<\/p>\n
The round was \u201cIf the answer is 700 billion, what\u2019s the question?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat do our ratings have to reach before someone at the BBC admits they made a mistake?\u201d suggested comedian Ed Byrne<\/a>. He swiftly followed this with a dig at the show\u2019s new home: \u201cHow far down the channel menu is TLC?\u201d<\/p>\n Welcome back, Mock the Week<\/em>, a programme that\u2019s perfectly happy to mock itself.<\/p>\n Having been canned by BBC Two in 2022 after a whopping 17 years on air, the topical panel game has been unexpectedly rescued from the broadcasting wheelie bin by obscure cable channel TLC \u2013 previously home to reality trash but now free-to-air and focusing on entertainment. The show was looking distinctly dog-eared by the time it was axed. A four-year break and a few format tweaks have given it a new lease of life.<\/p>\n It helped that there was plenty of juicy news for the panellists to sink their satirical teeth into. Cue gags about everyone from Donald Trump to David Walliams, from Andy Burnham to Brooklyn Beckham, from Nigella Lawson to Jeffrey Epstein.<\/p>\n Original host Dara \u00d3 Briain \u2013 looking exactly the same, he joked, thanks to cosmetic surgery in Turkey \u2013 will be joined during the nine-part series by a revolving cast of comedians, with Rhys James as a regular panellist. They were joined by Byrne, Angela Barnes, Sara Pascoe, Ahir Shah<\/a> and original stalwart Russell Howard<\/a>, returning after more than a decade away.<\/p>\n \u201cThe last time I did this, Andrew was a prince and Phillip Schofield was married,\u201d he noted. As Pascoe added, \u201cI just feel bad for the viewers. When they bought back Gladiators<\/em>, they had fit, young, sexy, new ones. They didn\u2019t just bring out the old ones again.\u201d<\/p>\n The set was the same. So was the theme tune, News of the World<\/em> by The Jam, now accompanied by a godawful CGI title sequence. Many of the old rounds remained, with the addition of \u201cAudience Question Time\u201d, in which punters posed questions to the panel. Guests were happy to bite the hand that feeds, with regular pops at TLC, including a reference to one of its previous flagship properties: MILF Manor<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n Barnes said of Trump\u2019s Board of Peace, which numbers Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orb\u00e1n among its members: \u201cIt\u2019s like having Huw Edwards and Prince Andrew on your PTA.\u201d Some pundits hoped the show would be liberated by its new home and able to be more risqu\u00e9. \u201cFreed from the leftie shackles of the BBC,\u201d as Byrne put it. Potshots were aimed at both ends of the political spectrum. If anything, Keir Starmer got a rougher ride than Nigel Farage.<\/p>\n