The Horne Section TV Show Review: Alex Horne’s magpie meta-comedy delight

One of teacherThe most recurring joke is that Alex Horne is the show’s lackey. The affable, awkward assistant is described by host Greg Davies as “little Alex Horne,” though the hit comedy series was actually his brainchild. But now he breaks out. Horne has his own comedy series called The TV show Horne Section (Channel 4), on his fictional quest to start his own comedy series called The Horne Section TV Show, with his real band called… The Horne Section. still with me Buckle up; We get meta.

And Meta is it: The show opens during a taping of teacher, with Davies – who makes a point of emphasizing his tyrannical on-screen personality – berating his co-host in front of the audience, while Alex (Horne plays himself with added humility) fidgets in the wings. A man of great ideas, worn down by years of television bureaucracy, Alex lives in Davies’ shadow. When asked if he would like some lunch, he replies sheepishly, “Me? No, I ate yesterday.”

Alex dreams of directing his own live musical talk show – which he plans to film in his own home – but he doesn’t even get a 10-minute meeting with Channel 4 boss Ash (Georgia Tennant). In the end, the show gets the green light — but only after she accidentally sent him a congratulatory email. “It was an accidental assignment. We all made it,” Ash insists, rolling her eyes and blowing steam out of her nose.

It might sound a bit like baseball; An interest in the TV production process will definitely increase your enjoyment, but it’s secondary to the show’s endlessly charming, offbeat humor. We follow Alex from the show’s poorly perceived pilot to inexplicable social media success as he struggles to finally find success after years of lurking behind the scenes. But just as Alex’s show-within-a-show is a mishmash of genres, so is Horne’s sitcom. In one scene, everyone is forced to wear giant plastic hands (including reluctant guest Martin Kemp), and the band’s saxophonist plays his instrument through a suitcase-less Henry vacuum.

Horne’s comedy has delightful magpie tendencies. The show is a whirlwind of wacky, cartoonish vignettes, random musical numbers (very Flight of the Conchords) and abstract gags (very Toast to London). Horne recruited an eclectic array of names to take part in the joke. The “guests” on Alex’s talk show play against guys and have a blast doing it: daytime TV star Dr. Ranj is snappy and rude, rapper Big Zuu loves to knit and musician Imogen Heap sings about taking MDMA. But the highlight is certainly John Oliver as Alex’s desperate-to-please, “real life nightmare” of a co-host. When Oliver first appeared on the show via video call, I rolled my eyes (Zoom fatigue exists on TV as it does in real life), but he’s just as captivating and hilarious virtually as he is on his own show.

The TV show Horne Section paints a pretty bleak picture of the TV commissioned business, suggesting that making something without a big name attached to it is a fruitless endeavor — and even then, it takes TikTok appeal to become a hit. But Horne’s show sparkles when it’s at its most meta, obsessed with mocking the industry. Going back to a standard sitcom format loses some of its momentum. But it’s retracted later in the series when Tim Key appears as a celebrity-obsessed therapist who everyone keeps saying looks like Tim Key. Driven insane by the stress of success, Alex breaks the fourth wall and yells, “Maybe I’ve changed! Maybe my character has developed!” Alex may have struggled with the pressure of the outburst, but Horne, creator of The TV show Horne Sectioncharacterized by this.