The Best 124 Moments In Taskmaster History (As A Way Of Escaping The Despair of 2020) [100–81]
So here we go, Part 2 of this countdown of the Best Moments in Taskmaster history as a way of distracting myself from the yawning chasm of joy that was 2020. So far we’ve had Tim Vine going fly-fishing with a chocolate egg, Katherine Parkinson gently letting a shoe land in a bath, and Iain Stirling having a proper meltdown. What will the next twenty instalments bring? The possibilities are ENDLESS! (Spoiler: Iain Stirling will have another meltdown.)
ENOUGH CHAT MORE ACTION LET’S GO GO GO
100: Joe Thomas Gently Guides A Beach Ball With Two Teapots (Series 8, Ep 8)
Task: Get the beach ball across the finishing line. Only water can touch the beach ball.
What happened: While every other contestant requested (and received) a hose to move the beach ball, Joe Thomas went fully Amish and seemed to forget that he was in the 21st century and pressurised water exists. Instead, he first tried to move his beach ball with a large bucket of water which he had to keep refilling, like something out of Little House on the Prairie. When this proved too blunt an instrument to manipulate the ball, he got out two dainty teapots and tried to carefully move it through the obstacle course (with zero success).
Why is it so good: Joe Thomas is a strange, unique Taskmaster beast — he’s actually quite resourceful and intelligent, he just seems crippled by his own sense of inadequacy, embarrassed by everything he does. This was one of the few times in the series that that embarrassment was somewhat justified — Joe suffered a brainfart of epic proportions, and yet one has to admire the way he quietly carried on, undeterred, even as his little heart was breaking, pouring water from those teapots as if that was ever going to work. Eventually he worked out that using ice to move the ball was actually quite effective, but by that time he had already sealed his teapot-shaped fate.
Position in task: Last, even behind Paul Sinha.
Watch out for: Joe initially thinking that the “finish line” for this task was the very first obstacle, meaning that as the ball bashed into the wall he triumphantly threw his bucket up in the air (which he immediately apologised for, as it was “a bit over the top”).
99: Iain Stirling Is A Little Bossy Boots (Series 8, Ep 4)
Task: Get the most weight into this hammock. If anything falls out of the hammock, you will be disqualified. (Team Task)
What happened: Iain Stirling and Lou Sanders have a disagreement about the correct strategy for the task (Iain wants to put a bath underneath the hammock, Lou wants to think about it logically for more than thirty seconds), and Iain gets extremely passive aggressive. When Lou asks how a bath will help stop falling out of a hammock, he replies “I’m QUIETLY CONFIDENT, ACTUALLY”; when they start moving heavy things towards the hammock, Iain scowls at the camera and hisses “I suggested doing all of this, SEVEN MINUTES AGO.” It’s Genuinely Awkward.
Why is it so good: well… it depends what you mean by “good”. Usually with team tasks there’s a little bit of tension simmering underneath the surface (Joe Wilkinson watching Katherine Ryan trying to build stuff out of flatpack furniture and just saying “it’s shit, it’s shit” is up there), but here it’s a proper spat, like something out of I’m A Celebrity or Hell’s Kitchen or one of those documentaries about the Labour Party. Alex makes a joke out of it — “Isn’t it nice when people just get along?” — but it’s not an easy watch, with Iain’s needling grumpiness coming across as actually spiteful instead of comically curmudgeonly. Back in the studio, Iain is horrified — “That… that wasn’t pleasant for me to watch.” The closest the show has ever got to feeling like An Intervention.
Position in task: Disqualified (not for bossiness, but because Lou Sanders dropped a book)
Watch out for: Paul Sinha not getting involved in the children’s spat and instead minding his own business by rolling a barrel across the garden. Classic hands-off Dad.
98: Siân Gibson Travels “Around The World” With Romesh Ranganathan And A Beach Ball (Series 8, Ep 5)
Task: Play a game of long distance catch with this beach ball. One team member must throw the ball offscreen to another team member who catches it in a different place, and so on over the longest apparent distance. (Team Task)
What happened: While Team “Arguing Kids and Dad” (Sanders, Stirling and Sinha) played a conventional game, using footage of them outdoors where it was obvious they were in their stated location (New York, Soho, Edinburgh, etc), one member of Team “Hyperactive Child and Sad Management Consultant” (Gibson and Thomas) was sneakier — Siân sent in several videos of her catching the ball in front of suspiciously similar backdrops, next to Romesh Ranganathan, who would say things like “it’s so great to be here with you in Johannesburg, Siân” and “Well done for catching that here, in Malaysia”.
Why is it so good: As cons go, it’s just so fantastically brazen— the total lack of effort by Romesh or Siân to pretend they’re anywhere other than backstage at a TV studio in London is only topped by Romesh’s deadpan delivery of the lie: “Here we are in New Zealand”. The conceit is wonderfully flimsy — what are we, the audience, expected to think here? That Siân and Romesh go on secret breaks together to different continents around the world, but crucially always stay in the same hotel chain, with the exact same corridor, wearing the exact same clothes? Siân tries to keep up the pretense — “Romesh does a LOT of travel shows [in fairness, absolutely true], and I just popped along for a bit” — but it falls down immediately. Another example of Surprisingly Sneaky Siân.
Position in task: Last, beaten by Paul Sinha on his own.
Watch out for: Sian throwing the ball back from “Malaysia” and clearly hitting the camera man in the head with the ball. Also — did Joe Thomas actually go to Tokyo for this one challenge, only to be undone by Siân’s sneakiness? Poor guy.
97: Paul Sinha Tries To Find His Mobility Scooter Blindfolded (Series 8, Ep 10)
Task: Follow the instructions on the signs through the course and park the buggy at the end. You must wear the blindfold. You have 10 minutes to prepare your journey.
What happened: In arguably one of the most dangerous (and wildest) tasks ever, the contestants had to drive a buggy around a carpark and complete various challenges while blindfolded. Paul Sinha, for some reason, repeatedly leaves his buggy and spends the majority of the task trying to find it again, culminating in a moment where he mounts the scooter backwards, like a cowboy on a bucking bronco.
Why is it so good: There is a joyful pathos to almost everything that Paul Sinha does in this show — perhaps after years of having to appear stern on The Chase, Taskmaster became an outlet for his inner befuddled grandpa. This task is peak Sinha — he immediately gets off his buggy to search for the bells, without thinking that he’s, you know, blindfolded, so has absolutely no way of knowing where the buggy is now. Tottering around in the dark in his dressing gown, searching desperately for the bells — it had the energy of Scrooge in Act I of A Christmas Carol, if Dickens had decided to put the Ghost of Christmas Past on a mobility scooter. By some miracle Paul finds the buggy again, drives it a few metres and then gets off it again! Why? WHY? This is basic stuff, Paul — after you’ve been rescued once, don’t jump back into the sea. Surely this has come up on The Chase. He finds the buggy again (mounting it backwards) and then drives into a camera-man, before giving up with a grumpy “I was nearly there”.
Position in task: It says a LOT about Lou Sanders that Paul didn’t come last here. Worrying.
Watch out for: Paul testing out the buggy and reversing into a camera before he had put a blindfold on. Along with Alex’s panicked “stop stop stop STOP STOP”, as if he knew he was going to have to have a long conversation with the insurance people.
96: Phil Wang Finds A LIIIIIIIIME (Series 7, Ep 9)
Task: Find the sock containing a satsuma. You may not look inside any sock. You can squeeze 5, strike 10, sniff 20, put your hand inside 3 and your foot inside 11.
What happened: Phil approached this task with a look of intense concentration — he methodically struck, squeezed and sniffed various socks before carefully putting the prime satsuma sock suspects on his feet. After a few careful minutes of analytical toe fondling, he was sure he’d found the satsuma — but when he looked in the sock to check, he found a LIME. Livid, Phil threw the lime into the sky with a guttural yell: “A LIIIIIME!”
Why is it so good: Finding a lime in a sock when you needed a satsuma (surely a rejected Alanis Morissette lyric) has never been so painful. It’s the intensity of the lime yell, the anguish in the eyes as he discovers the offending citrus fruit and catapults it as far away as he can in disgust. As Greg says, no-one has ever been so passionate about tossing a lime into the air — it had the energy of a cliffhanger on Eastenders (or Cul de Sac), where one of the character discovers the man they’re seeing has been having an affair with someone who works at a Lilt factory. Intense, limey brilliance.
Position in task: Disqualified. Or eLIMEinated, if you’ll let me (please don’t).
Watch out for: Phil’s desperate line “the foot is just the hand of the leg”, a precursor to Katherine Parkinson’s “it’s a shame my hands aren’t my feet” in Series 10.
95: Siân Gibson sends a naked selfie of Alex to Greg (Series 8, Ep 3)
Task: Do the worst thing, then make the best apology to Alex for it.
What happened: Siân Gibson presented Alex with a plate of refreshers and a Tunnock teacake that spelt out the word “SOZ”, which is a fine apology. But it probably wasn’t enough to make up for what Siân had done — sent a photoshopped picture of a naked Alex Horne, from Alex’s phone, to Greg. Alex looked genuinely horrified.
Why is it so good: The more of these I write the more I’m starting to realise that Siân, behind that sweet innocent exterior, was properly evil (in the best possible way). The way she collapses into a fit of sadistic giggles as Alex realises what’s happened is pure art, especially as you can see the look of panic in Alex’s eyes, as he realises he’s going to have to explain to his professional colleague why he’s just sent a naked photo of himself with the caption “come to Momma” and several explicit emojis. It was a task with a certain amount of risk for Alex, and this was the closest that anyone came to doing something so awful that it might make him cry. And surely that’s always the aim with this show.
Position in task: Third, which is frankly ridiculous.
Watch out for: The way that Greg reveals that Alex’s wife knew that this was a photoshopped job — because in her words, the man in that picture had a big penis and small testicles, where Alex is (and I quote) “quite the reverse”.
94: Paul Sinha Fails To Hide Himself In A Phonebox (Series 8, Ep 6)
Task: Conceal yourself inside this phone box. No part of you or your clothing may be seen from outside.
What happened: Every other contestant had a good go at this task, but Paul seemed to suffer a minor breakdown — first trying to sellotape very thin paper to the outside of the phonebox, then deciding that he could instead obscure himself by getting crew members to stand around the phonebox with some sofa cushions while he squatted. Turns out that is not the cloak of invisibility you might think it is.
Why is it so good: Like Lolly on the slide, the edit does a great job of setting up your expectations (“it’s Paul, he hasn’t thought this through, this is going to be terrible”) and then, as the camera pans round searching for him, it makes you think that maybe, just maybe…he’s nailed it? Maybe somehow, Paul has managed to make himself entirely vanish in that phonebox using only seat cushions and some crew members? And then, as the camera cuts to a close up shot, it pulls it back with the punchline — bam, Paul’s confused little face, baffled that he’s not completely invisible right now. It’s Paul’s face at the end of the task that makes this, squatting there in the phone box, as the camera looms over him, looking like a cross between a papped celebrity during a sex scandal and a toddler caught down a well. As Greg says, “What a lovely, lonely little boy.”
Position in task: Last, always last, wonderfully last.
Watch out for: The way that Paul’s first attempt — covering the phonebox with newspaper — is ruined by the high wind… and Alex’s observation that he could have just taped the newspaper inside the phonebox.
93: Iain Stirling Makes A Very Very Bad Volcano (Series 8, Ep 3)
Task: Build the best volcano.
What happened: Iain began with a whirlwind of activity, constructing his volcano with a kind of delirious, determined fury. Soil? He had a wheelbarrow full of it. Pebbles? By the bucketload. Bottles of Coke and Mentos? He seemed to have bought out an entire newsagents. He even used a drill to create a mechanism to lower the Mentos down into the Coke. He arranged a series of victims right in the path of the predicted lava flow, dropped the mechanism and waited. And waited. And waited. Until a sad few dozen brown bubbles popped out of the top of the vase and fizzled back down. The Coke had gone flat. The dream had died.
Why is it so good: as Greg says, it’s like a Shakespearean tragedy. A tale as old as time — a man dares to pay God by attempting to simulate His creation, and is instead brought low. The vainglorious pride as he declared to the world that this would “go up like Christmas”. The way he arranged the former Champions upon his mountain (he actually found little action figurines that looked like Widdicombe, Ryan, Beckett, Fielding and Mortimer) and proudly announced that he would be joining them soon. The impotent little cry of “NO!” as he realised his invention had turned against him. The pain and anguish of Iain back in the studio as he whispers “I…genuinely don’t want to talk about it.” This is what Taskmaster does to the proud, the cocky. It crushes them.
Position in task: Last, alongside Sian Gibson, who just used a bunch of orange twizzlers for fire.
Watch out for: Iain coming up with new volcano terminology — “vol = the liquid bit” and “cano” = “the solid bit”. Iain did GREAT on the cano. Not so much on the vol.
92: Paul Sinha Has A Horrible Time Moving Rice (Series 8, Ep 2)
Task: Transfer as much rice as possible into the bottle in the living room. You may only use the contents of the shopping basket, and the bottle must not leave the living room.
What happened: Paul Sinha, objectively the smartest man to ever go on Taskmaster, fails to understand the words of the task and, in a task where he cannot touch the rice with anything except what’s in the shopping trolley, and where he cannot move the bottle from the living room, picks the rice up with his hands and places it in the bottle (which he has moved from the living room).
Why is it so good: We’ve had disqualifications for misreading or missing a crucial aspect of the task (Lolly reading “without moving the fishbowl” on the task and then immediately moving the fishbowl springs to mind), but this is in a league of its own — Paul immediately picks up the rice (disqualification) and starts carefully placing it inside a balloon (??) which he then blows up (??) and then gets surprised when all of the rice flies out. Then he smashes a mango and looks at it disappointedly (“It wasn’t as hollow as I was expecting it to be”, as if mangoes are famously empty), before shovelling more rice (with his hands, disqualification again) into the mango, taking it into the living room, moving the bottle into the living room (TRIPLE disqualification) and sighing to himself happily. “Didn’t do too badly this time!” Oh, Paul. If only Bradley Walsh and the rest of the Chase team could see you now. As Greg says, it’s a very rare treat on a television programme to see someone lose their job on a different television programme.
Position in task: Disqualified (about five times).
Watch out for: Paul’s head in his hands before the VT starts as Alex goes through the rules of the task. He knows what’s coming. He can’t stop it.
91: Aisling Bea creates a sexy cuddle bot (Season 5, Ep 1)
Task: Give Alex a special cuddle.
What happened: Immediately disgusted with the task (“oh no. Oh Alex. Oh, Jesus, this is awful”), Aisling then gets Alex to close his eyes, lights several candles, puts on a few bubble machines, and then comes out as the “Sexy Cuddle Bot 5000” — a robot made out of a cardboard box, several reams of ventilation hose, a sanding mask and a whole motherboard of smut.
Why is it so good: It’s the way Aisling immediately assumes “special cuddle” means sex — and then leans into it as hard as it’s possible to lean into it without involving Ofcom. Her sexy song (“I’m going to make you so relaxed”) is only slightly ruined by her sudden observation that she’s made a surprisingly flammable costume (“Ideally that candle would be blown out”). And anything that features Aisling Bea bonking Alex’s head with an arm made out of ventilation tube as she asks “Do you want more, big boy” has to make it into the Top 100 moments.
Position in task: 3rd, but rated Best Buy in Which? magazine for Cuddle Bots 2017.
Watch out for: Alex’s face, a picture of pure horror and fear, as it always is any time a woman is vaguely sexy near him.
90: Katherine Parkinson Bags Herself (Series 10, Ep 5)
Task: Bag the heaviest thing from the furthest distance. Your attempt ends once you bag your first item.
What happened: While other competitors flung heavy things into the machine from a (relatively close) distance, Katherine knew exactly what she wanted to do from the get-go. “Is it be mad to suggest myself?” she asked, as if she hadn’t been thinking about jumping into that bagging machine as soon as the task started. From there there was only one logical way the task could go — Katherine sitting wearing a bike helmet and protective kneepads in a wheelbarrow, as Alex pushed her from the top of the driveway all the way to the bagging machine. Katherine clambered out of the wheelbarrow, into the net bag, onto a soft bed of cushions. Glorious.
Why is it so good: Apart from Katherine and Alex debating whether she’s heavier than the Taskmaster Cow (“Well, it’s hollow, and I’m not”), it’s the combination of a Great Idea (bagging yourself AND making sure you can claim it’s from a distance of 33 metres? Check.) and Gloriously Slow Execution. Katherine pulls herself into the bagging machine with such careful unhurriedness that she actually has time to have an out-of-body experience — about midway through her own bagging, as she’s inching forward in the net like a sack of sentient potatoes, she starts laughing uncontrollably. “I just suddenly had a moment of wondering what I was doing,” she says. So say we all, Katherine.
Position in task: First (with a stupidly high score of 47 million, because Alex’s scoring system for this task was out of whack)
Watch out for: Katherine telling Alex that she weighs 22 stone — the same as Greg Davies, despite being close to half his height. A Sian Gibson level of bullshitting that actually pays off.
89: Paul Chowdry Spreads His Clothes “Far” and “Wide” (Series 3, Ep 4)
Task: Spread your clothes as far and wide as possible in 30 minutes.
What happened: While others sprinted out of the Taskmaster house and paid ridiculous sums of money for their items of clothing to be dispersed around the greater west London area (cough Al Murray cough), Paul seemed to think that the task had to remain in the grounds of the Taskmaster house. One sock on a model plane, a shirt in the bush, trousers over the fence, and another sock daintily placed on a tree branch. Job done, with 28 minutes and 30 seconds to spare.
Why is it so good: Usually, comically bad attempts at a task get final billing on the Taskmaster VT, as it follows the natural rhythm of a joke: you see four “standard” attempts to ground your expectations, so the comically bad attempt is a subversion which acts as a kind of punchline. This time though, Paul’s comically bad attempt is shown first —and strangely it has the effect of making the joke last longer. As I’m watching the other competitors — Sara Pascoe sprinting around London and throwing a sock into the River Thames, Dave Gorman catching a bus, Rob Beckett throwing his trousers out the window of Alex’s car — in the back of my head all I can think is “They’re doing all this, and Paul Chowdry put a sock on a model plane.” Genius.
Position in task: Last. They had to zoom in four times on the map to work out the area Paul spread his clothes.
Watch out for: Paul trying to argue that he threw one item of clothing over a fence “with spin”, so there’s actually no way of knowing exactly how far it travelled. A brave tactic.
88: Lou Sanders Gets A Toddler To Hit A Duck With A Hammer (Series 8, Ep 4)
Task: Make the best thing to engage a toddler.
What happened: Lou Sanders is told to make a thing to engage a toddler, and so logically decides on a rubber duck filled with sweets, a large hammer and a song that goes “Hit the ducky, hit the ducky, hit the ducky on the head”. Grim, and yet strangely effective.
Why is it so good: I could spend days trying to figure out Lou’s thought process for this task and I’m still not sure I’d get it. It’s rare to see someone try so hard to make something kid friendly and end up inadvertently creating something so disturbing — a duck with a hole gauged out of its side, hanging by the neck, as a nightmarish song plays urging a child to beat it to death with a mallet. It’s like something out of a bad remake of The Wickerman. To Lou’s credit she does, at one point, wonder if hanging a duck by the neck is sinister (“Yes,” sighs Greg, like a teacher who is really sick of dealing with the child who is blatantly going to become a serial killer).
Position in task: Last (but with 3 points, so duck murder does pay).
Watch out for: Lou trying to compose her song and wondering aloud “What rhymes with ducky?” A beat. “Not that.”
87: Hugh Dennis Keeps A Basketball On A Treadmill For Four Months (Series 4, Ep 2)
Task: Keep a basketball on a running machine for as long as possible. You may not touch the basketball.
What happened: While other contestants tried to set up contraptions to keep their basketball on the running machine (Noel tried a series of carefully balanced sofa cushions which fell apart as soon as the machine was turned on), Hugh just grabbed a wash basin from the kitchen and held it over the basketball. It was so easy that he managed to sit down and start reading during the task (with a book that Alex got him from the house). Eventually, Hugh got Alex to bring over the power socket — with one hand still on the wash basin, he pulled the plug out of the running machine and walked off. A masterpiece. The ball stayed there for four months, before falling off at some point during Storm Doris.
Why is it so good: Hugh had been set up as the Elder Comically Incompetent Contestant (a kind of proto-Baddiel, if you will), but actually repeatedly managed to confound expectations — during the pommel horse challenge, he did some surprisingly good acrobatics, and in the “Score A Goal With A Plastic Bag” challenge he did a really great forward roll. This, though, was surely his most glorious moment — using nothing more than a simple wash basin, he made a mockery of physics, fitness and basketball (the natural enemies of comedians). I’m convinced that this task, combined with his stellar turn in Fleabag in 2016, began a renewed respect for him in comedy circles — a kind of Hugh Dennaissance. I’m not sorry.
Position in task: First, only beaten by the weather.
Watch out for: Hugh trying to read his book balanced on the wash basin, only for it to fall off after a few seconds. “It’s quite boring, isn’t it?” he says to Alex midway through — a ringing endorsement for the show.
86: Katherine Parkinson Makes A Really Good Marble Run (Series 10, Ep 7)
Task: Make the best and longest-lasting marble run. After releasing your marble, you may do nothing to alter its path. You have one official attempt.
What happened: Despite never having made (or heard of) a marble run, and despite once again not leaving the room even though she had free reign of the house and the garden, Katherine creates a brilliant marble run that puts experienced marble runners Cooper, Vegas and Herring to shame.
Why is it so good: Everyone loves a redemption arc, don’t they? When the task first starts, and Katherine is staring fearfully at the giant marble in front of her (as if it’s some kind of orb that will steal her soul), we were probably all right to fear the worst. And given that Johnny Vegas had exited the room yelling “I will build a marble run that will power this house for two minutes!”, it looked like Katherine didn’t stand a chance. But then, something remarkable happens: against all the odds, and without any formal training, Katherine starts to create a beautiful, brilliant marble run. It’s like Good Will Hunting except with marbles instead of maths and shit — Katherine manipulates wooden rulers, tabletops, chairs, experimenting with higher gradients, creating a SEE-SAW effect with a hollow column and a cushion… the result is the most fantastic marble run ever seen in Taskmaster — nay, television — history. OK, marble run purists may say that it was just a marble rolling back and forth on a wooden ruler, but they can go to Hell. Katherine, Queen of the Marble Runs.
Position in task: Where else? First.
Watch out for: Katherine at the very start of the task saying “we are cooking with gas!” and then immediately afterwards “no we’re not, that’s not going to work at all.” A very Katherine Parkinson sentence in an otherwise very atypical Katherine Parkinson task.
85: Rose Matafeo Has A Funeral For A Chickpea (Series 9, Ep 10)
Task: Do the most preposterous thing with this chickpea.
What happened: While others went for the romantic (Ed Gamble having sex with a smashed chickpea) and the orthodox (David Baddiel starting a chickpea cult), Rose Matafeo went in a dark and surprisingly moving direction — a beautiful short film for the funeral of Chick Pataki (2012–2019), where the chickpea is placed inside a matchbox coffin and painstakingly lowered into the ground by four very long pieces of string. Rose Matafeo, in floods of disturbingly realistic tears, pours salt and pepper over the grave, before covering it over. Rest in Pea, little guy.
Why is it so good: it’s the commitment to the bit — the three pallbearers for the tiny coffin, the way Rose sobs throughout the piece, the way Alex gently places a hand on her shoulder to comfort her, as if to say “there there, Chick Pataki is at peace now”. It’s brilliant acting — through just a few sniffles and tears, Rose hints at a long and torturous backstory for Chick Pataki. I found myself wanting to know more. She’s completely devastated, and yet she’s the only one at the funeral. Was she the only person in the world who cared for Chick Pataki? Was she the only one who truly understood them? Was Chick Pataki a friend? A lover? A part of a balanced lunch? Is seven years a long time for a chickpea to live? We will never know. As Greg says, the most preposterous thing is not that she’s having a funeral for a chickpea, but that she makes the audience grieve for it.
Position in task: An entirely deserved first place.
Watch out for: Just as Greg is grieving the chickpea, Ed revealing that after that scene he had dug the chickpea up and fucked it. Horrid, but we were all thinking it.
84: Al Murray Hires A Gong (Series 3, Ep 2)
Task: Surprise Alex when he emerges from the shed after an hour.
What happened: Alex emerges from the shed to find a semi-naked Al Murray, smashing an 8 foot gong and honking four airhorns at the same time with his feet.
Why is it so good: The Roman Abramovich of Taskmaster strikes again — literally. Greg is at pains to point out the audience at home that the show did not provide Al with that gong — it just so happens that Al lives in west London and knows how to source a gong with an hour’s notice, which is a really brilliant superpower. The look of childlike delight on Al’s face as he smashes the gong is beautiful — every time he hits it he looks back at Alex with an expression that says “can you believe it?! I hired a GONG!” Also as a sidenote: anyone who can control four airhorns with their feet deserves some kind of prize. If only Phil Wang had that kind of toe dexterity in the satsuma sock challenge.
Position in task: Second behind Rob Beckett’s grandma (more on that later)
Watch out for: Alex literally not being able to speak for the first twenty seconds after the gong smash, and then saying “it’s good, the dong and the gong.” Even when surprised you can always rely on Alex for a dick joke.
83: Ed Gamble Turns Alex Horne Into A Fountain (Series 9, Ep 4)
Task: Make the most striking water feature.
What happened: Both David Baddiel and Ed Gamble had the same idea — use Alex in their water feature — but only Ed had the wherewithal to turn Alex into the big bosomed mermaid figure we all knew he could be, using just a powerhose, two funnels, a sleeping bag and an upsetting amount of duct tape. The fountain experience culminates with Alex topless, freezing, with a laughably powerful jet of water protruding from one breast (and one breast alone), while singing that famous mermaid song, “ahh ahhh ahhh ahhhh”.
Why is it so good: I cannot stress just how powerful that jet of water is coming out of Alex’s right breast. If that were a real fountain in the centre of London, it would have taken a child’s eye out and been shut down within hours. Moreover, Ed is not afraid to be mean to Alex (a tactic which is guaranteed to earn points from the Taskmaster), and the way he ominously holds up the duct tape in front of the defenceless Alex (combined with his double denim) makes him look like an East End hardman from a Guy Ritchie film. “We have ways of making you sing, mate. Chick Pataki? Fetch the funnels.”
Position in task: First, almost certainly because it made Alex really uncomfortable.
Watch out for: The way Ed just walks off at the end while Alex flails about on his chair, covered in bubble wrap and duct tape. A cold blooded gangster.
82: Rhod Gilbert turns Alex Horne into a fountain (Series 7, Ep 8)
Task: Poke the most unexpected thing through the hole in the roof of the grotto.
What happened: While others went for the conventional (Phil Wang poked his yellow jumpsuit through the grotto, James Acaster his underpants, Kerry Godliman her bra), Rhod Gilbert used this task, as he used all tasks, as an opportunity to torment and psychologically scar Alex Horne. He got a ladder, made Alex stand on top of it, pulled his trousers down and fired water out of a bottle between his legs to create an upsettingly sexy arse fountain. Anything Ed Gamble can do…
Why is it so good: There are some tasks where the degradation of Alex is baked in — “do the worst thing to Alex” from Series 8, for example. This, a fairly bog standard task about an exciting thing coming out of a grotto, was definitely not one of them. In some ways, Rhod Gilbert is the MacGyver of Taskmaster — give him a seemingly mundane task and he’ll be able to fashion a weapon to humiliate Alex in seconds. There’s also something so creepy about the way that he just casually tells Alex to “pop his trousers off”, like he’s a GP doing a physical and not, you know, a Welsh comedian at the bottom of a ladder in the middle of the woods. The final image though makes it all worth it — water gracefully spraying between Alex’s cheeks against the backdrop of nature as classical music plays. If you squint you could trick yourself into thinking you were at Swan Lake.
Position in task: Like Ed, first place. If you humiliate Alex with water, you get five points. It’s a standard rule.
Watch out for: the way that, when the water runs out, Rhod Gilbert says (to no-one in particular) “That is the water feature closed for today, kids (??)”
81: Jo Brand Sings Jerusalem Down The Phone To Time An Egg (Series 9, Ep 5)
Task: Make the most accurate and inventive egg timer.
What happened: Tasked with creating an egg timer to make an egg that was runny (but not too runny), Jo Brand decided the best method of timekeeping would be to scream the lyrics of Jerusalem down the phone at Alex Horne. Inexplicably, it works, with her egg garnering genuine “ooooohs” from the studio audience.
Why is it so good: I’m not sure anyone realised quite how much they needed Jo Brand, in a car, calling Alex and bellowing “AND DID THOSE FEEEEET, IN ANCIENT TIIIIIIIIME…” in their life. As always with Jo, there are a lot of questions. Why Jerusalem? It’s clearly not that it’s the exact correct length to cook an egg, because Jo adds in an all new verse at the end (which, admittedly, is mostly just her going “Nyeee nyee nyeeeeeeee!”). Do you have to sing Jerusalem to cook an egg, or can you use any proto-national anthem hymn? And why did she call from a car? Who’s driving the car? What did they say when Jo Brand said to them, “Hang on a second, I just have to scream the lyrics to Jerusalem down the phone to a man cooking an egg. It’s for a show on Dave.”? In the end though, it doesn’t really matter — all that matters is that it’s a great egg, and that if Taskmaster had any merchandising nous they would bung the raw footage of Jo singing into an egg timer and sell them by the thousands.
Position in task: First, great singing, great egg.
Watch out for: Jo forgetting the words in the second verse and going “bring me my…something else…of gold…”. Also the way Alex silently mimes along, like he’s in the front row of a Jo Brand hymn concert.
Well there you have it. 44 down, 80 to go! And yet there are still so many questions! What will be Number One? Will ANYONE get angrier than Iain Stirling making a volcano? Who was Chick Pataki? And why were there so many segments from Series 8 all in a row this time? (Answers: not telling, no, dunno, and bad planning on my part)
And thank you for all the lovely comments about the previous installment! I’m really just doing it to distract myself from Everything, but it’s a lot of fun to look back at all these episodes, and it means a lot that you’re all along for the ride. If you enjoy me talking about TV you might enjoy my articles this year for The Guardian, where I bingewatched a bunch of shows and then had obsessive, over the top thoughts about them…
