AC15: Random TV Special Review - Yule Never Leave (The League of Gentlemen)

 

At the beginning of a new millennium, four writers came together to create the comedy troupe known as The League of Gentlemen which in 1999 would go on to become a surreal sitcom set in a fictional Northern Britain town called Royston Vasey. While originally depicted as your typical sitcom with audience laughter, that was eventually cut, and so we got darker stories than anything funny as the series went on. It became quite successful and it led to a feature film that ended up being the series finale and the writers (three of which act as various parts in the series) have gone on to do other things. Mark Gatiss went on to write many Doctor Who stories during its revival era and also produces Sherlock with both shows also having him act in a few episodes. Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith went on to write and star in the dark comedy anthology series Inside No. 9. And Jeremy Dyson (who due to a so-called lack of acting talent, never appeared in the series, but acted as assistant producer) went on to create the West End production Ghost Stories and its film adaptation. All that plus many other projects. So let's check out this Christmas Special:

The Rev. Bernice Woodall (played by Shearsmith) who doesn't believe in God (taking real pleasure in humiliating those with confessions) and despises Christmas, spends the entire special listening to three different but very dark stories from people in the village. In the first story, Steve (played by Pemberton) talks about a reoccuring nightmare that involves his wife Stella (also played by Shearsmith) and a vodoo spell. In the second story, a tramp tells the vicar of a time when he enlisted into a choir and believed that Herr Lip (also played by Pemberton) the choir master at the time, was a vampire. And in the final story, Mr. Chimney (played by Gatiss) talks about one of his ancestors who gave his family a curse following an incident involving monkey balls.

As silly as some of the stories and characters are, this special proves that these men are very twisted and are all for dark humor long before the days of Black Mirror. I guess this special is seen as the turning point of the series because as mentioned, the series takes a darker and less funny turn after this special. You could say that if The Simspons ever did another Treehouse of Horror like special but set around Christmas, this could be the inspiration. Its dark, funny, scary but above all, everything you'd expect from the people that would go on to do Inside No. 9 and various other dark projects. 8/10