosplay or something like that. And so we thought we started putting it together. And again, the thing about Tart that I've always really loved is how they adapt their style and their art to the story. And so one of the things that we discussed was what if this isn't a comic book convention, but an anime convention? And then the art style can be an anime style because both of us like anime style, comic people like anime style. It'd be so cool to see it in a different format, in a different way. Again, just playing off that creativity. Just don't be afraid. Just go for it. And so that's so that's what we did. So, yes, once we knew we were at 24 cards, once we were nude that we were hiring an anime artist, you know, we found an amazing artist and we sort of pitched it as 24 pages. It's like a comic book. It's just going to be single panel panel pages. That's awesome. All right, guys. You know, I'm going to show you guys the only thing I can think of is even like this. This was a old Kickstarter pre pandemic. This is a long time ago. I don't even remember where it was, but it was a comic told on different card decks. wow. This is actually issue one issue, two issue, three issue, four issue, five. That's awesome. And it's an actual playing card deck and the arts on the on the other side. And then the other side is an actual playing card. And you actually set all the images in. a grid and then it becomes like, you know, your eye scans down and follows the action on the grid, blah, blah. And it just tells it in that way. This is a little different because it's actually this is a bit of a I love the idea, but actually finding space to lay them all fucking out into and then put it down and like not get distracted and have to go do something else and then read the whole thing and then put it all back together. I'm like, this is actually not easy to do. So it is. a cool idea, but not very practical. I think your guys' ideas much more practical. Halfway through, think one of us realized that was probably a problem. And so in the Kickstarter, do have booklets that will have the story. And Mike had the idea. There's going to be, you can get a booklet with the toxic fruit characters that are drawn by Ryan Mendoza. You can read the whole card story and then in that one it'll be issue one of Miskatonic, right? I still get confused about some of the things. Ryan does the art of toxic fruit and you'll have issue one of Miskatonic because we think maybe the tart people will want to read the one that has the I think you got it backwards. I think, yeah, Ryan draws the toxic fruit and then issues is a really confusing project, guys. This means it's going to be real. That's all. This means it's going to be real. Or not, one or the other. Hopefully people will get both, because then you get Mischatonic 1 and TART number 1, and you can read our first issue, and you can read the whole story. But also, you're getting the card set so you can mess with people who don't have it, and maybe hand them card number 13 and say, find the rest. And after the Kickstarter, mean, besides eBay, it's going to kind of be back a Mystic Atonic and hope you get the right card from Mike or back Tart and hope you get the right card from me. So I am hoping there's somebody out there who won't back the Kickstarter, who will try to track down all the cards. But one, only one person. I want everyone else to back the Kickstarter to get the cards right. See, I want that one person to have one card that they're missing for the next 13 years. That's it. It's only fair. It's only fair. It's only fair. Yeah. Yeah. Why didn't you back the Kickstarter? And then you wouldn't have this problem. All right. So everyone, for all you listeners, there are links down below in the description of this episode to follow all the comics that we're talking about here today, both the card story campaign and then links to follow both Kevin and Mike and Miss Katonik and Tart. So you can find that all down below and we'll repeat all of this at the very end of the episode. But we are actually here today. to talk about our second TV show of all time. This was Mike's Pick and it is the British Comedy Panel Game Show. Comedy Panel Game Show for Americans, if you don't watch British TV, you're gonna be like the fucks. What does that even mean? It's not really something we do here. I feel like Hollywood Squares might've been the closest thing we ever That's the closest. It's sort of like parlor games. They specialize in parlor games. celebrities. Right, right. And maybe Battle of the Network Stars. Yes, that's what I was thinking. Yeah. OK. I've never even heard of that. man. When I was a kid, that was really important to me. was was must see. Yeah. Back in the day, you'd see all your B-level stars showing up to compete against one another and roller skating and nonsense, absolute nonsense. But it was entertaining. I would be. I was depressed if NBC lost. That was how important it was to See, for me, that was the gateway drug to like Laugh Olympics. Yeah. Yeah. Ooh, I loved Laugh Olympics. OK. OK. Bear. I will have to Google this when we're done with this show. I've already never heard that phrase in the history A lot of shorty shorts, because it was like 78 to 82. So. Yeah, you see you see some thighs on the which is I think no one had any self-consciousness And the hairy legs too, right is like it was it was always yeah Those were very legs the men shorts were basically tanked high Yeah The unofficial spin-off of Miskatonic High, Taint High. Taint High, I'm you. Well, here's what's crazy. I actually have a pilot, a television show called Taint's Bill. It's in the intersection, basically a town right where South Carolina, Georgia and Florida meet. So Florida meets Taint. There we go. Well, in any event. British comedy panel game show. Yes, we are here to talk about the one called Taskmaster. Now, I had never heard of Taskmaster before Mike chose us for the show. We watched all of season one. Now for you Americans again, who have never watched any British TV, that only means six episodes. Yeah, so they're not really series as well. Yeah. series series one good i'll remember that for when i actually put the official title to this episode so series one and they do this multiple times a year so this is not this is not only annually but the only one i've ever really watched before was a show called qi which stands for quite an amazing show it stands for quite interesting it's much loosey goosey than Taskmaster. Taskmaster actually has rules associated to it that they're, they fairly stick to. Quite interesting. Each season is a letter of the alphabet. I believe they're up to season V or W or something like that. They're almost there. They're almost at the end. And they actually do do like, like in 16 to 20 something episodes per letter. And so it's always a topic. The topics are always start with that letter. And it's just about topics like the and it's all comedians mostly though few other celebrities or big names in British culture will show up occasionally same light as with Taskmaster. And you're just trying to be interesting about the topics and the host just scores everyone at the very end. No one says what the scores are on the way through. It's just at the very end. He's like, well, you have negative six. And you have four. And it's always kind of half the joke is he just like labels people like, how interesting were you? People have won because it's like you are our winner with one point. Everyone else is in the negatives, you know, and or like you won with negative one because you were the most least interesting, but everyone else was vastly more uninteresting. But it's it's a very fun show. And I'm glad I watched that, though, because I was actually familiar with absolutely every face and every name they recycle in Taskmaster season one. They recycle comedians and wits and writers. what's kind of amazing is it is heavily dependent upon the relationships between the guest and the host because they do all have working relationships and they know one another. there's that inside joke kind of aspect that resonates. It's kind of a comedy hangout. Yeah, right. like they're all just sort of hanging out and doing this game show. that does have rules and is structured, at least with Taskmaster is structured. And they actually, much more than QI is. But it is just sort of friends hanging out. They're all in this together type of a thing. They know each other really well so they can really fuck with each other and have a good time and whatnot. But Mike, why this show and what's your history with it? So much like most people, I have a day job and I commute to my day job. and I am on my phone way too much when I commute to my day job. And, you know, it's one of those things where these little TikTok reels or whatever start popping up. And, you know, I got into watching, you know, some of the best year countdowns or whatever from British TV. I have no idea how it started, but once you do one, the algorithm starts showing them all to you. And so that went to Taskmaster and I started seeing all these little things and I had no understanding of what this was going on, who these people are, any of that, but found them funny. And so I was just looking it up and it turns out that every episode from every series is on YouTube, you know, free. so it was like, okay, I'll start watching. You know, and next thing you know, I'm in, you know, it's, it's one o'clock at night, the, all the lights are out in the house. I'm trying not to laugh to wake up my kids. and I'm watching YouTube and my wife is like, what the hell are you doing? It's Taskmaster. Get to bed. So yeah, so that was my history. And you know, it's just one of those things. It's it's easily watchable, but it's not just physical comedy. Like you think it's just gonna be physical comedy or whatever. And then every now and again, they throw this creativity into it, which, you know, I just really respond to where they're like, Go make a film. And so they go and make a film and make a film in reverse. And it's like, do the best thing in reverse. And you're like, wow. Okay, you know, if that's my thing, it's like, you're, it's okay to be funny, it's okay to be all this. But if you're willing to add creativity to it, I'm sold, I'm there. I think there's also an element of, you know, there are creative challenges and each time you, catch on really quick that each individual has a... their own way of approaching these kinds of challenges. you get and then you start to get into this like, once you hear the challenge before you see what anyone else is going to do, your first thought is like, fuck, how would I? would I? Right. How would I accomplish this? And then you get to I sometimes I would actually pause the thing and like think it through in full and be like, Yeah, okay, I got my battle plan. Now let's see what they did. And Now, to be fair, almost always, at least most of them, would be like, that's a lot smarter than what I had. So that's a lot better. But then every once in a while, some of them would have like very, like they would get more stymied than I would in terms of like coming up with a good or smart idea. And I'd be like, my God, what are you doing? And that would usually be the response to everyone on the show is like, literally just stood there and did. What was the one where the bolder she had to go find like a knife to cut the watermelon and things like that. like she spent like 10 minutes looking for the knife. And you're like, wow, like it never occurred to you to try any other way and all that time, things like that. And then there were a couple of moments like that throughout the show. But Kevin, was this this was your first. Do you watch much British comedy shows or British TV or what's your history with that and Taskmaster? So when I heard the word Taskmaster, I thought there was a Disney Plus series I had missed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was like, that's cool. They brought her back from Black Widow. OK. And then I was quickly told that I was off by a little. Yeah, from the Hawkeye Show for those who didn't watch. There we go. So I was like, OK, I'll do it. You know, like any other comedy nerd, you start with Monty Python, you go through faulty towers. you find out that Michael Palin had ripping yarns and you grab that and you're like, this is the funniest thing I've ever seen. but in, the, then your friend comes up and visits you in New York and he's excited because he was able to get an import DVD of this show. You've never heard of called the office. He puts on the pilot, you and your girlfriend who you end up marrying, sit there and watch four episodes of the first series of the office. Like in. in the apartment instead of going out in New York City. So I have loved much of the great British comedy. I am not an aficionado of recent stuff. I didn't know any of the people on the first series of Taskmaster. I came in completely ignorant of anyone. I found half of them to be quite charming and very funny. And the other half I was like, I don't think. These guys are very funny. So I don't know if that's cultural. It's probably cultural. But I was like, probably half these people are really funny. Why do the other half get a seat? Friends, their friends with the hoes. Friends. got a schedule, opening in their schedule. But I feel like everyone would have like a moment where they really shown like a moment or two. But some were more always on the ball than others in terms of getting the true yuck yuck glass out and what. Yeah, the true laugh out loud moments. Yeah. Yeah. But it was a fun show to watch. And I'm glad and I am a big podcast fan. Jason Manzoukas. has been leaked. yeah. On one of the next series. So I am going to probably skip series two through 18 and go to series 19 and watch and watch. I got it. I got to do it for my boy. Beautiful. Dallas, how about you? Yeah, I'm very familiar with the the canon of British parlor shows as I like to call them, kind of my favorite entertainment because they're the intersection of wit of stand up of they can be a little not brainy, but they can be you know, it's definitely not one dimensional. Generally, there's usually someone on the panel who's making some interesting witticism or quip or I will say, this is probably in my top 10 probably around number eight or nine. Top two without question. I'm going to go ahead and recommend recommend these to everyone listening right now. Eight out of 10 cats. And would I lie to you? Would I lie to you is you'll see it. It is just there are two guys on this show who are they are God tier Jedi when it comes to wit quips it just it's just it's it's clinical anyhow but again they're all related to to this show because a lot of the cast is sort of recycled yeah and just fantastic but yeah very familiar with the show lots of fun if you got something you need to do you want something playing in the background that's slightly engaging with the occasional kind of yuck yuck. Yeah, this is a great show for it. Greg Davies, who's the host. Phenomenal actor, his crazy backstory used to be a teacher and had is a great sitcom life as well. He is just he's a scary dude who really is the exact opposite in terms of personality. He's busy like six, eight or something and he's just as imposing. was gonna say When when Josh would a comb or whatever his last name is, my God, it was like a winner. my God. But next to him, right, because he stood up next to Davies. And I was like, wait, how tall is Josh? I didn't even ask how tall was Davies because I was just like he came up to like his belly button. Yeah. I was like, what is happening? What Josh is relatively normal sized. One of Josh's sort of threads that he likes to weave into a lot of his comedy is that. He was up for all of the roles in The Hobbit. Very tiny. Yeah, Greg Davies is actually the one and only guy I was not familiar with before watching this show. So I hadn't seen anything with him in it to my knowledge, to my knowledge. You know, in my brain, he was new. I hadn't his face wasn't familiar. His name wasn't familiar. His style wasn't familiar. And kind of like you, Kevin, I am much more familiar with old school British comedy. and sort of the Monty Python and faulty towers and Red Dwarf and like that whole era of comedy. Yeah. And then of course, coming into the modern era, only QI, but I was kind of aware that that was a very big thing in Britain, these sort of comedy sketch shows. and what's the one where it's a vicar of something, it's a female vicar. of Dibley. she comes. She heard Dibley that is an amazing show of the ab fab. She is the partner to who stars in ab fab. French and Saunders is their name. yeah. They also also have a comedy sketch show called French and Saunders, I believe from the late 80s, early 90s, which predates ab fab and Vicar of Dibley came out was phenomenal. She also. OK, yeah, sorry. Yeah, I could go in for a while, but go. Yeah, I'm having fun here. was like, was like, Mike is going to be our resident expert on Taskmaster specifically, probably. And we'll just be our expert on like the wider scope of British shows. right. So let me actually give just I'm just going to give a brief little history and detail about what the show is and how it works and whatnot. Then we're going to get to what we think we're going to drink with it. And then we're to get to talking about some specific details and favorite moments of the show itself. So Taskmaster, this is all from the Wikipedia article. So this is not it's not a deep dive, guys. This is is skimming the surface. But Taskmaster, it's a British comedy panel game show created by comedian and musician Alex Horn and presented by both Horn and Greg Davies in the program. A group of five celebrities, mainly comedians. attempt to complete a series of challenges with Horn asking as umpire in each challenge and Davies, the titular taskmaster, judging the work and awarding points based on the contestants performances. So taskmaster was the brainchild of Horn, whose idea was inspired by the crystal maze. actually don't know what that is. Probably another TV show. His work on Big Brother. I do know what that is. Thank you. And his envy. of his close friend, Tim Key, who was one of the comedians in season one here. Tim had won the Edinburgh Comedy Award in 2009. And I think Horn was basically like, I can win the Edinburgh Comedy Award. Let me give this a shot. So the original concept of the program took place over the course of two years. Starting in September 2009, Horn sent 20 comedians monthly tasks by email over the course of a year. He then presented all their efforts as part of a two hour show at the 2010 Edinburgh Film Festival Fringe titled The Taskmaster, which focused on demonstrating the differing attempts by the contestants before revealing who won based on their performances. So basically the concept of the show, but probably, you know, it's a two hour show and all done in one a little bit different than doing a string of episodes across a not season, what do we call it again? Series. Series one. you. Series one, Mike Wozniak was announced as the winner of that very first Taskmaster. Wozniak, by the way, is, I believe he's in series 19, like whatever, or 17, or one of the very recent ones. He never came back until recently, but then he did come back for one of them. no, I'm sorry, season 11, there we go. I did write that down, I thought I had it. Six participants in the original. Edinburgh show have gone on to appear in the televised version of Taskmaster as of 2024. For the 2011 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Horn conducted another stage show titled Taskmaster 2 at the Gilded Ballroom with a similar format. This time, though, there were 10 contestants, nine comedians returning from the previous year and critic Bruce Dessau or Dessau. I'm not sure how to pronounce his name. Both stage shows proved a success with their audiences leading Horne to recruit production company Avalon, who were also his agency at the time, to help produce an adaptation of his concept for television before pitching his idea to several different broadcasters. Channel 4 reportedly paid for the production of a pilot episode, marking the first use of their house in Chiswick, which would go on to become the taskmaster house going forward, but they did choose not to commission it at the time. British television channel Dave, best British television channel ever plainly, took interest in the idea and bought the rights to it with comedian Greg Davies recruited to help present the program alongside Horn. However, the channel's deputy director of commissioning at the time, Hilary Rosen, was concerned with the structure of the show. Horn assured Rosen that the program was not like a traditional panel show, but quote unquote, more like a sitcom. to account for the involvement of the same group of contestants who would appear across an entire series. Another problem with the format of Horne's concept was his concept of shooting, I'm sorry. Another problem with the format of Horne's concept was that shooting a traditional pilot became implausible. However, the aspects of the show filmed before a studio audience were done as a sort of pilot, sort of test how that part might work. But of course, all the challenges, and this is something we haven't really said, much like the prototypes that debuted at the Edinburgh Festival, they are all pre-recorded before it shows on television. So what you're watching, what they're filming live or in that episode, are the contestants sitting in on a stage before a studio audience talking about the results, and then they screen, they basically project what they filmed. sometimes weeks ago, sometimes months ago, prior to, and then we're just kind of, and everyone's getting to see the results for the first time. Because everyone only knows their own results and not what anyone else did. So a series of six hour long episodes were commissioned by Dave in September of 2014 with Davies and Horne attached. Initially with the episodes intended to be shown in any order. Rosen later determined the show should actually be arranged in order, pointing out that this was a show You record and transmit in the same order. February 2015, the first cast five contestants for the first series was announced and the studio based segments of the program where footage of the contestants attempts at completing the task of the task at the Taskmaster house was played to them in front of a studio audience were filmed at the Clapham Grand. The involvement of veteran comedian Frank Skinner, who is the oldest contestant in this series one and one of my. I think he is my personal favorite, actually. He's also a highly, highly acclaimed actor. And you've seen him in something. Yes. He's phenomenal. Yes. Yes. Yes. When he agreed to join after meeting Horn for lunch, helped to entice the other contestants to take part in the program. The first series, which started airing in July of 2015, proved a success leading to additional series being commissioned on Dave over the course of five years. Now I believe it's gone on like it's moved beyond Dave. It's actually I think it's going on to either Channel 4 or another station that it says Channel 4. So because it's up to 19 at this point. So it's had and it's still going. So it's had it's very special. That is the format. Yeah. Lots of lots of specials, which is also something British TV does that we used to do in America way back when it's kind of rare ish to do it these days. But I think with reality TV, you sometimes get it with us. But I rarely see it for like the masked singer doesn't just do a one-off special, right? Really or I think they don't I've actually stopped watching it after I should see the two so I Right, like in on British TV They have like the Christmas special which is like you have your your seasons and then you have your special that's aired during Christmas when everybody's at home doing nothing and so and then the charity episodes they're huge they Very large charity kind of base built into their their seasons Yeah. Yeah. All right. So that is the background of the TV show. Mike, is there any amazing things from the podcast you wanted to throw out there as like really cool moments or are we good to go? Well, OK, so they they were filming this first this first episode and they weren't sure like Alex Horn, who's the creator and the co-host on it. was like a little worried because he's like, this is my dream. I've invested like a lot of time and money and a lot of people's efforts in this. like, so they were filming Romesh, I forget his last name. Do you know? Yes. Who has become a humongous British comedian. Yeah. So he wasn't big at the time. And so he was there and they were filming his stuff first. And so they film like five, six tasks in a day. And so they're filming his tasks and he's not doing very well. And he can see Alex sort of freaking out like, this is going very, very badly. This is like, I'm going to have to go find another career. And so they get to the watermelon task and, and, and Romesh is thinking about this. They're like, okay, I really got to do something. And so the task is eat as much watermelon as you can in 30 seconds. and so before they go into the room, they think, okay, it's gonna be sliced up, know, slices of watermelon or whatever. And you go in and it's an entire watermelon. you know, so that's why one of the contestants goes off and tries to find a knife for 27 seconds. She's fantastic, by the way, in general. Right, yeah, yeah, it's wonderful. There's very little urgency to, is Roche her name? She has very little urgency in any of her tasks. Roche, yeah. So, So Romesh is feeling a little tense about this. And so the time starts. He immediately hurls the watermelon on the floor. It splatters all over the place and he gets down on all fours and just starts going to town on this watermelon, just eating every little bit of it. And the crazy thing is, like if that's not crazy enough, he's like getting sick from eating the watermelon. And it's like you can just see him getting physically ill eating this watermelon for 30 seconds and it's so gross and it's terrible and like pink drool is coming out and it's just so terrible. And then you know, and you're just like, God, God, you can feel it. Like we've all we've all been there, unfortunately, with something not necessarily watermelon. But yes, yes. And so and and so then you know, that the time ends up he goes out, he does his business. And he comes back. And Alex Horne realizes that he's not going to have to find another job. That was when he knew the show was going to work. OK. And so that's the first wild and crazy attempt. Well, and it's funny because he and then Tim Key, the guy that this was, know, Alex was inspired, one of the people he was inspired by in the first place, tend to be like the two that almost took it upon themselves to be like, we're going to be the most impish about this. Like, we always have to find a way. to circumvent whatever. Right. The letter of the law. Like, what were the rules exactly? And then once they find that, they're like, huh. Okay. So no one said I can't blankety blank and they'll do something absolutely outlandish. His worst idea in within series one was tying balloons on the boulder. Where I was like, no, I know it's not a real boulder dude, but they're not going to float this thing. I'm like, I'm sorry. But again, think of it like you're him. You've just spent the last six hours in this little house going absolutely insane doing stupid tasks like empty this tub without using a bucket or whatever it is. And so it's like, at that point, you've got the TV cameras on you, your brain is gone. You think? Who cares? Yeah, I can use balloons. I can use balloons. That'll work. Let's just do that. Let's just do it. Yeah. When they do it all in a single day, like they're doing all six challenges in one filming go. Of course, you save money doing that. Yeah, of course. You don't have to assemble them again. But that is a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot. They did that. I know that was one of the reasons Stephen, the first host of QI finally had to bow out is they want he was like they had to film so many in a single day, like so many episodes in a single day. And he's like, I'm dying. Like I'm and I think then they wanted to add one more. to the docket like per day. And he was like, okay, this has been fun. I can't do it anymore. Sorry, Kevin, you were saying. No, well, you just you brought up the Tim. And when you say that, I think back to it. I think Tim had no interest in winning Taskmaster. Yeah, he had interest in making his friends show as good as it could be. And now that I now I go back and I reverse engineer everything he did, he didn't. care if he won. He cared if his segments were funnier than everybody else. And he is one of the guys that I did actually enjoy quite a bit. The only time I think he actually kind of sort of cared was the one where he put the egg inside a tennis ball. And there was a moment where he was authentically like, wait, I didn't win? Like he was like, but that was brilliant. Like that was, I was so proud of myself for that one. Like I have to win. It was either that one or the stone in the river, the boulder in the river. One of those two. The ice in the river. in the river. the ice in the river. He so proud of what he had come up with that when it didn't work, he was like, think genuinely like, wait, how? was such a good idea. Like I thought it was a good idea, not just a silly idea. Yeah. Right. And that becomes the dynamic of the show as it goes on is there's always those comedians and contestants who are thinking outside the box. How can I get around the rules and the people who are going straight through it who get so upset at the people who are going around the rules. And generally one thing you will find on most of those shows with these composite cast, you'll have at least one performer who is there purely to make all the other performers laugh. And it is working so well on camera. Like it just it's just they they've got it down to a science. I cash these things. And I think it's a good mix of people because you don't want everyone being that kind of exactly. know, you don't want them to be that outlandish. You you need the mix of people. And to be fair, I do one thing I did like about series one maybe and maybe they do less of this as the show goes on because now everyone's more familiar with the show. But even the people that were very straight and narrow to begin with. they started to take cues from the people that were, because it would actually usually work. They would win by breaking those rules. And so they would be like, I need to think outside the box. Okay. But then again, these were all filmed prior to, so that technically isn't true. I probably just, as you mentioned, Mike, as the hours wear on, as that day wears on, you just like, have less interest in doing it straightforward. You're just like, God, let's just. How can I finish this as quickly as possible? know, like what's the hack? What's the shortcut? Right, right. Yeah. Cool. Yeah, and as Dallas was saying, it's that tension between people who think winning is important and the comedians who remember they're there to be funny. Right, yeah. You know? So gents, before we ask a couple questions about the show in specific or this series of this show in specific, we paired. Beverages to drink with the show what we all thought would be best So I'm just gonna go clockwise from where where I see myself on the screen So Mike you are directly to my right. So what beverage did you pair with taskmaster series one and why? Okay, I came at it. I wanted to find a drink that would not work just for taskmaster, but also for our card set cross up. And so I was thinking about it, you know, what are the combinations and you know, we're both trying to be funny, we're both mixing different flavors coming together, trying to be creative, trying to be a little zany, trying to be a little weird, but you know, maybe something at the end of the day that tastes really good. I don't drink alcohol, so mine is a non-alcoholic beverage and because I am a grown up child, mine is very, very sugary. So I don't know if you guys do, like you go to Five Guys, you go to the Sun Fast Food place and they have the machine where you can put the drink in and you can get all the different sodas. Yep. Yep. So, you know, I just follow my kids, you know, go right up there, you know, put a little orange soda in there, you know, put a little Sprite in there, you know, put a little ginger ale in there. Then I take it over and I get a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Toss that in there, making a perfect, a perfect orange sickle. float. We call that the Amputator. I know, that's inappropriate. It's more like losing the teethinator. That's inappropriate. You might name it that. They're in Tatesville, USA. Exactly. Exactly, Kevin. And because there's five contestants on Taskmaster, I needed one more ingredient. So I'm thinking, what better than a cherry at the bottom? That's beautiful. We have to put that recipe up on the cherry on bottom. Yeah, we have to get that recipe and put that up for you for sure. Try that one. Yes, yes, yes. All right, Kevin, what did you come up with for this one? So very, very similar. This works for both. But Taskmaster, I'm thinking the UK, I'm thinking the British Isles. I know that Ireland is its own country, so I'm not going to say that they're British and get in trouble. I have never tried to do this except for when I was bartending with a tap. what in the world is better than lager on the bottom? Little heart. Are we doing a black and tan? We're going to try our darndest. Never once did it without a tap. We're going to see how this goes. This is if you want. And for the listeners, he poured the lager in and now he's got to pour the darker liquid much slower over a spoon as it gently drops on top. And he's doing it in a tart glass. That's a lovely head. A lovely film on top. Available for all if you if you check out those campaigns sexy it is very available if you are somewhere I can hand it you because these He's like I ain't shipping this shit will I will tell you the glass for ten dollars and they will cost thirty eight dollars to ship it to you so I think it's There's there's a there's that looks good bad not bad. Not bad. It's it's like Yeah, that's good. It's not bad. If you want to get into Guinness and you just can't get into it, try black and tan. It's just a little smoother. It's a little bit colder. And after three months of this year, I'm like, let me try Guinness and you're going to like it. This is how I got to be a Guinness fan. Good choice. Very nice. Very nice. And having a drink thing going on with Guinness drinkers. Have you heard the little challenge going on with Guinness drinkers? Because here's a challenge for you. Speaking of Taskmaster. But once you've created the... Now you've got the tart glass. we're going to go with the tart rather than because in Guinness classes, there's a G, right? For Guinness, it's always labeled on the thing. And there's something where, what's the exact phrase they use for it? Like you drink to the G or you finish at the G or something like that. And it's your first sip. you have to find out, you have to drink just enough that when you put it down, the foam line is right in the middle of the G, like right where the little line is. And if you get it, your next Guinness is free. Like all bars will like do it that way for you. So for you, it's like right to the middle of the tart, like right under the T crossing. Let's see if you can do it. A little too far down. A little too down. A little too down. No, no, no, it's going back up. Let me put it down. I be cheating. I think it's the foam line. it's... settles or where it stops? Yeah, the... Yeah, it's going down. I did forget one thing. It's also Taskmasker makes simple things ridiculously hard and doing this with Canza beer is right on theme with Taskmasker. Ridiculously hard. There you go. Perfect. Good challenge, guys. Good challenge. And yeah, and if you want to take it to the net so start with blackened tans then move on to Guinness's and then never move on to Irish Carbons That is where that is where your love for Guinness ends That is an Irish cream just sort of dropped into the middle of a pint of Guinness and it curdles so you have about 60 seconds or less to down the whole thing It's a terrible idea to continue with our vernacular here we call that the poop Okay, okay. mean, feel like I'm so much. ploop the little shot of Irish cream right in the mouth and makes it open. Yeah, we'll go with that. Dallas is like, that's not why I come. I will say it's been 20 years since I've had one and that was probably my last one. I don't think almost 50 Kevin is going back to the Irish Carbons. It was the one and only time, yeah. It's the one and only time I browned out from drinking. was, yeah, So Dallas, on that note, what did you pick, my man? Yeah, so I think one thing that these British, I do call them parlor shows, one thing they do have in common is they are a little elegant. It's like an elegant way to spend an evening. You sit around with some friends, you're crack wise. You know, you crack wise, even if even if the topics and what you're talking about is sort of just blue and disgusting and low brow, at least you're sitting in a velvety chair. There's the idea that something is refined in this room, even though they would all consider themselves all trash. But I decided to go with a port because as a person who has done a few curated little evenings and Dave and I've been talking recently about perhaps the wine and boys doing a little cabaret evening in the near future in the not too distant future. know, port is definitely on poor for the evening when it comes to those little sort of curated evening. So I went with the W and J grams tawny port, it's 20 year. You know, like I said, it's a little elegant, it's got a nice long finish, it pairs well with nuts. And everyone in this cast is just nuts. And yeah, that's what I went with. It's a lovely little port. I do have to ask- Tony Port for those. Sorry, go ahead, Kevin. I was just saying one question. What is elegant about baking marbles into a pie? It's the fact that- The British accent. British accent. That they successfully managed It's the British accent. Yeah, it's just the British accent. And the elegance of actually getting that inside a lovely little dainty little hot water pie crust. So, yeah. Right. And I will say, think one of the we've already mentioned this about the show, like the different contestants and how they approach these challenges and the daintiness. Like some of the contestants will be like they had to empty a bathtub at one point. Right. And like some of them are like, OK, I don't want to get too wet. And other people jump in the bathtub and just start with their hands. like shmooning it out. And so you get to see and then same thing with like the watermelon. It's like, I need a knife, I need to find a knife. And then the other person smashes it on the ground. And so you get the the night the full range the full gamut of everything. And yes, and I did want to say for those out there who are not port drinkers are not familiar with port, the tawny port is the brown port that's out there. So you got the Ruby, which is the red port, the tawny port is going to have those more nutty characteristics to it, you're going to get more caramelized notes, more nut notes. And the way they do that, it's basically aged usually in smaller barrels. So more liquid is touching this barrel than in a giant barrel where only a little bit is touching. Yeah, and okay. So and usually for longer, but not always because it's a 10 year tawny, there's a 10 year Ruby, so it can be the same. But it's that extra oak contact during that time that Browns it more. And it gets a little extra oxidized as well because of that. So that is Tawny Port for those who did not know. So similarly to Dallas here, you know, I went with and also inspired by one of the episodes where everyone, this is one thing we kind of didn't bring up. There's always prizes that they're going for in every episode. And it's random objects they brought from home based on an instruction from the taskmaster. And so it'll always be like something valuable or something near and dear to your heart. Or I can't remember all of them, but one of them, Russian brought in a mega champagne bottle at one point. And it was it was something like a five liter or something like, mean, it was it was crazy big, which and a five liter is. basically like what four bottles, five bottles worth of normal wine kind of a thing all in one bottle. So it's just this really gargantuan heavy ass bottle. Usually you do it just to be pretentious at a party or presentational at party where you're like, look at this giant ass bottle. And then, but hopefully you have enough guests because you do have to drink that whole thing. you open it. it's like, only do it for big gatherings, but I didn't do anything that size, but I did think what's been happening in the last, I wanted to go with something British. And in the wine world, British wine has really come into its own in the last half decade or so. It's actually started to really compete on the world stage, especially in the sparkling wine category. That is kind of where they're at in terms of super like quality wine that competes with champagne and cava and Prosecco and all those things. So I went with a British sparkling. I went with a non-vintage boney estate bubbly brute cuvée. from Sussex, England. This is a blend of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and a grape called Mueller Thurgau. And Mueller Thurgau, I did not know this, but it is the second most planted grape in Germany. And I've rarely heard the name before, but apparently it's a cross between Riesling and a grape called Madeleine Royale. You don't get much more British than that. And Madeleine Royale is actually also a German grape, weirdly. But it's it's a it is a vitis vinifera, which is a wine grape, but they actually grow it to be a table grape in Germany. They really don't make wine with it. But they crossed it with Riesling, got this Mueller Thurgau and they make a lot of wine with this Mueller Thurgau in Germany. And then it grows really well in Britain because it's a similar cold climate during certain parts of the year. So like Austria, Germany and now Britain, and especially with global warming, that's been kind of the thing. Global warming is actually finally brought. Britain into having just enough of a warm season and a proper warm season that they can grow wine grapes really, really well. So this is going to have I'm going to go out and start my car and I'm just going to get some of those fossil fuels up just for Britain. Now that I know that I'm helping people help them out exactly. Don't you like to burn things in the backyard, Kevin? I think that's a big thing of yours. Like just keep Getting that into the atmosphere for Britain. See, but that's that's to that's to sequester thing. I've been ruining it. I'm sorry guys That's true. Yeah, that's supposed to have the opposite effect So I did this for a couple of reasons the bubbly. It's very crisp. It's very mineral It really is like very sham. I believe they use the cremant the champagne method when they make this So it is just it's crisp green apple flavor yeasty bready aromas the sparkliness of the bubbles. So I think that matches all the cheekiness, the quote unquote freshness that goes on in this show, which is all very tongue in cheek, all very like them just giving each other a hard time, giving each other shit. And then also to match the taskmaster is all about challenges that are harder than they should be. Make a wine in Britain, I feel like is a challenge worthy of the taskmaster show itself. which is like make a sparkling wine and make it something people even not in Britain or people who have access to fucking champagne want to drink, right? And so it's gotta compete with that shit. And it's like, yes, this really does. Now, British wine guys, it is actually available in the States. You can find it. You might have to look online. It's hard to find in shops. Not a lot of it gets, not a lot of it is made still. So not a lot gets exported, but you'll probably be set back. This usually goes anywhere from like 35 to $50 a bottle. depending on where you can find it. And that's pretty what a sparkling bottle of British sparkly these days, British bubbly does, is generally your 35 to 50, maybe as high as $60 go. And this is Boney Wine Estate, founded in 1972, won its first award for a still white wine in 1985. The second generation then took over in 1995 and improved the vineyard and quality techniques, made their first red wine in 1998. They actually didn't build their first proper winery, their first proper vinification area that was all their own until 2005 with a grant from the British government. So it kind of took the British government getting serious about British wine as well to where they were like, okay, we'll give you money for British wine. I think before that they were like, no, they're like, we have, have, we have better things to spend money on guys. Come on, don't ask us for this shit. But then by 2005, they're like, this might actually be a thing. And then they finally became a tasting room and opened up to the public in 2016. So this is all very new stuff. But yeah, boney estate, bubbly, brute, cuvée, non-vintage. Non-vintage basically means it's a mixture of grapes from different years. If it's more than one year, you can't put the year on the bottle. You just leave the year off. that we just refer to that as non-vintage ports are often like that, that there are vintage ports. There are vintage bubblies, just not often. Cool. So cool. Let's talk a little bit more about the show now that we know what we're drinking with it and what we're sipping with it. And my first question for you guys, what was your favorite challenge of these six episodes? Mike, what was your favorite challenge of these? My favorite challenge of these is do something that looks amazing when run backwards. Yeah, that was actually fun. That was actually that fun. Yeah. So again, where it goes to the creativity, say, just do something that's going to look cool backwards. And then it's like five short films. And they're funny, they're engaging and whatever. And I'm going to spoil it for people who haven't seen it. But Ramesh does one where it's tree wizard. Apparently, he still is walking around on the street and people come up to him and shout, tree wizard. Tree wizard. Curiously, it's so perfect. Curiously enough, Royston's hers was so art housey and it's been. Wasn't that so good? Yeah, it's been pilfered a few times. Like, you know, when I was watching it, because I've watched this is my second time watching this. I was like, yeah, and they have to steal that, put it in something soon. So, yeah. Well, you know, water in black and white, you can't go wrong. It's just it's so beautiful to see. Yeah. And then and then but also the failures, you know, you Frank who, you know, up to this point, you know, like Frank is the elder statesman of British comedy on this show. And his thing is he's going to do a push up and a push up backwards. Doesn't look any cooler. Yeah, it looks like a push up. Right. Well, and it's funny because he says at the very end, like once everyone else's place, he's like. OK, so filmmaking is apparently for younger men, younger generation. And I was like, apparently, I'm like, wow, guy, yeah, that was. So, so like once I once I saw that, I was like, man, I'm hooked. Yeah, yeah. All right, Kevin, how about you? I'm going to go I'm going to go with moving the fake boulder for entertainment value because it was just such a dumb challenge. And then some people made it dumber. I I just. I loved watching people do nothing and think they were going to succeed. But for wow, this was really brilliant to even come up with this. The GPS art on the soccer field, a football field, I'm sorry. gave them a GPS thing and they were just following them. had to walk around a football field and create art. I think the one was like flowers. It was very much, yeah. Yeah. So that one is like, whoever thought of that's a genius, but just for the idiocy of moving a big fake boulder is probably the one that sticks out to me. Dallas. like Frank Skifford on like the train going like, you know, several, several kilometers away. Yeah. It's the same for me. It's the reverse. film. know see it's the same for me also but you know second backup what's your backup cuz I'm gonna pick a backup to back up for probably going to be the egg. Egg golf. The dropping the egg or the golfing the egg. The dropping. Yeah cuz it's it's it's such a simple conceit it's such a simple thing but it's also nearly impossible because the egg is going to shatter the moment it meets with any significant force or, you know, so it's so I was surprised. Sorry, go ahead, Kevin. Yeah. Well, the task is get the egg as high as you can. So it there is technically no dropping of the egg. It's just four of the five people decided to drop it. You know how I'm going to do this. I'm gonna drop it, even though it says if the egg breaks, you're out. And four of the five people are like, I'm gonna throw this against the wall. And you're just like, what are you doing? Yeah, go ahead. I was just say, like two of them tried to just stack it on things and not actually have it. And everyone tried to catch it in certain ways. And actually I was surprised that Frank's idea of wrapping it in paper and catching it didn't work. It would have worked had he caught it, embraced it rather than, you know, just dropping it. Yeah. Right. Right. Right. Right. Yeah. No one on this show, can I just say people throwing things up in the air, because this was not the only challenge they had to do something like that and throwing anything and catching it was absolutely impossible for all of them. And I was like, people. These are not your best physical specimen. Hand-eye coordination is probably not high in These are comedians. Play catch with your dog. Do something. See Like every once in a while. anyway, sorry, go ahead, Mike. Well, I was just going to say, so Josh Whitcomb threw it up and he missed it and it hit the ground. And when they said, yeah, everybody knows eggs are designed that when they hit grass, they just don't break. And so then Josh picked it up and threw it up again. And you're like, Why are you throwing it a second time? what's crazy is, apparently that's true. Yeah. Apparently it's quite true. It's educational. Exactly. They're designed not to break when they hit grass. Right. Now, I don't know that, but I do know this. The reason they're thick on the bottom and thin on top is if they roll out of the nest, they will turn and stop. So they will keep rolling away from Papa Ducks. mama duck or mommy chow is good. But I didn't know the grass thing until I watched TASP. I see you have poultry preference there, Kevin. You said duck first. You called me a Florida man. We got a lot of Muskogee ducks. We don't have a lot of chickens around the neighborhood. What about you, Dave? Yeah, I think it's weird. I think for me. There are number of the challenges like golfing with the eggs, which I did highly, highly appreciate. Other other tasks that I was I should have been more entertained by. But the one that stuck in my head, the one that is my second favorite for no reason. I'm having a hard time putting it into words. But in my head, when I think of the show now, having watched all of series one, the fucking ice cube challenge. the giant ice cube. like, I love that ice. And you have to make it disappear, make it disappear somehow. However you do it. And everyone had a different take on it. But I think I felt like they were pretty exhaustive in all the possibilities of making that happen. And I was I think I was puzzling along with them the most on that one where The things that didn't work, I was just as surprised didn't work. The things that didn't work, I was like, I was actually kind of surprised it worked. Like I was with Frank about the oven not working very That was wild that it didn't get rid of the cube. I thought that was a disaster waiting to It's surface level heat, right? So it's like, it's not penetrating deep enough to do it fast. It will take time. It's cooking the outside and that's it. So yeah, I think that Ice How would you guys have actually done the Ice Cube Challenge? What would you have done? When Dave said, I think about what I would have done, I went right to the ice challenge. I would have grabbed it and crushed it. And I was so mad at everybody for not doing it. then, how do you say his name? Romesh. Romesh. Romesh. He crushes it. And I'm like, yes, do it. Boom. And he was like 30 minutes slower than everybody else. like, I think I would have died on this challenge. Because it's not like the ice disappeared. It's just now you have more of it. There are many small pieces of Right. If he had crushed it in like a container or a tub or something, like if he had brought it over there and kept it all in there, then done like what Royce did with like the hot shower water or something, as a crushed up version, that would have gone so much faster. But yeah, he just sort of crushes it on the lawn and it goes everywhere. And you're like, yeah, that's going to take time now, man. That's not gonna work very well. I'm thinking, you know Fort Lauderdale. It's a hundred and three degrees on a cool day and they're doing it England where it's you know, like Probably not thirty thirty nine degrees. So the the elements aren't helping you there I'm gonna I know that I wasn't with you guys on the backwards which was cool The one I loved just as a photograph of British people was the one where they had to high five someone who was 55 years old. the embarrassment of a British person. interrupt. Yes. it was great just to see. know, Americans, we would have run around and be like, you're 55, you're 50. Grabbing people, saving was my first, yes. That was my first instinct. I'm like, you just go around like a circus parker. right or 55 55 55 55 who's 55 who's and everyone would be like what's going on what's going on and then everyone would become engaged and then someone would say they're 55 just to find out what the fuck is going on and that would have worked but you would make them do the work you don't do the work walk up to a straight professional you could ask them to do these are professional this is thing you could ask them to do it's Not in not in Britain in Britain your whole job is the audience comes to you and you dignifiedly dignifiedly wait for them to all take their seats and then address them and you know the idea of going to a mall and trying to talk to someone who hasn't talked to you first right yeah, and that's the genius of Alex Horn and his writing staff is they picked a number they know that that is just old enough that it's embarrassing to walk up to say, are you 55? It wasn't, find a 32 year old where everybody, any 33 an 83 year old. Yeah, they've been old a while. Right. I'm proud to still be alive at 83. 55 is like, do I look 55? Exactly. no, I remember Frank. He was like, yeah, so I'm not going to ask any women this like that. That's just right out. Yeah. Like it will only be men. And then in 55 is also that nebulous. It's a nebulous age. So it is really fucking hard to look at someone and be like, you could be anywhere between 40 and 60, man. I don't. I just like you're either aging well or poorly. Shit. You know, I don't know what it is. So or right on the. I don't know. And then if you said like. Conjure up an image of a 55 year old in your head. None of us have that. I don't. I don't know what that looks like. So yeah, it was brilliant. it looks like Kevin after he finishes his black and white. I was going to say it looks like me right now and I'm 34. All right. So contestant that we we cheered for the most. Who did we want? Who did we like the best? Who did we want to win? Whether each individual challenge or the as we found out at the very end of series one, there was a ultimate winner that won the most points overall at the very end of the series. Who were we rooting for, Mike? Who was your favorite? was rooting for Ramesh the whole time. One of the things that happens later in other series that you will see, it expands to like 10 episodes because it got popular. So of course, they expanded it to like a full season, which over there is 10 episodes. Is that a lot of times it seems like it's arranged so that every contestant will win at least one episode. But this, because it's six episodes, because they hadn't figured it out yet, it didn't happen. So Romesh might be the only contestant in like Taskmaster history of 19 seasons that never won an episode. And I felt so bad because he was doing so well. It's just he never could quite get over it. There were a number of tie breaks and he just couldn't get there. And, you know, like he brought in the best prize test. Like he was supposed to bring in the most important thing. car sucked. Yeah, but he brought in his wedding ring. If I lose this on a TV show, I'm not going home. Yeah. But you know that was somehow okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, she saw how much he was making from Taskmaster and decided, okay, There you go. Yeah. I will say his highs were the highest too, right? Like that tree wizard. when he was on, even though he didn't win the episode, like, his highs were just like, damn, that was one of the, and even his ideas, like Kevin said. is like, yes, smash the fucking ice cube. Yeah, yes, this is it. This is great. And then it doesn't work. But you're like, you're with him a lot. Right. All of my favorite moment for him was just being angry that there wasn't a box when there obviously was a box. Just him just bearing down on the fact that there wasn't a box for me, mate. Like, of course, there was a fucking box, Watching British people get angry. I got lucky. My two were Frank and Josh and Josh ended up winning. And Frank, think, was right there with him at the end. It was close. But I thought the probably youngest and the oldest were the two most charming to me. just enjoyed their whole vibe as well as their comedy. Right. think for me, Roy Shin. her character is she's such an underdog because she she gives off that I'm just showing up because I'm kind of friends with everybody who does this. In reality, she's a very funny woman. You know her work as an actor and writer and particularly on the show eight out of 10 cats count countdown, which is there's a lot of like math and sort of stuff that happens in the show. And it really does illustrate how sort of average most of these celebrities are. It never fails. She ends up just being the comedic nucleus of every show she's in because of that character and because of that, even in this series, it's her. It's always going to be Royce and she's just like, yeah, she's walking through it going. I don't care about how she will not be rushed. No, she won't. And then she and then she's also she's the one where it's like physical labor and she's like, hmm. Yeah, let me let me think about this. Yeah, it's got to be another way. You know, wait, you me to get on the horse? Right. Well, I like with the water in the bathtub. She did that thing with like one hand gently just like splish splish and then she's like, OK, well, that won't work. Not like that. And she said, she thought I that in common too, because I'm very much, I'm a version of that in a lot of things. It's like, well, I'm going to do this the way I want to do it. So stand over there and be quiet. See, Mike, Mike, my competitive juices would come out. I would been Tim Keen jumping in that. Just, you know, in, I'm in it, you know? Right. And I will. I'm not going to pick Tim, but I will give a shout out to Tim just as like I think he'd be my second my runner up just because he is he was so impish. But he he did it in a way that I think it really did balance out what everyone does on the show. And I was always really curious to see if what he would do worked like whether it would win because half the time it did and then half the time it absolutely did not. But it was always really fucking clever. So I give him tons of credit for that. But for me, it was Frank. I just I loved. his old gentlemanly British ways and just like, but he was willing to get physical. But of course he was an elderly guy. So he's like, he's 50. But I'm I'm 56 elderly. All right. You're still you can't do so. It's not 55. He did. You take that back. You're doing that. Our segment of our audience right now. You have any old 50 year old watching us. Calm down. Retract that. joke. When I'm when I'm 55, I'm going to be like damn straight. That's that's going to work. Because again, like, yeah, but nobody is going to come up to you in a mall and ask you if you're not. No, no. If I as good as Frank in, you know, five years because I hit 50 in December. I mean, he's an elegant, attractive man who's older than the rest. Yeah. Right. Yeah. For his video. I'm like, you can do the push up. But he's also like, right. but I'm not going to be like doing the worm on the ground, right? I'm not throwing myself into something like that. Those days are past. Thank you. But I liked that he also worked. It worked so often. And yeah, poor Josh. No one likes a winner, Josh, apparently. No, he's one of my two. He's one of my two. I like Josh. Beautiful. All right. Last question for everybody. So we know who your favorite person is, what your favorite challenge was. Is there a favorite overall episode between these six for each of us? I'm going to the first episode, they do a really good job of just kind of easing you into it and not easing you into it, just dropping you into the world because the rules aren't that difficult. Yeah, the relationships aren't that difficult. There's nothing difficult to understand or get about the show. They really just sort of drop you into it and it's smooth sailing from there. So yeah. I'm going to go the opposite. I'm to go the last episode because it's sort of like at this point, you're familiar with the the characters on the show. You're familiar with the people on the show. You're familiar with the concept of the show. You know how far they're going to take it. There's some tension about who's going to win because the points are relatively close and you're wondering why you care about the points at all. And then when it finally comes and they reveal the winner and they pull out the trophy, it is completely obvious. then they had completely forgotten that they needed a trophy and just ran out and bought like a kickboxing trophy. And like, here we go. Yeah, know, I'm going with Mike on that. Yeah. Last I'm not even going to do a backup one like, yeah, last episode. I loved the last supper thing. I did love that challenge, too. Yeah, it fulfilled. I'm a big baking and cooking show person when it comes to these types of competitive shows. So I was like, great. I get Taskmaster and a cooking show in one go. I'm like, this is this is fulfilling me on every level. And what is your ingredient for X? It's certainly a xylophone now. I was against it. And then I saw the ambiance it added. was like, yeah, xylophone worked. Actually, I don't know what they call them in Britain, but in America, X large eggs. yeah, good one. We do it with the X. did extra large. I think somebody did extra large. They did. But I wouldn't have come up on it. I would not have come up. I'm like extra. You can even do XX large. Like I'm like they have now they have those size eggs. It's like, come on guys. This is easy. Just those duck eggs. Isn't xantham gum like an ingredient in something? It's a stabilizer. I think one of them did that. And yeah. yeah. But you can only buy, think xantham gum is one of those ingredients that like if you're a restaurant or a production facility, like from a corporate, like from one corporation to another, you can buy it from business to business. Okay. That's Alex. individual can't buy xantham Yeah, I'm pretty sure it the ingredients in Breaking Bad. not mine. That's true. And hey, they're incorporated as a TV show. They should be able to buy it. I'm going to veer. I was going to go with the finale because it took a while to really see what the cast was. when Josh brought an open signed check and knew that he could lose 20,000 pounds. There was a lot of pain and angst and that was my favorite episode. Because Frank had a ring that he thought was worth 600 pounds that was worth almost 4,000 pounds. He had a check for, you know, he wrote 19,000 pounds at the end. I'm guessing Frank didn't take that much out of him. But there seemed to be some money on the table. Now I know Rocha brought a 12 pound. Fake ring which was funny, but was that and that was the one with the crappy car. So yeah, it's crappy It's still a car. You're there. So there was kind of like tension for that episode So I'm go with the one with the really expensive stuff. Nice. Yeah Okay, I'm gonna make one pitch. That's gonna wrap up our pitch here guys since you are all now fans of not to say that you weren't before of British sort of parlor games. I'm going to go ahead and put a little note here in our collective minds and say, we're going to circle back around here for would I lie to you, which is another. It is a another parlor game. It is by far the most fun you're probably going to have, particularly with two of the guests. So that'll look for that in the next six months or so. We'll come back, but anyone listening, make sure you this. I will be here October 25th, 2025 to talk about it. Dallas, so Dallas doesn't know this, we Dallas, Kevin, this is the day last year that Kevin was last on our show. Shut up. It came up on my Facebook memories today. That's crazy. It's wild, right? that's fantastic. So yeah, so now it's every year we have a standing. Regardless of whatever else we do, this is a standing engagement. I love it. I love it. Beautiful. So would I lie to you one year from now? this has been our discussion on Taskmaster. Once again, we are drinking what is a what do call yours, Mike? I call it a suicide float, what you called it a? Dentist lament. Dentist lament with a cherry on bottom. Amputation with a cherry on bottom. With Dallas, it is a tawny port. Well aged, do a 20 year. Do a 20 year with Kevin. It is a black and tan. And with me, it is a sparkling British bubbly. And Mike, where can people find you online if they'd like to follow you? I am at MiskatonicHighComic.com, or you can find me usually on Kickstarter every two months. Beautiful. And Kevin. He's the hare. He's the hare. The tortoise is not on Kickstarter quite as often. BlueSky, Instagram, Twitter, at KevinJosephCMX. You can find me and all of them under the same one. And I would love to talk comics or some British comedy at any time. Is there a Miskatonic drink? By the way, Mike, Kevin? There is not. So again, a year from now, we're going to have to figure that out. Miskatonic. All right. Links to everything will be down below in the description of this episode. Thanks for listening, guys. We will be back in one week with another one in entertainment pairing for your entertainment. Ciao for now. Take care. Later, guys. you