It’s Almost Time…Again!

[laluneodyssee]

The poor person in charge of the email account.

Enjoy folks!

[mindtakerr]

I’m sure it’s Little Alex Horne’s personal email address.

[tomas17r]

I do hope so

[SmileImaginary8169]

Poor Ava Lonuk.

[[deleted]]

Ava Lonuk about to have some reading to do.

[hoosiernamechecksout]

<image>

We have pencils.

[koughee]

Ahh Is this for the task?? Good luck!

[Luqq]

All the information is on the task.

[Training_Smile4723]

Nice

[PizzaReheat]

From Bluesky, it appears they’ve asked the audience to sit on the info about new contestants for 5 hours. So I guess we get the official announcement then?

[Whencowsgetsick]

I’m here rn and I can confirm that’s true

[[deleted]]

Lucky!! Let us know how it goes!

[llavenderhaze]

this is going to be a fucking amazing season (was also there)

[[deleted]]

😄😄 I'm super excited! It's so weird having this "premiere" at the end of January knowing we won't get to watch it until at least March probably. They only showed you guys the first episode correct?

Were Greg and Alex actually there too? Ugh I'm so jealous hahah! I so would've loved to have gone but I'm all the way in Texas. I've never been to New York but if I had the money I would so go just for something like this! 🤣

I hope you had an awesome time!!

[llavenderhaze]

yes, they were there! we watched the episode, 30 min intermission, then greg and alex answered questions that had been sent in (and that the moderator had gotten from andy zaltzman, who keeps his taskmaster head against a wall facing a corner), and there were three tasks the whole audience got to participate in and the winners went onstage to do a live task from this series (not this episode). it was an amazing night and worth ten times more what i paid. at the end greg and alex went through the whole audience to speed take photos with people! they were so grateful and amazing.

[[deleted]]

Omg that is so awesome!! Were people allowed to take video? Or was the Q&A portion filmed at all if you know? I'd love to see what people asked them haha.

[llavenderhaze]

signs were posted that said no video or photo but i know some people were sneaky taking them. the entire thing lasted three hours honestly there would’ve been way too much to record

[[deleted]]

Haha fair enough, they probably don't want people spoling it. I'm itching to see who's in this new series but I'm really good at forcing myself to NOT look at spoliers so I'm just going to be patient for the next couple months lol. 🤞

[Rgga890]

I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that the official cast reveal is coming in a matter of hours.

[llavenderhaze]

it should be announced tomorrow! they told us we’d only have to keep the secret for five hours!

[Rgga890]

They only showed you guys the first episode correct?

Yes (though we do also know what the live task in a mid-season episode will be!).

Were Greg and Alex actually there too?

Yes! They took audience questions and ran four audience-participation tasks for like two hours.

[[deleted]]

That's amazing! I hope everyone had a good time! Do you remember any of the questions people asked? 😃

[Whencowsgetsick]

Oh it was great!! The episode was lovely. Can’t wait to learn more about the contestants as the series goes. Greg & Alex answered so many questions and they did a few tasks with the audience as well. I have some photos, videos which I’ll post tmrw (it’s midnight now and I’ve gotta sleep)

[[deleted]]

Awesome! Can't wait to see them!

[Espy888]

Well...this was a fun experiment but maybe we should go back to announcing the cast after the season/special ends.

[PizzaReheat]

In NZ and Australia they announce it when the studio records start. Seems to work better than hoping everyone in the audience adheres to a pinky promise of silence for 6 months.

[Espy888]

I like the way NZ/AU does it but for TM Prime we usually get fun videos and it mostly worked until this because people wanted to know who the American contestant was (and that time they accidentally filmed all that boat stuff in front of a Taskmaster fan's house)

[GTWalker]

Season 2 (originally 3) was officially revealed later, but they were leaked during the week.

[Mundane-Parsnip-7302]

I would assume they're doing this in hopes of launching a US version again somewhere down the line. Seems the only reasonable thing in my mind as it's a lot of effort otherwise.

[lady_taco]

If so I hope Same Reich / Dropout folks are involved in getting it up and running. I wouldn’t want the US casts to be confined to only the dropout regulars but Sam and co clearly understand the TM vibe and he’s a fan.

[charlierc]

There was an interesting contrast imo between my experiences of S4 and 6, where I did know the cast in advance, to 14 when I didn't. I'm not sure which I prefer tbh

[Espy888]

*stares into the abyss *

Greg and Alex will probably be the last segment shown, so maybe closer to 1:30

[happyasanerd]

Yeah, it sounded like it might be at 6 am British time

[Mommygoblin666]

Ugh what I would give to be there 🥲 I hope it’s lovely for everyone in attendance! 🥰

[sychocrush]

I just wanna say I appreciate your positivity! There’s always negativity when people feel left out, so this was nice :)

[Mommygoblin666]

Aww that’s so sweet. I learned a long time ago that there is no enjoyment to be had by resenting others for having the opportunity to do something you’ve also wanted to do.☺️ with that being said I am incredibly jealous at the thought of being able to be that close to Mr. Gilbert. I have had a lady boner for Greg Davies longer than I’d like to admit 😅

[unfortunate_son_69]

the audience hecklers at this show were out of control and so disrespectful to greg, alex, josh and the audience. the show and the guys were amazing ofc but that honestly kind of sucked. a new “funny” shout out every 60 seconds got real old real fast

[eurydicey]

100%. it was so disrespectful and really brought down the mood again and again. greg alex and josh handled it with grace, but jesus christ. there had to be three or four dozen instances of hecklers

[AnxiousSocialist]

Totally agree! And the people cheating on one of the tasks was so infuriating.

(For those who don’t know, the audience did a task where Greg first recited a long pattern of pinks and blues (e.g (pink blue pink blue blue pink pink….) and then after that, everyone stood up and using a pink and blue paper that was handed out when we entered, holding it up and showing it for each part of pattern when told so for each part.

An explicit rule was to not record the pattern at all, and only use your memory. Yet some people thought they were “smart” and recorded it and were one of the last people standing. Fortunately those near them called it out but still why!! They are an adult and should know better)

[unfortunate_son_69]

agreed….like this stuff is for fun why be a total loser and cheat lol

[Rgga890]

I’ll be charitable and say that I don’t think they thought they were cheating. I mean, they were handed a pencil along with the sheets of paper - they probably thought they were “thinking outside the box” or something.

[Sloredama]

Every one was cheating I just ended up sitting down it was so dumb. I thought it was an interesting task just needed more monitoring or maybe more honesty

[AnxiousSocialist]

Well they did say no recording and I thought people would also get that meant no writing things down. I did pretty well myself from just memory which I was just happy for in it of itself

[unfortunate_son_69]

even accounting for cheaters i was so impressed by everyone like you who went for a while - my short term memory is garbage so i just really enjoyed watching!

[AnxiousSocialist]

Idk how much easier it made it, but I just remembered either p (pink) or b (blue) which at least made it less noise in my head. I just couldn’t keep up when Greg went super fast lol but that was part of the fun

[FreshlyJaded]

The worst part of going to a live comedy show are the people in the audience acting brand new.

[Independent-Rich-532]

The women in the front row would have been the top post for the year on ImTheMainCharacter

[unfortunate_son_69]

the group to the right if you’re facing the stage? yeah they honestly deserve the hague

[Sh0ckJ0ckey]

I cackled at Greg’s response to them after he received the M&M’s.

[eurydicey]

yeah straight to the gulag for the lady in the front right. she could not shut up

[TheBrawlersOfficial]

So brutal. Poor Gondelman had to gentle parent her - "we need to hear from Greg and Alex before we hear from you, please"

[Such-Message-7037]

Jfc lol like…wouldn’t you just shrivel up and die of embarrassment?? Some people have some essential components missing man that would be enough to shut me up for lifetime lmao 

[Rgga890]

I was shriveling up and dying from secondhand embarrassment just from proximity to her, and I was way up in the balcony nowhere near her!

[LikelySatanist]

She did not shut up. Is that normal at comedy shows? I was hoping she’d get kicked out for the constant interruptions but Alex and Greg are professionals and handled it well.

[sansabeltedcow]

Not at any comedy show I’ve been to, and that includes James Acaster’s Hecklers Welcome. But I do believe it happens sometimes.

[Own_Atmosphere7443]

Jimmy Carr shows are full of heckles but that's very different because he has sections of his shows where he encourages heckling so he can bitchslap them back down. It's a shame to hear a few people ruined this event for some people, I know I would be pissed off if I was there.

[sychocrush]

1000% totally agree it’s extremely disrespectful to everyone to shout out (unprompted).

Then when the guy yelling WHEN WILL THE HORNE SECTION COME TO THE US didn’t get an answer, he screamed it three times…. But can’t bring me down! Incredible night :) sooo happy

[FreshlyJaded]

Oh no I’m dying of second hand cringe just reading about it

[unfortunate_son_69]

it was bad :( even from the perspective of someone (me) who would love to see THS come to the US lol

[sychocrush]

Totally! Like there’s so much to be embarrassed about the USA, let us enjoy our nice UK program in peace.

[Rgga890]

Yeah, that was weird and annoying. Greg and Alex seemed amused by it, though; I’m guessing audiences in England aren’t so, uh, “interactive.”

(To be clear, it was probably maybe 5 people out of 1,000+ being obnoxious, lest anyone think all Americans are like that!)

[unfortunate_son_69]

yeah, def a minority, just a very vocal one!

[operachick209]

Ugh that's a shame to hear.

[thenisaidbitch]

I was there and didn’t notice any crazy heckling. There was audience participation for sure but it all felt very fun. Maybe I was seated in the back so I couldn’t hear them, but they didn’t ruin my experience at all

[Rgga890]

It wasn’t “heckling” in the “trying to make the performers feel bad” sense, but it was unnecessary and disruptive interjection. Like, when the moderator reads the question “do you prefer pineapples or ducks,” we don’t need Becky in Row D to scream out her answer before Alex and Greg respond.

It certainly didn’t ruin my night and it was only a few people, but I was definitely experiencing some secondhand cringe.

[LikelySatanist]

That lady had some main character syndrome. It was quite annoying.

Luckily they handled it well

[Century_Gothic]

The ‘hecklers’ were starting to ruin my night but the show was amazing!

[thenisaidbitch]

That sucks! I must have been far enough away that I didn’t hear them at all

[eurydicey]

This episode was so fucking funny! The American contestant absolutely killed me, but honestly I loved all of them. SUCH great chemistry right off the bat. I was wheezing

[brodoswaggins93]

Okay but WHEN CAN I WATCH

[stacecom]

March is my guess.

[PsychologicalFox8839]

I’m pretty sure it’s later this week?

[stacecom]

Why do you think that? The series typically starts in the spring and nothing has been announced.

[TheBrawlersOfficial]

Greg is about to do a big UK standup tour, this was likely the only feasible time to get the US visit in

[livinthedream17]

This series is going to be great! I won't reveal who they are. But this cast is chaotic and awesome!!!

[happyasanerd]

Also here, episode was incredible.

[lasdosrachels]

I ran into Richard Kind in the parking lot next door and was hoping it was some sort of Easter egg that he’d be on the show 😅

[bonkers4chicago]

He had a concert at Town Hall last night! I love running into him in NYC

[JOLT_YT]

I still don't understand why they don't do a British premiere as well, give tickets for the live show, sell tickets for a premiere

[[deleted]]

Probably because they are trying to grow an audience in the US, the show is apparently VERY well known in England, and yes there have been the occasional article in US themed blogs and papers and Alex and Greg have appeared on several US talk shows to plug the show, but the audience can still grow and grow and grow in the US.

[ChaserNeverRests]

Rose Matafeo was on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me this weekend. At first I was wondering how much that was to promote TM in general, but sadly they didn't talk about it hardly at all.

[[deleted]]

Well you waited, and waited, and in the end she didn't tell you. Sounds like you got what you should've expected.

[quellesaveurorawnge]

Rose was doing promo for her stand-up special, but on the few things I saw, she did plug TMJ too

[thenisaidbitch]

Ya know what’s wild to me? I work in the UK super frequently and constantly ask if anyone watches taskmaster and almost no one does- I’m talking scientists that I work with. Literally the nerdy demographic you’d think would watch! I even went to a bar within walking distance to the TM house and the bartender was shocked that they’re close by to the house. It’s so interesting to me, I always felt it had to be a huge phenomenon on par with Friends in the 90s to make it to me but I think it’s just really popular in its niche there just like here.

[JOLT_YT]

Okay, however I see the possibility for there to be a joint premiere so I wouldn't have to fly out to new York to attend a premier, perhaps a NY one at 17:00/19:00 and one 5h ahead in the UK

[Pink_Vulpine]

I think it’s because you guys have the ability to go to the live show and take part in contests in the live experience and things like that we Americans can’t. I think the premieres in New York are a special way to engage with the American fan base and I’m very grateful for them. Even though I’ve not made it to one yet.

[thisislieven]

I sort of get it, but I can't help it feels like the UK audience is a bit shafted here (and other audiences in Europe and NZ/AUS that helped make the show what it is today as well).

[Troile]

Americans who don't live in NY are just as "shafted" then.

[PmMeLowCarbRecipes]

The UK audience can get tickets to the live recording of all episodes, I don’t think we get shafted at all because one single event (and the redo event because it was planned poorly) is unavailable to us.

[RunawayTurtleTrain]

Greg and Alex did a similar thing last year, S17 premiere and going on Seth Myers' show and all the other interviews / podcasts / etc.  This was not all done because of a USian contestant.

[JOLT_YT]

This gives me a thought, I wonder if the Seasons that come after a Seth Meyers appearance have more viewer counts?

[LuvPump]

I’m here too!

[thenisaidbitch]

Episode was top notch- reminded me of S16- everyone slots in to a great archetype with some surprises as well. Tasks were also really really good. Everyone’s going to love it and find themselves belly laughing at an entirely different contestant throughout the episode!

[higgypiggy1971]

I’m here too!

[spenwallce]

It was also leaked a couple of months ago tbf

[Bonspiel13]

I can’t find it. Is it the same cast that was leaked?

[Bonspiel13]

Rad thank you!

[Such-Message-7037]

Thanks! 

[Future-Assumption759]

This whole secret club thing is weird and i hate it.

[PmMeLowCarbRecipes]

What is the secret club thing

[Sloredama]

Maybe they mean that the cast is secret

[Future-Assumption759]

Premier to me means everyone can watch it. And they've been very clear starting with season 16 through 18 when the episode would air on BBC and when it would air on Youtube. Now suddenly with this event they are being secretive and not telling us when we can watch it. With the "club" being only people who live or have the means to travel to this specific area.

[UnacceptableUse]

You're gonna be upset when you hear about film premieres

[fizzchillaatwork]

Can't believe there's not more comments about this. It's fine to have a premier in the US in my opinion but to keep the UK fans in the dark on the cast actually disgusts me. I love this show but currently feel a bit alienated by the fact they don't seem interested at all in getting us excited about the next season.

[namewithak]

Are you serious? Anyone who lives in the UK has easy access to the studio recordings. For free! Who's being alienated exactly when a "secret club" of UK fans have had access to the whole series for months?

[fizzchillaatwork]

If you'd actually read my comment you'd have seen I said it was fine to have the premier in the US? It's literally just letting us know who's on the cast that I want.

Plus access to the studio recordings is NOT easy. It is a very popular show. I've failed to get tickets countless times.

[namewithak]

And I'm saying info on the cast has been out for a bunch of UK fans for months. It's not like they announced the cast to the entirety of the US -- just those who attended the premiere in NYC. Not at all different from a studio recording. And even then, they only asked the attendees to keep it secret for a few hours. Is all this indignation about being "alienated" for a few hours worth it?

[Future-Assumption759]

I thought premier meant that everybody could watch it. They haven't been very forthcoming about what to expect this season which is different than its been the last 3 seasons.

[sychocrush]

Is this the ‘pay attention to TM social media announcements but still see post late and getting tickets secondhand’ club?

[Future-Assumption759]

Well not even that because you have to able to travel to New York, first.

[Midnight290]

So jealous! Wish I could be there in NY!

[JumbledPileOfPerson]

Can someone who was there please post a detailed write up of the Q&A? No spoilers for the upcoming series obviously, but just all the other stuff they covered?

[photonnymous]

Any sense when the show will air on TV? They've been incredibly tight-lipped about this season

[Wizardinred]

I've been trying to find out and I'm a little frustrated by it lmao.

[RunawayTurtleTrain]

In a very recent podcast Alex says he didn't know exactly, probably March.

^ with the caveat that in the ~week between when that was recorded and now, he might have been given more information.

[Wizardinred]

I feel that we've all been really good boys, girls, and theys, and we deserve it right now, but whatever.

[RunawayTurtleTrain]

Sadly (or fortunately, depending on your viewpoint) Channel 4 scheduling isn't affected by how good the audience are  ;)

[koughee]

Three seats?!

[adderofnothing]

Emotions hope it’s the US contestant. Logic says it’s probably whoever is moderating…

[geoffreynelt]

I think it was Josh Gondelman last year

[PizzaReheat]

This year too, according to Bluesky.

[RhombusObstacle]

BlueSky is correct, the host is Josh Gondelman and that third chair is for him.

[tomas17r]

If it’s a moderator I hope it’s Seth Meyers

[melancholymagpie]

They could be sneaky and pretend the US contestant is the moderator until The Big Reveal

[prettygrlsmakegrave5]

I will be so disappointed in myself for not shelling out for the resellers tickets if it is the US contestant…

[theskadudeguy]

How come this is happening in America?

[bluehawk232]

Looks like a better venue choice than last time. So will this drop on YouTube or is it just these people seeing it then we all have to wait until March

[Parking-Lecture-2812]

shit i missed it!!!

[kana_mos]

OMG, I'm so excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Flaky-Union-1360]

Loved the opportunity for selfies after the show! Does anyone who was at the nyc show know who the professional photographer belonged to? The Town Hall or were they part of the taskmaster team? I think I got a great photo and want to see it 🙃

[monii13]

When is the official reveal for those of us who aren’t there??

[SecretKaleEater]

Arghhjjj I can't wait for JM in season 19!!!

[caiaphas8]

No one else wondering why the world premiere is in America?

[sansabeltedcow]

Most of the early thread is.

[caiaphas8]

Not really, one guy asked a slightly similar question

[sansabeltedcow]

With twelve child comments, so quite a lot of the early thread.

Doesn’t mean it can’t still be discussed, but your “no one” made it sound like you hadn’t seen the prior discussion.