NIGEL FARAGE GETS HIS LIFE BACK, BBC2, 10pm
WE KEEP hearing that satire is dead. People like Trump, Boris and Farage are just so absurd that a satirist can hardly make fun of them.
Reality has done the job before the writer can even lift their pen.
I agree with this, but I also blame our antiseptic culture of trigger warnings and political correctness.
Perhaps satirists, or their bosses, are wary of causing offence and so some necessary brutality is held back. That’s why we have Newzoids instead of Spitting Image.
Gamely, the BBC is attempting a satirical comedy about Nigel Farage here, with the Ukip leader played by Kevin Bishop.
There may not be a physical resemblance between the actor and the cigar-smoking charlatan, but Bishop captures him nonetheless through mannerisms and voice.
It’s a mock fly-on-the-wall documentary following Farage after the Brexit vote, when all the angry purpose has suddenly gone from his life and there’s nothing to do but go to the pub or grow a moustache.
OPERATION GOLD RUSH WITH DAN SNOW, BBC2, 9pm
DAN Snow is all over the TV again. Maybe it’s because the festive season is approaching, and the BBC is trying subliminally to get us all in the mood. Snow, everyone! That’s all very well for civilians, but for us TV critics, Christmas TV normally means repeats and ‘specials’.
But there will be time for grumbling about that later…
In this new series, Snow fights his way through a lot of the white stuff in the Canadian Arctic region to recreate the deadly conditions of the Klondike Gold Rush.
In the 19th century, 100,000 people who were brave and enterprising
– or perhaps just plain foolish – set off for the icy wilderness of Canada to try to strike gold.
Over three episodes, Snow and a group of polar explorers relive the hellish and dangerous conditions of the frozen
600-mile journey.
Their predecessors were motivated by gold, but the BBC team is spurred on by the commissioning of a three-part series.
There must be easier ways to pay the rent.
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