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The Witchfinder is one of those set-in-the-past sitcoms where, in this case, it’s 17th Century life with the added aspect of modern-day language and structure, so when we first meet Daisy May Cooper‘s character, Thomasine Gooch, she tries to out a puppet show for being… well, a puppet show and not living creatures, leading everyone to derides her with “Don’t ruin it!”, “Oh well done(!)”, “What is wrong with you?”, and so on.
It’s a time when they call for the death of people who worship the devil, public hangings take place and we see “a pig killed by sorcery“, which instead looks like it’s been cooked.
In this opener, a witchfinder and right-hand man to the Witchfinder General, John Stearne (Joplin Sibtain), is passing through town and taking some of this town’s witchfinder’s – Gideon Bannister (Tim Key) – work away from him, resulting in a bit of consternation between the pair. However, since the lead is played by Mr Key, who is basically the same in everything, you can imagine which is the pair is going to come out on top.
The Witchfinder comes from the writers of the recent-ish Alan Partridge series, from around 2010 onwards with This Time With Alan Partridge, Mid Morning Matters and some one-off specials. They’ve been hit and miss overall, definitely compared to when Armando Iannucci, Peter Baynham and Steve Coogan were in the writing chairs, albeit still more hit than miss.
Meanwhile, Ms Cooper is best known for another BBC comedy, This Country, which somehow has a following, but I don’t get it whatsoever. Together with her brother, Charlie Cooper, I just keep thinking it’s an extension of The Office, as if they’re trying to copy Gareth, and giving him a family.
As for this new sitcom, one episode was more than enough and the whole series can hang from a tree… although it’s more likely to be on the iPlayer from day one.
The Witchfinder begins Tuesday March 8th at 10pm. It’s not yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD.
After episode one has been broadcast, I expect the whole series will be on the BBC iPlayer.
Directors: Neil Gibbons, Rob Gibbons
Producer: Joe Fraser
Writers: Neil Gibbons, Rob Gibbons
Music: Sam Hooper
Witchfinder Gideon Bannister: Tim Key
Thomasine Gooch: Daisy May Cooper
Goodwife Seldom: Phoebe Walsh
Goodwife Griffin: Celeste Dring
Hat seller: Mike Wozniak
Old Myers: Jessica Hynes
Topcliffe: Vincent Franklin
Cumberlidge: Tuwaine Barrett
Hebble: Daniel Rigby
Mr Griffin: Kiell Smith-Bynoe
John Stearne: Joplin Sibtain
Landlady: Michelle Greenidge
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.