Transformative Taskmaster | Pilot – We’re on first name terms with fanfic.

TK
Welcome to Transformative Taskmaster, where we drill down into the narrative. It’s a podcast by fans, for fans and about fans. My name is TK, which stands for Tiny Kitten and I’ll be your host. Every episode will have a special guest on to talk about the finer details of Taskmaster and its fandom, focusing on a specific topic of conversation.
We’ll play some games, discuss Taskmaster current events, and give you some fan work recommendations at the end.

TK
We’ve just come back off the back of the Taskmaster series 19 premiere in New York City, where Greg and Alex hosted a Q&A, did tons of interviews and seemingly won on so many dates. They also shouted out five different fanfics on the Seth Meyers taping, so that was a thing, that we were all completely normal about.
Totally fun. Okay. Every episode will have a special guest on to talk about the finer details of Taskmaster and its fandom. We’ll really dig down into the narrative, as Greg likes to say, focusing on a specific topic of conversation. We’ll play some games and discuss Taskmaster current events.
For our pilot episode, I am delighted to introduce a staple of the fandom and a very dear personal friend of mine, Amanda!

Amanda
Hello, crowd goes wild. Thank you. Hi, T.K.. Thank you formy intro.

TK
Yes, you are so welcome. And thank you for being here. As we figure out the ins and outs of the podcast world. It’s very exciting.

Amanda
It is very exciting.
TK
All right, so we, the collective we, on our little, what should we call it we call it a group chat?

Amanda
I’m not sure I’ve been, like, leaning towards, like, writing group or, you know, just just fan forum that, you know, that

TK
oh fan forum, I like that

Amanda
old school, old school.

TK
So the collective we on our, on our fan forum have been discussing, creating this podcast for it’s only been, what, like a week or two at this point.

Amanda
Yeah, I think like I mentioned before, but now it’s serious.

TK
Yeah, we a bunch of us went to New York, for the premiere. And I think to kind of kick started, this kind of, want to expand our little fandom, as it were.

Amanda
Very much so, yeah.

TK
So obviously we have the official Taskmaster podcast was Ed Gamble, which is amazing.

Amanda
It is.

TK
Yeah. So they’ve just started season two of New Zealand, which I’m very excited about because that’s one of the best seasons ever according to the fan base, which is pretty exciting. We’ve also got the Taskmaster People’s Podcast, which I believe is currently being hosted by Jenny Eclair and Jack Bernhardt. And yeah, I feel like our little community specifically will go and listen to these podcasts, and then we’ll come back to our little, our little, group chat, as it were, and will be like, but they didn’t talk about this or they didn’t talk about this, like, why aren’t we talking about the one that the one thing that really stands out to me, personally is how the editors edited out Nick’s Dracula.

Amanda
Yeah, Nick Mohammed. Oh my goodness, yeah, they went Dracula, well he doesn’t have a reflection. So like completely over the top. There was no reason for doing it. I don’t think they even mentioned it anywhere. They’re just, like, subtly. It’s in every shot he’s in.

TK
And it was one of those things where once you see it, you can’t unsee it. . And it was just amazing and incredible. And like every time, you know, somebody put a GIF set up on Tumblr, I was like, yes, reblog, this needs to be seen. People need to know about this.

Amanda
There’s someone out there putting their absolute heart and soul into doing this editing and we see you. We thank you. This is delightful.

TK
Yeah, especially with that mirror task. I can’t imagine how much of a pain that must have been.

Amanda
I think that might have been the origin of it. I think they might have been like, wait, we’ve got Dracula with a mirror. He shouldn’t be in the mirror. And then someone went, guys should know it would be fun. We gotta go back. We gotta fix it all.

TK
Yes. So, yeah, I feel like there’s a lot of little tidbits like that that that we as a collective group, will notice and point out and then yell at each other that nobody else is yelling about it. And so this, this podcast kind of is a little bit for that.
But we’ll also have a little bit of, a bunch of other things. We have. We’re going to have a, you know, a regular segment on promoting fan works, which will include fanfic, fan art, fan fiction. Sorry for those. Let’s call it let’s just call it fanfic. Just call it fanfic. It’s

Amanda
We’re on first name terms with fanfic.

TK
We really, really are. Yeah. Yeah. So we’ll, you know, we’ll play some games, we’ll have some guests. It’ll be interesting to talk about different, aspects of the Taskmaster universe. The lore, the fan base, specifically. So that’ll be really fun. Now, we were trying to come up with a title, or a name for this podcast, and it was you, actually, who suggested Transformative Taskmaster.

Amanda
Someone scrolled back and found me.

TK
Actually, I did not scroll back. I just remember that that was you, because I immediately was like, oh, that’s perfect. And everybody was immediately like, yep, that’s the that’s going to be the name of it.

Amanda
Yes, Transformative Taskmaster.

TK
Yes. So, Amanda, tell me why you how did you come up with that first of all.
And then why do you think it fits so well with what we’re trying to do here?

Amanda
Oh, gosh. I mean, it was one of the spur of the moment things, you know? So I hadn’t been sat there racking my brain for like ten minutes or something about that. It was a case, you know, people were throwing ideas. It was really, you know, flexible.
People were just trying stuff out. But there was definitely this sense, like, everyone having, you know, this discussion about it being about the like the, the extra added world on top of Taskmaster. It’s not specifically the Taskmaster world itself, although it absolutely would include that. But it’s like the things that then go beyond Taskmaster and bring it out into the world of the fans and what the fans like turned into.
And so I think, there’s, you know, been a lot of, talk about like, transformative works, being something that, you know, fan fiction and fan art and all the rest of it, you know, are considered like, legally. And then, who doesn’t like alliteration? So Transformative Taskmaster I threw out there. And, you know, I got some thumbs up.
So that’s nice.

TK
Yeah, I think it’s perfect. It was for me. I think it’s a little bit of a death of the author type thing where, you know, we and I say a little bit of because it’s not completely, because obviously we love and respect and cherish the original, you know, content and everything. And that’s, that’s what we’re pulling from.
But but also the transformative bit makes it so that we can take what they’ve given us and make it our own thing. You know, regardless of whether that was that thing, was what they intended to happen, etc., especially because, you know, for, for a lot of us, there are so many what we think of as obvious things that Greg and Alex do that we’re like, why would they do this?
And then Greg is like, I don’t know why they think we’re like, romantically. I know we’re like, you literally kissed him on, like what?

Amanda
Yeah, yeah. I think I think probably like after every single like nugget and grain and crumb of content that we get from, you know, Taskmaster proper, all of us just like run back to discuss it, you know, in our, in our little groups and be like, why did they do this? What were they thinking? And half of our time is just trying to figure out, you know, what the intention was. And most, like you said, death of the author. Half the time it doesn’t even matter what the intention was, because if you’re just playing with the toys that they’ve given us, it’s a it’s a toolbox. It’s an absolute, you know, sandbox of of mad, crazy canon and ideas and, and characters and we, we just love playing in this, this, you know, box of toys that they just give us and keep giving us over and over again.

TK
Yeah. And I think Alex in particular would really like your metaphor on playing with toys, giving us toys to play with. Because it definitely it very much feels like that. And I think that on my, my thinking is that probably what happens is, especially with Greg, I don’t know how much Alex, you know, rewatches everything. You know, being an executive producer and has the final say and the final edits and everything, but normally I think what happens is that they record the show and then never think about it again, you know, and like, because I imagine that’s what happens because they’ve been doing this,

Amanda
I think I forget a lot of what’s going on.You know, they throw a line. They throw a look or an idea or a joke and it’s it’s there in the moment and it’s hilarious. And then they move on because they’ve got more jokes to make, you know.

TK
Yeah, yeah. And I think for us, the thing that that separates us from them a little bit, I mean, obviously there’s a lot of things that do.
But for this particular example, is that we will rewatch and we will pick apart and we will make GIF sets and we will make text posts and we will draw and we will write and we will sing sometimes.

Amanda
Very much so.

TK
Yeah. Yeah. And I think, personally, I think that if I watched an episode and then never thought about it again, like, of course I’m not going to remember that one time that this one person said this one sentence, you know, then be like oh, yeah, I remember, because, you and I were both lucky enough to go to, New York City, which we’ll talk about in more depth here in a little bit. But one of the things that that was funny to me was that during the Q&A with Greg and Alex, you know, some of the audience members would shout out some stuff. And one of the questions was like, what’s your, do you have a favorite, like quote that you quote from the show?
And of course, we all have our favorite quote. We have a whole basket of quotes

Amanda
Who can choose one.

TK
I mean, yeah. And then, you know, so one person shouting out like bastards crying innit , Alex is and Greg is like, oh, what did they say? And Alex was like, bitch is crying innit. And we’re like, no, no, no no no no no, that’s not what that is. It’s bastards. Come on Alex, you get it together.

Amanda
I mean, he’s so busy. Forgetful.

TK
Yeah. But even you know, Greg has well, I’m sure he has all the time. But even when, you know, when Alex was like, well, you know, the fans will know that, you know, Liza and everyone goes nuts. And Greg is like, sorry, what did Lisa do? It’s like, we already know. You don’t have to. You don’t have to remind us that you sat on the cake. We all, all of us are already having your butt in our mental image, sitting on the cake like we don’t have. You don’t have to explain this to us. But of course Greg doesn’t remember that until Alex reminds him and then he’s like, oh yeah, I guess you did do that.

Amanda
Yeah, yeah, it was incredible. Yeah, I think, there’s almost like this privilege that fans have of, you know, being able to dig into far more than, like, you know, the creators and the people who are on it, ever, ever do. In fact, if they did be kind of a little weird in a way, because they should be looking forward, whereas we get to see it revisit it, like perhaps only the editors and, and, you know, the fans have analyzed each individual frame as much as you know anyone else.
But I think it’s definitely like, people like Alex who who knew it a lot, you know, and now share this language with the fans where he can see there was this moment with Liza and all of the crazy fans in the audience, of which I’m proud to, you know, hold my hand up and say I’m one of immediately know what he’s talking about.
He doesn’t need to keep saying it. We share that, you know, that piece of information. There’s never a shorthand between us. He can he can mention offhand things, and we’re like, we know exactly. And we share that between the fans as well. Like in our, you know, in their chats on our forums and our, you know, Tumblrs, whatever it is.
So we can just be like, I’m, you know, I’m feeling, you know, very Liza Tarbuck today and you know, people are, you know, throwing their, their hands in the air going, oh good God, what does that mean? That could mean all of these different things. You know, we have the shared language, like any subculture ends up having. And I think the Taskmaster fandom, like many fandoms, is a subculture that shares a language, shares all of this knowledge.
And as you, you know, as you get new fans to the fandom, they’re kind of introduced to all of these secret meanings and languages and shortcuts and, you know, you know, nods of the head and, and little insights that we all share.

TK
Yeah. And I think the thing that is interesting about Taskmaster specifically and I, this is one of the things that I do want to kind of continuously bring up as part of the the podcast is that I feel like Greg and Alex do this thing where they want to create these in-jokes with their fans, like they actively do it.

Amanda
It seems to seem very much like that.

TK
Yeah, yeah. And it’s it’s a really nice feeling to be kind of perceived, as we call it, which we’ll talk about later. Yeah.

Amanda
Like, if I can, like, bring that even further, it’s like, yeah, looking at the structure of, you know, a Taskmaster episode, it really shouldn’t be generating this amount of, of, you know, this fandom and this investment and, you know, dedication to the “lore”. I’m putting, you know, bunny ears in the air here. But like, it could have been exactly straight up. People come in, they do their tasks. A man judges them and they go home. But that is not how it ends up it. Because of Greg and Alex and the relationship that they play out on stage, and how they bring the contestants in during the tasks and during, you know, the studio tapings. It becomes this complicated, ongoing, almost pseudo storyline that people who watch it and watch series to series can get invested in. Whereas if you were comparing it to something like Countdown, you know, there there isn’t really, you know, that kind of angle to it where people are creating, a pseudo storyline that goes through the background.

TK
And what a storyline we get.
So, I mean, the, the canon law, as we call it, is just ridiculous.

Amanda
And it makes no sense within itself, which is fascinating, aggravating, perfect and wonderful. Yeah, it contradicts itself constantly. Greg and Alex don’t seem to behold themselves to any kind of consistency. If they find something funny in the moment that suits their characters, then they will run with it because the characters seem to be the thing that absolutely holds everything, the character of the Alex plays and the character that Greg plays.
Those are what’s true in an episode of Taskmaster, and that’s what carries through the whole thing, it seems.

TK
Yeah, yeah. I mean, talking about that, I think it’ll be interesting at some point in the future of this podcast to talk about the interstitials and how Greg and Alex used to be like creating their own little clips for those, and in the I mean, I don’t off the top of my head know which season or which series they stopped doing that in. But, you know, now it’s just kind of Alex doing, holding up two fingers and holding up three fingers. But he’s riding a rollercoaster for some reason. Like, who knows why. But yeah, definitely seemed to originate with a lot of kind of lore of like, why are the why, is Alex like massaging Greg’s feet or. No, he’s clipping toenails with those hedge clippers. I mean, it’s like, what,

Amanda
shears

TK
was that necessary? No. Did we absolutely love it? Yes.

Amanda
Oh, absolutely. I mean, you know that one of my favorite ones is the, advert for, I think, season ten where they were moving over to Channel Four. And they have Greg sat in his glorious chair while Alex hustles around in the background of their quite physically impossible, like, Escher inspired mansion, which is supposed to be, you know, one of their many homes or one Greg’s many homes, of course. And then Greg opens a door. It seems that there’s a room full of Alex’s with a sign on it saying ‘do not feed’. And it goes, ‘oops, wrong door’ closes it and moves on, and they never mention it again. And you just sat there going, oh, what just happened? This is what? So yeah, delightful. They’ll just it’s like someone who’s addicted to throwing out plot hooks, and they’re just going to have loads of funny things to run with.
We’re not going to keep track of them. And we as the fandom try to, we’re just running behind them, picking up all of these mad little things that they’ve given us and going, this is fun. I can I can do something with this.

TK
Oh yeah, I feel like a raccoon rummaging.
Hi, podcast cat.

Amanda
Hello?

TK
Stop. I feel like a raccoon rummaging through the garbage a lot of the time because, you know, Alex will just throw out his his trash, and then I’ll come around with my little grubby raccoon paws and pick it up and sniff it, and you be like, oh, I can make something out of this.

Amanda
Mmm tasty.

TK
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, yeah, with the, the whatever we want to call it the clone door and the clone room especially, I know it has, I need to look up some stats before I start talking about this kind of stuff, but, you know, a fair amount of of fanfics, you know, just about the clones idea themselves. And it’s, I think, incredible how something that’s, what 10s long not even

Amanda
if that. Yeah.

TK
You know, can be turned into thousands of words by dozens by dozens different people. It’s incredible.

Amanda
Yeah. And and again, to reiterate, they never mention again it’s not a focus event. This is a, you know, a show where they invite five comics on, do some silly tasks and send them home again, none of this is necessary.

TK
No it’s really not

Amanda
It’s just delightful little nonsense bits that they just threw out. And, you know, these interstitials that you’re talking about, the ads that they do, the banter sections, you know, at the top of an episode, just a little throw out the the throwing to add sections, apparently Greg is the one that writes, often have these little moments of, like, insight into the relationship between the Taskmaster and The Assistant.
And and nobody’s telling them they need to do this. They’re just like, this is this is fun to us. We’re going to make up this whole backstory that doesn’t make sense and, you know, enjoy it or don’t. It’s just amazing.

TK
Yeah. And that’s I think one thing that I really, really love about our fandom is that we can pick up this tiny speck of dust that they throw us and turn it into

Amanda
yeah, crumbs

TK
You know, 40,000 word fic. And it’s just incredible, that we get such inspiration from the tiniest little things, but that really is very fun.

Amanda
And I think as well the fact that the, you know, the so-called canon is inconsistent with itself and doesn’t actually make sense means that there’s a lot of freedom to just make shit up, you know, because that’s what they do.
It’s like someone can’t sit there, push their glasses up into their nose and go. Uh, actually, you’ll find that that contradicts this bit here. And so again, it doesn’t matter. It contradicts itself. So you have a lot more freedom as long as to a certain extent you keep a core of the character that Alex plays and the character that Greg plays, you know, true in whatever story or piece of fanart or, you know, fan content that you’re making, you can do whatever the hell you want because Greg and Alex are right there doing the same thing.

TK
Yeah. And it’s it’s really nice to because they do give us multiple layers because not only do. Stop (podcast cat bites microphone)

Amanda
You know I love you podcast cat

TK
she’s like, oh, what if I bit the microphone. What if you didn’t do that. Because they give us the Taskmaster and his Assistant.
So that’s layer one. On top of that, we have Greg and Alex in the studio, which is layer two, which is almost the same thing, but not quite. And then we have Greg and Alex as Greg is The Taskmaster in this show. And Alex is the executive producer of this show. Yes, which is another. And then we have Greg and Alex out living their own lives.

Amanda
Yeah. And and the delightful, sometimes fascinating. And I think, I do think that this was the thing that actually drew me into the, you know, the fandom itself was the the lines between these different layers, like the lines between The Assistant and Alex Horne, the executive, and Alex Horne, who’s just mucking around as a comic on stage, as a real human being, can blur and flip flop between any and all of these in the space of the same sentence, like, to me, Alex can be saying something about, you know, living in our lovely house together, which is The Assistant talking about the canon world, for he is pretty much the live-in slave of the almighty Taskmaster. And then in the same sentence, he’s all of a sudden talking about how Greg needs to change, you know, do the points, right, or you know that they’ll have to cut this bit or something like that, because he’s actually the man who’s ostensibly in charge of the whole show. He made it. He’s one of the executive producers.
He has phenomenal power within, you know, the bounds of this show. And yet he’s playing this character who’s just a little toady weasel guy who is just like the lowest. He’s the carpet snake. He’s like absolute scum. And Greg is all mighty, all powerful. And yeah, he’ll literally do it in the same sentence or the same breath. And it’s just it’s fascinating to watch.
And he is trying to follow it puts all new wrinkles in my head is to. It’s just delightful to watch.

TK
Yeah. And even with his other stuff like I didn’t get into The Horne Section until after I had watched a lot of Taskmaster. And, and even then, like, with The Horne Section TV show, you know, he’s like, I’m Alex is the leader.
It’s called The Horne Section. It is his band. Literally it is his band. Like he is the the frontman of the band. He is in charge of the band. Like all of the decisions that he makes for the band are essentially his final call to make. And he chose in The Horne Section TV show to be like, but what if Greg came in and was like, I’m going to steal your band and undermine you?
And I’m just like, why do you do this? I mean, it’s fascinating and it’s so interesting and it’s hilarious, but like, what motivates him? To write these storylines?

Amanda
The Horne Section existed completely separately, as you know, the thing that Alex loves doing with, you know, childhood friends and other people is, you know, and it’s all comedy jazz band and it goes on tours and the whole thing, and he’s like the front man who can’t sing, and that’s that’s delightful. And he didn’t need to have like, the very intro to The Horne Section TV show being Alex Horne, the toady, you know, who obeys all that, you know, meeting Greg, the Taskmaster does in the studio, being bullied around and told to go and get sandwiches and rest.
He didn’t have to include all that. And then having go to his, you know, temporary changing room or something like that, tear off his Taskmaster suit to reveal his Horne Section, you know, the costume underneath it with The Horne Section around him going, sorry, Alex. He didn’t need to do that, but he topped and tailed the whole series with this framing device of the character who’s at the front of The Horne Section band is also the toady guy who works for Greg in the Taskmaster show, but not The Canon version of The Assistant who lives in the mansions, right, and gets tied up before he goes to sleep at night or with bells or whatever. The hell.

TK
Yeah, because that because The Assistant doesn’t have his own band, except for when he’s in the studio sitting next to Greg, and Greg brings it up like the one time, you know,

Amanda
It’s just it’s another layer.
And Alex has been like, no, but what if I just massively expand this element of the canon to include an entire other area with a whole plotline and storyline and, you know, Alex’s character and that is so beaten down and sad and the whole, you know, series one is just about him being sad guy who can’t figure out how to get his life in order and all the rest of it.
And he’s just like, what if I was wet? What if, just just constantly? I was the wet guy? What? What if just that if I just played that way, would that be fun? And I. And he’s supposed to be like, the cool guy, the front guy of a band, and he dodges that role and just goes, no, I’m going to be the the saddest wet puppy that there’s ever been.
There’s like whole scenes where he’s just left alone all on his own and, you know, in a robe and slippers clicking away, a laptop, being sad and looking through old photographs of his, you know, his friends and the band. It’s like you’re you’re literally doing this to yourself. What’s going?

TK
I mean, you’ve got to think it must be a ton of fun.

Amanda
Oh, absolute

TK
Like so much fun to to mess with the narrative like that.

Amanda
If I can, like, reference a thing that I’ve mucked around with myself, I went and did, sorry, an improv class. And one of the things and I did this in Los Angeles, of all places, so there was like six classes and all the rest of it, and you wander on to, you know, the stage and then try and give someone a clue as to, you know, what setting you were doing your scene in, and what character you were doing, and all the rest of it.
And one of the things that popped out is I would end up picking the low status character to play, so I would I would come in and be like, oh, professor, can you can you help me do this thing or whatever it was. And people would be like, oh, yes, I’m the professor. I’m going to wander in and start this scene and do all the whole of the thing.
And it’s a strange thing, because most of our class would not pick the low status role in any scene, and people pointed out that’s something that Amanda does. And I was the only Brit in the room and I’m wondering Is this a Britcom thing? Is this because, you know, people have talked about the difference between British and American comedy and obviously massive overlaps everywhere, but just generally it seems you know people have talked about this in the past. But it seems British comedians like going I’m such a sad guy. Look at me. I’m, what a shame. I’m trying my hardest, but I’m just getting beaten down. Yeah. Whereas you know, the American, you know, typical comedies like, I’m such a cool guy, I’m going to be in charge of everything. I’m going to poke. poke, you know, power. And I’m going to show everyone how it’s done. And you trick all of the people. And so I’m wondering if Alex is just following that, you know, that grand tradition of being oh I’m such a sad guy

TK
Yeah, and he’s he’s got the face for it. I got to give him that. What a face. What a great face.

Amanda
Oh, absolutely. It looks like a cartoon character.

TK
Oh really, he really does.

Amanda
Can you draw a hairy sausage cartoon character and make him sad?

TK
That’s Alex Horne

Amanda
Absolutely.

TK
Excellent. Okay, so we’re going to move on. This next segment would normally be games, but I don’t get, we don’t have games yet. So we’ll we’ll just pretend that we’re playing games.

Amanda
Yay I can’t lose.

TK
Yay. Yeah. So for the the games will have, fact or fan fiction, which I think is something that I’m made up in New York, I think. So I was like, you know, these these boys really out here just saying shit. Like what? What are they doing?

Amanda
So the idea with that one is that we’re like, here is something completely unhinged. This is about the Taskmaster universe. Is it unhinged from Alex and Greg, or is unhinged from the mind of one of the fan creators?

TK
Right. Like. All right, this next quote is from Greg Davies, and then you just read something completely, you know, like you said, unhinged.
And then it’s like, fact or fanfic or which one was it?

Amanda
Yeah. And then is because, you know, there’s a lot of, I think we’ve seen that a lot where people would be reading, you know, piece of fan fiction and they’re reading through it and going, well, that’s bonkers. Obviously someone, someone who’s writing this is made it up.
And you’ll find out that generally the most bonkers things are things that actually did happen. Or were mentioned.

TK
Yeah, it’s, pretty wild.

Amanda
Yeah. I’m really glad you didn’t have any prepared, because I didn’t really have.

TK
Yeah, I think like the banter section or not, the, the, the introduct-ory?, that was a word that I said.

Amanda
Oh, yeah. The Alex introductions.

TK
Alex introductions are like the most unhinged. I mean, my favorite part of those is when Greg, like, loses his composure halfway through and he has to cover his mouth with his hand.

Amanda
Yeah, I think there’s a lot of Greg has written these at some point in the past, and he may have forgotten
And he forgets and sees them come up on the autocue and goes, oh no, am I going to say that? Yes, I’m going to say that he’s horrified by his own written thing and giggling through it. Meanwhile, Alex is just like white knuckling it on the, you know, the throne next to him going, oh no, sad guy mode engage.

TK
Yeah, it’s so funny. And I, I admire Alex’s tenacity to I don’t think he’s ever done this. I mean maybe he has like in the studio and they’ve cut it out, but I don’t remember ever seeing him once, other than, aside from him doing his like finger wave

Amanda
Finger wag, yeah

TK
you know, where, you know, he’ll, the, you know, where you just have to assume that he’s saying, no, no, no, that’s not, because sometimes you’ve gotta

Amanda
Yes, I know where you’re going with this. It’s like he will always, yes and and never no but, you know, Greg will say the most horrific thing. And lay that down as this is a true fact about Alex Horne. And everyone in the audience knows. Oh, God, no, that’s the worst thing ever. That’s clearly not a thing that Alex thinks. Yeah, but Alex will never go, ‘Actually, no, I disagree with what you’re saying there’. He, like you say, he’ll occasionally wag his finger in a kind of like, ‘Well, not quite’ sort of look or ‘oh please don’t, you know, follow that up with anything else’.

TK
Right.

Amanda
But the the man’s dedication to your sound is legendary.

TK
It really is. It’s it’s. I aspire to eat a whole pat of butter at a wedding because somebody told me to,

Amanda
One day, Greg will get a new story.

TK
Ugh, one day, today is not that day. Now, this is a good segue into the New York trip, which we’re going to talk about next. So this is going to be the segment where we kind of talk about current events or the most recent episode, obviously, you know, we haven’t really had a most recent episode, unless you count the premiere, which we won’t spoil.
We won’t spoil, the series 19 premiere, except to say that it’s amazing and it’s going to be, a great series if the first episode is anything to go off of. But yes, like I said earlier, you and I were lucky enough to go to New York City for this trip, and there were about, I want to say, like there were like 14 of us from our, our group that we’re in.
And, and it was a lot of fun to hang out with each other and put faces to names. And yeah, I mean, I there wasn’t a single person in our group that I was like, ‘eh, can take them or leave them’, you know what I mean? Like, like every single person was genuinely so much fun to hang out with and talk to and everything.
And, yeah, it was it was really fun getting together and going out for meals and a bunch of us, you know, would split off occasionally to go to Central Park and see if we could find Greg and Alex, because we knew they were going to Central Park. You know, and we were like, surely they’ve got to be here somewhere.
And then we’d walk around in the freezing, freezing cold.

Amanda
Oh yeah. I’m not sure how many people who weren’t there understood. But there was like an absolutely cold snap for exactly the days that our group and, you know, coincidentally, Alex and Greg were in New York, it got bitterly cold and and I know you’re a huge fan of the cold, of course ;).

TK
No, no, no, I, I grew up, in New York, not the city, but in New York. And I hate, I’ve always hated the cold. And now I live in California. Much happier, but I, Yeah, the night that I flew in, it was snowing, and I was miserable. I was so angry, I was like, okay, let’s go to this diner.
I think actually it was the diner. We tried to, because Greg and Alex have their their names on a couple of plaques on one of the Brooklyn diners.

Amanda
Yes, yes that’s what it’s called Brooklyn Diner. And there’s two locations for Brooklyn Diner.–

TK
es. And we originally went to the one that didn’t have their names correct. And then we did find the one that did have their names later. So that was fun. That that is a tiny, tiny booth, let me tell you that thing was cramped. I don’t know if Greg and Alex, like, went and sat at their. But it’s I feel bad for them because. Holy leg room Batman. That did not exist. At that booth, But yeah,

Amanda
I imagine Greg’s used to. The man is a giant. He’s, I mean, you know, normal booths are probably cramped to him.

TK
Poor guy. I feel so bad. Yeah. But, yeah, we had a lot of fun. They they did a ton of interviews with just a lot of people. That seemed like they did, like, a lot of Zoom interviews or. I don’t know if they’re actually using Zoom these days. I don’t know what the kids are using. It used to be Skype. Now it’s Zoom. I don’t know, whatever.

Amanda
Greg and Alex are not The Kids.

TK
What are the, what are these kids up to these days?

Amanda
40 and 50 year old British men, what are they up to

TK
Adult men, yeah. So they did a lot of interviews in person and online. And so we kind of got to see some of those while we were in New York. And then some of them after we got back home and everything. And of course, they have the premiere and the Q&A, and the Q&A was just amazing. I mean, it was incredible, for one, because they came to New York to do it, which I don’t know about you, but I am very thankful that they came to The States because, like, what am I going to get an opportunity to go to London, you know,

Amanda
So, I’m going to pop a bit of context here and go, this is the second time that they’ve done this.
They did this in March of last year, 2024. And so this time it was January 2025. Guys pick a warmer month. But the previous, you know, attempt that they’d done had been a really, really tiny venue where they were, you know, cramped people were turned away at the door. It was all a mess. And so this time around, they had found a location, was it Town Hall I it was called (TK affirms), with 1500 seats, you know. So that was that was much, much bigger location. The tickets went like hotcakes. We were in a frenzy trying to make sure that we could get all of the tickets that we needed for our group.

TK
Yeah, sold out within two hours, didn’t it?

Amanda
Something like that. Yeah. And, you know, they weren’t, they weren’t free, but they, there were, you know, moderately priced. And then the scalpers came in and, Urrgh scalpers we hate them. But, you know, this was a much bigger location. And I think Greg and Alex themselves were just, taken aback by how many people were there, and probably by the fact that the tickets sold so fast at all.

TK
Yeah, yeah. I mean, one of the things that happened was we we all went into the theater. I’m pretty sure there were no empty seats because, I mean, if there was like, I would have been really surprised. But as far as I could tell, there wasn’t any empty seats. And we watched the episode first, and then we had a little break, and then Greg and Alex came on.
And so we had been sitting there for an hour, you know, maybe, maybe more if, you know, depending on what time you had gotten to the venue. But when they walked on stage, they immediately got a standing ovation, like, all of it just happened. And we were just like, yes, we are. So they hadn’t even said anything yet, not a single word had come out of their mouths, and we’re already giving them a standing ovation, and they’re just like, ‘what is happened?’ like, I don’t like I don’t think they realize how big they are in The States. Because I think they just keep getting blown away by everything that this is

Amanda
the dedication that they seem to, you know, garner is is taking them, you know, back every time.It’s like you wouldn’t get this for, you know, Countdown or another kind of, you know, just, just plain straight up quiz type show. And I think they didn’t realize that it’s, for so many people. It’s been a massive part of their lives and a really load bearing intrinsic, you know, part of their their well-being and their happiness. And they just they bring joy.
And people want to, you know, give this back. And they’ve done it by coming all the way across the entire United States. We find out there were some people from, you know, up in Canada, some our group was from Canada. There was someone from Argentina. I think, it’s like people came miles and miles from far and wide to just see them, you know, up on stage.
And I, I think these guys might be, you know, Alex and Greg, are so modest that they thought a lot of people were coming to see the first episode in the series. It wasn’t for the ep of the series. It was nice, you know? But it was really to see Greg and Alex up on stage and, you know, just hear them talk and you know, banter back and forth.
And they they had some, you know, tasks, you know, for the audience and stuff like that. But it was just to be there and like you’re, you’re seeing our whole group was just full of really lovely people who have self-selected into this fandom of just kind, wonderful, generous, funny people doing kind, generous, wonderful, funny things. And so like, I think I’m just going to see, like, the, the guy who is doing the interviewing for the Q&A, I think Josh, his name? (TK affirms) He came out of the start, you know, to kind of give us the run of the show and tell us what was going on. The crowd went wild as soon as he appeared. And he was like, no, no, no, this is this is stollen valor, I’m, I’m not them guys. I’m just here to do the intro.
We didn’t care. The whole, you know, the whole audience. 1500 people went absolutely bat crazy for, you know, just just being there and being excited. And so full of excitement that this was finally happening. So when Greg and Alex came out, you know, almost an hour later, after a 45 minute episode and all the rest of it, we went bonkers. We went absolutely crazy. And, you know, some people should have been tired. It was freezing cold. People have been having travel issues and all the rest, but they made it and they were just like, please take our love in the form of us standing up and screaming at you for is a good 30s.

TK
It’s the least we can do. Yeah, I definitely agree that because even and I told the group this multiple times, I kept saying like, I forgot, we get to watch the first episode of series, like that because that’s not why I’m going. I mean, I keep forgetting that that’s like the event that was, you know, scheduled. And I’m like, I’m just going to hang out with Greg and Alex.
Like, I don’t, I’m excited about, you know, but I’m going to watch it eventually anyway.

Amanda
it was a nice to have.

TK
However, I will say, that is the way to watch a new episode is with a group of 1500 Taskmaster, that was amazing. That was so much fun because the way that the show is made is that you like they have the studio audience, like, I don’t want to say laugh track because it’s not a laugh track, it’s the studio audience reactions.
So watching that on a huge screen with 15 other, heha 15 other people, can you imagine? 1500 other people was amazing because I felt like I was in the studio audience of the recording of Taskmaster, which was really cool.

Amanda
So I have a theory that I think Alex was, you know, full executive producer hat on would have been watching the reactions so, so closely of ostensibly an American audience seeing an episode for the very first time without any spoilers at all, and seeing who gets laughs, what gets people excited, and all the rest of it because he’s always fascinated to see what you know, what the audience is doing, how it’s reacting to things, what they are liking, or he’s always thinking about that, like you seen like with his Horne Section shows and all the rest. He runs a little experiment going, ‘hey guys, if you hear about it on this podcast, wear a yellow, you know, item of clothing’. And you know, he he’s always like there. He’s turning everything into a game constantly. And so I, I have to believe that he was fascinated and taking notes to see what an American audience would make of you know, a fresh episode of Taskmaster that no one had ever seen before.

TK
Yeah, yeah, I think that I think it would be so lovely to look at his notes, I think to see 1. what type of statistics he’s writing that, like what, what stats does he care about.
But yeah, I mean, I think and I don’t this isn’t a spoiler anymore because the cast has been revealed, but The One American that’s on this series, I think, I mean, obviously got a HUGE cheer from the crowd, like because obviously, like, he’s our boy, (in a New York accent) you know, you come to New York?

Amanda
That’s fine. I getcha

TK
Yeah, yeah, I get yeah. I mean, I feel, I feel like otherwise we pretty much laughed at the same things that the studio audience laughed at.

Amanda
I think so, yeah. So, you know, I mean, you know, obviously, it’s a most biased sample of both samples. These are Taskmaster superfans who have made, you know, the effort and paid the money to come and see this.
So they know they like Taskmaster. Yeah. Except for I think there was one person in the Q&A who said, ‘hey, I’ve brought my boyfriend and he doesn’t really know Taskmaster’. And I’m like, ‘well, welcome’.

TK
Welcome to the fold, my guy. Enjoy. You like the wild? Now, you were saying that we had so much energy and excitement, and even though some of us had come from a very long way away, and, you know, it was freezing cold.
Oh, my gosh, so cold, y’all. It was like, -12°F. It was not fun and wind chill. It was disgusting anyway. But we had every

Amanda
I thought it was delightful. It was thrilling. And I hadn’t seen snow in ages. And I think I was driving up the wall on the way to that diner because I was going, ‘this is lovely’, and you’re like, ‘oh, I hate this’.

TK
I was miserable.

Amanda
Oh, I was having so much fun.

TK
Good, good, good memories though. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, we I don’t know about you, but. So, so we’ll, we’ll talk about why this happened, but that night, we. I stayed up till 2:30 in the morning. My bedtime normally is 9 p.m., I kid you not like we had so much energy,

Amanda
Is that taking into account the timezone difference because there’s like five, is it five hours time zone difference betwee?

TK
Three. So we felt like 11:30 p.m., which still is 2.5 hours past my bedtime. But so, we got the Q&A, which was incredible. We even got, I mean, I don’t know if I should be @-ing myself, but like, I got a personal banter section with them.
Because they, you know, if if anyone, if any listener out there has, has seen or heard the, the bit where they talk about fanfic, because I’m like, why are y’all just bringing this up like you are bringing this up? We didn’t say anything. None of the quest, none of the questions that were asked. Except for the ‘Greg, can you pick Alex up, please?’ or however it was phrased. So delightful. Oh my gosh. Was like, not nothing. Nothing mentioned fanfic and very, very early on in the Q&A, Greg was like, did you know? And we’re like, brother, do we know? Don’t we know. And they were. And Alex was saying like, oh, this 867 on the website that we visited last night and I, forgetting that, you have to have an account and loggin to see the actual number was like, well, all of us were like, ‘that’s not right, those are rookie numbers. Like that’s you’re low balling it man’. And then one I forget which which one of them said it, but they were like was the person over there shouting about nobody. And then we all went really quiet. And I was like 1025. And they’re like, oh, you’ve been writing. You’ve been, there’s more are there?

46:54
Amanda
Yeah, yeah. So that’s fun. It’s crazy.

TK
Yeah. But I mean, they’re just out here bringing it up, which is one of the things that I love about them so much and like, and it was incrediblend aduring that Q&A, Greg was saying, I mean, he was like saying stuff about, he was like calling out a fake title and stuff.
And he was like, oh, you’re the person that wrote Daddy’s Little Screamer,
are you? And I was like, it wasn’t me, but I don’t know, off the top of my
head who it was. Turns out they’re part of our little group online. So we
did, we did know who it was in the end, but. And then he said something
like, oh, you’re on Seth Meyers right now.
And I had no idea what he was talking about. And to be fair to me, he was a couple hours off because Seth Meyers wouldn’t be airing until, yeah, midnight 40, you know, a few hours later. So I was like, ‘what is he talking about’, man, did we figure out what he was talking about. Anyway, were you gonna say something?

Amanda
There’s there’s so much context to be going on here. It’s like going, okay, so Greg, during the, you know, the Q&A brought up the fanfiction and he was like, you know, here’s, you know, the name of a fanfiction. We had no idea where this had come from. We had no, we knew that it was written by one of our people, we knew the website was from. We probably know more about it than we want to do. But we didn’t know why Greg was bringing it up. And then he mentioned this. You know, Seth Meyers show. Which we had already known had been recorded the day before, because a bunch of us had tried desperately through a comedy of errors and, you know, all kinds of shenanigans to try and get tickets to see the taping of The Seth Meyers show, because again, in 2014 or 2024, they had also gone on Seth Meyers.
Seth Meyers seems to be a huge fan of the, you know, British comedy scene or Britcom, as we knew it. And so we know that they had been there and recorded something, you know, the day before the show. And it wasn’t until later that we’re like, ‘oh, we now understand why fanfiction was on Greg’s mind’.A mere less than 24 hours later.

TK
Yeah. Unbelievable. I mean, yeah, with our little group, I mean, we, you know, the 14 of us, there were a lot of emotional highs and emotional lows, and I won’t get into all of it, but if you know, you know, but like, you know, there was like, you know, some people got what they wanted and some people missed out on opportunities, you know, and, and all this kind of stuff.
So it was like, oh, I’m really excited that like, we got to go see them live. We got to go see them do the Q&A. You know, but they didn’t have time for individual selfies after, they didn’t do the stage door after,

Amanda
No, they couldn’t there was it was 1500 of us, you know. It’s like if you just run the maths. You’re like, okay, if you got, you know, a minute with each person,

TK
oh, way too long. I mean, Alex even said

Amanda
It’s bonkers

TK
he said ‘there are 1500 of you, if each of you took five seconds for a selfie, we would be here for over two hours. And we just can’t do that.’
And I was like, you know, the numbers don’t lie. I mean, he’s right. Unfortunately, as much

Amanda
I’m not going to argue numbers with Alex Horne except if it’s how many fanfics are on the. Yeah.

TK
or how tall he is. He can’t be six foot two, five foot four at least.

Amanda
Got to believe one of them.

TK
Yeah, it’s got to be one of them, nothing in between.
But. Yeah. And so we, you know, we collectively all went back to our hotels and most of us had been staying in one hotel. And we were lucky enough to have a TV in the lobby downstairs. And so we’re all we all went, back to our hotel, and this would have been, I don’t know, 10 p.m., 10:30 something like that.
And we knew that Seth, we knew that them on Seth was going to come on at like 12:30-ish. And so we all were like, let’s just stay up and watch, you know, live like together because we’re all like hype. We’re all, you know, like riding this high of like they were there. We got to see them. Like, do you remember when they said this thing or they did this thing like, oh my gosh, this is like incredible. And

Amanda
and simultaneously we were like going, we know the name of this fanfiction. Who wrote this fanfiction? And we’re like scrolling, you know, on our phones to try and figure out who it was that wrote it.
We’re, I confess, I screenshotted the stats, of that fanfiction to be like, okay, how many hits has this got? Because if this is going to get mentioned somewhere, then are they suddenly going to blow up? And so I’m finding out who it is, realizing that they’re someone from our little group who’s not, you know, in New York with us and messaging them frantically going, ‘hey, if you want to hide, we’ve, we’ve got super legitimate insider information that you’re going to get mentioned somewhere. So if you want to hide, hide now.’ Unfortunately, timezones and they were sleeping soundly somewhere across the Atlantic. So they, they missed their opportunity, but thankfully they were totally okay with it. And it turned out they weren’t the only one.

TK
Yeah, little did we know that more than, because for for us, for our little group, I think specifically we are overjoyed and so excited whenever they mention fanfic, because it’s just ridiculous that they do it in the first place. And it’s so funny when they do it and we’re like, and we’ll be like, we know that person, that like they you know, I think out of all of the fanfic they’ve ever officially mentioned, I think there’s only like one person that we don’t personally know wrote it, like 1 or 2

Amanda
Yes. And they are like the origin, they’re like from the, the old time.

TK
Yeah. Like you know years and years ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, so we were all like really excited and we were saying up in the lobby and, Seth Meyers comes on and we’re like, okay, like this. This is exciting. Like, here are the boys. And we’re all trying very hard to be quiet because we want to be watching this thing. And we don’t want to miss anything. And then they go on.

Amanda
and I think this is the moment where something like, weird, I had, like, a sixth sense and I’m like, I’m, oh, I’m going to record this with my phone, which makes and makes no sense because obviously they’re going to release the episode and, you know, they’re going to do clips and all the rest of it, you know, if fun stuff is mentioned, you know, as Alex and Greg go there, but I’m like, no, I’m on my phone and I’m like a really sharp angle to the screen and I’m just recording the screen on my phone, and I don’t even know why I’m doing it.

TK
I’m so glad he did because they so they bring up, you know, they talk a little bit, with Seth and then.
And then Seth brings up fanfic first. I think

Amanda
They’re talking about being invited to weddings. Greg and Alex are going. Yeah, we’ve been invited to, like, at least three weddings, and, you know, they’re going, oh, yeah, we’ll turn up even if they don’t want us to. It’ll be great. And then Seth goes, but it’s not just weddings, is it?
He goes, I know there’s there’s been some fanfiction and Greg’s like, yes!

TK
Greg was so excited.

Amanda
His face lights up like he’s like, oh, I’m so ready for this.

TK
And all of us are freaking out, collectively because, I mean, out of the 14 of us, like, how many of us actively write to us, Taskmaster Fanfic? A good chunk of us.

Amanda
Oh, yeah.

TK
A good, good chunk. And so we’re all like, oh my gosh, they’re doing this like, are you kidding me? And then and then Seth’s like, oh, did you bring any to read out? And Alex is like I know he did. And I’m like and then grabs a physical piece of paper and I’m like printed. Bro, bou did not print out fanfic, OUR fanfic that we wrote and read it live on.
Well, I guess it’s not live, but like read it out on national television.

Amanda
Yeah. In front of a live studio audience.

TK
Oh my gosh. So at this point we’re kind of like, well, I guess it’s good that y’all didn’t get in to see the recording, because that would have been, I think because like we mentioned before, we tried to get in and it was myself and one of the our other group was in like the last ten people who could have gotten into the seats and I was like, number six and a friend, you know, from, from our group was number seven. And they picked one, two, three and four people to go in. And so I was literally just two people away from being in. And I, I swear, I think I could have handled it. I think I could have kept a lid on it and not just fainted in the seats, but I’ll never know for sure.

TK
And now that I’m thinking about it, I, I think I am personally, like, selfishly very glad that neither of you went because can you imagine having to like, there’s no way you would have not told us that. You know, because then the whole thing would have not been a surprise. I mean, it would have been, we would have been like shaking you, being like, give us details.
What exactly did they say?

Amanda
It would have been me and our other friend coming out of that looking like we’ve just, you know, walked off a, war field, you know, you know, something like that. A shell shock on our faces just being like, did that just happen? You know, we would have been spiraling not knowing what, because we would have been on our phones being like, hey guys, we got in and it’s really exciting. Oh my goodness, it’s supposed to be them. And then it would have been radio silence for the entire time that Alex and Greg were there, because obviously nothing else matters. We’re just paying attention to the guys. And then we would have been stuck. We wouldn’t have known what to do. It would have been, I think me and the other person would have just, like hidden in our rooms would be like, you can’t talk to anyone.
Sorry. Amanda’s not home right now.

TK
So I guess it did kind of work out. Probably for the best. And then Greg’s like, yeah, I’ll read it for you. And he just starts reading. I think he just he, does he? He doesn’t name drop the titles first I think he starts reading first

Amanda
He names the first one and then goes, let me read it to you. And he was like and watch Alex because he gets so uncomfortable because he doesn’t he doesn’t like being touched. And of course Alex is like, the picture of uncomfortable and and Seth is like asking you feeling uncomfortable. He’s like, I don’t I’m feeling uncomfortable with this being read on American television, which I think is the most telling part, because, American television is a world that he doesn’t know.
You know, he he dabbled, obviously, with the sadly, you know, not so great, you know, Taskmaster US but that that would just under underline his lack of awareness of what you can or can’t do, you know, with an American audience, you know. And so I just love the bit where he’s, like, literally grabbing hold of Seth desk.
He needs this to hold it steady while his, you know, experience is happening and Greg is leaning further and further and further over towards his chair.

TK
I, so unnecessary, honestly, I mean, Well, yeah, I mean, it is, interesting because so far, every other time that fanfic has been brought up by one of the two of them, it’s always been Alex.
And so we’re like, suddenly Alex is like, oh, I’m not comfortable talking about this on American television.

Amanda
We’ve certainly seen some like outtakes and stuff like that, where Greg has been, you know, like when Frankie brought the fan art in and you could see that Greg was kind of leaning back and his his throne, and he’s thinking about it for a second and he goes, do you know?
And he goes to, you know, there’s, there’s been a distressing amount of fanfic written about us. And you’re like, have you been, looking since Greg? What’s going on? Because, you know, he it was Alex who brought up in the first place and horrified Greg who just yes-and-ed him during the podcast and ran with it and was had his whole mind blown, I think, by the fact that this even existed.
And that was years and years ago now. So he’s he’s been on a journey has our Greg.

TK
Yeah. How far we’ve come

Amanda
indeed, very much so.

TK
But yeah. So, you know, he just casually reads out, a couple of snippets and we collectively lose our minds because there were two of our group that were in the lobby that got their, their fics either read out loud or name dropped, which was incredible.
And, and then the other three that he named dropped were all from our little fan group, which was ridiculous. And so, you know, and of course, this is, it’s like 1 a.m. at this point and we’re like, messaging every other. We’re like, okay, which which fic like who wrote this one? Oh, oh. Is this person okay? We got to message. And so we’re like all, oh, we’re all on our phones afterwards. So we’re all just like, did that actually really just happen? Like what is going on? And then of course, you know, now it’s up on YouTube and it’s up on Instagram and, and the, the, the days afterwards was so much fun because I’ve watched that video like at least once since.
Yeah. I mean, literally if I, like starting to get in a bad mood, I’m like, hold on, let me pull up YouTube. I really just downloaded on my phone at this point because it’s how often I’ve watched it. But, you know, the the comments on the videos are so funny because it’s like, can you imagine being one of those writers?
And we’re like, oh my gosh, wouldn’t that be a wild if you were just like, all in a room with your writer friends together? while while you freak out, that would be so wild.

Amanda
Yeah, yeah, I mean, that would never happen that that’s too crazy for real life, that sounds like fiction itself.

TK
Oh, that’s definitely, somebody wrote that, a fan, fact or fanfic?

Amanda
No, no. If we wrote that into fanfiction, people would be like, seems a bit unrealistic, guys, you know, turn it down a bit.

TK
Yeah. So I honestly out of the entire trip, I think that was my favorite part, was just sitting in a room of our people, having our stuff getting called out on Seth Meyers was ridiculous.

Amanda
I mean, like you said, we were already riding the high of attending, you know, the premiere, the Q&A, being in that room with 1500 other, you know, Taskmaster fans screaming their throats hoarse with excitement and happiness and joy and seeing all of this new stuff, and Alex and Greg running up and down the aisles to try and provide people with selfie opportunities, because we honestly, they know they can’t stage door, but they were trying to give us something anyway. And that, you know, that desperate attempt to give us that personal connection. They’re too good to us

TK
They really are. I mean, this is definitely something we’ll be talking about as the podcast goes on, because they are so good to us. And we I personally just feel very, very lucky that the this is, you know, the fandom that I’m in, because they are lovely and we are lovely.
The fans are. Well, at least our little group, I don’t go on Reddit or anything, but

Amanda
I’m sure they’re lovely there too.

TK
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So yeah. So that was, that was New York and now everybody’s home. And I think, was yesterday they dropped that, that, Instagram video

Amanda
What even is time anymore? It’s hard to keep up. It’s like, ever since there’s been little bits and bobs like that, people posting that they, you know, they got a selfie with Greg when they were, like, running around somewhere. They met them in the park. There was the whole, portrait that they got done in Central Park. And then one minute they’re going, this is the worst thing I’ve ever seen, my wife says it’s terrible, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then Greg is posting up on his Instagram saying, if anyone has any problems with this, you’ve got me to answer to. And we’re all like, bro? Like you said, it was crap. And it’s it’s definitely, you know, it’s a thing. And you know, we had to look at it and we compared it, probably shouldn’t, to some of the work that you know our fan artist friends have been making and going, yeah, guys, guys, you want your portraits done, you just let us know, you know, we’ll help you out.

TK
Yeah. You should have just kind of us. I don’t know what to tell you. And then, like you said, the official like Taskmaster account even posted this just, like, Instagram style, you know, video, which if a fan had made that video, no one would have blinked it’d be like, oh yeah, you know, yeah someone’s collected a bunch of, you know, clips and photographs from, you know, Alex and Greg and put it together and made it look all lovey dovey and like, they’re going out on dates.
No, this is official. This is real stuff that they released and they planned all of it. And they’re posing for photographs and they’re like doing little videos next to each other. And we lost our our gosh dang minds again. You know, it’s just a constant sequence of losing our minds.

TK
Yeah, it’s really fun. Honestly.

Amanda
It’s fantastic. It’s like you wake up and you go, what the heck happened now?

TK
I know, I mean, it’s it’s so nice being in a fandom that what I would say is not dead, where, you know,

Amanda
very much alive.

TK
Oh, yeah. I mean, well, for one thing, like, the show is actively still going on, so that definitely helps.

Amanda
May that long continue

TK
But seriously, but yeah, they just they just keep giving us new content, which is awesome.
And, yeah, it’s I mean, I would love to find out at some point, like. So there are like two parts to what I want to find out. The first part is, they have to have someone in charge of like, okay, we’re going to do this for the socials. Who is that person?

Amanda
Social manager. Yeah, yeah.

TK
Right. Like we’re going to do the Harry met Sally thing who signed off on this? But then so, the second part of this is, because when we went to the Q&A, and Greg brought up fanfic or maybe it was, maybe it was on Seth Meyers that he said this, but Greg said, like, I read them to him and we’re all like, you do not. You do not go to this website and read fanfic.
Like, you don’t have time for that. Like, you you don’t. And

Amanda
but also he said that it was the sexiest thing he’d ever been involved in and we’re sat there going, what? We’ll take that. Thank you.

TK
You are welcome sir. But yeah, I mean, I would love to because, surely it is not him going on this website. And being like, scrolling through.
Surely it’s not. So what I want to know is who is doing it because someone is doing it. Like these are real fics written by real people

Amanda
and, and some of the bits that are quoted. And you notice this yourself are not from like the, the opening paragraphs or some of their from the very last paragraphs on an ongoing story, you know, so either they’ve read the whole thing, which can run to many, many thousands of words. And even Alex was like some of these are 20,000 words. It’s like going, oh, honey, you don’t know the half of it. But someone has, you know, read through a whole bunch of these and has like picked out paragraphs for Greg to seductively read, you know, and whisper into Alex’s ear on television for the American audience, from from various places.
And I think we’d had to look at and we worked out that the ones that got called out, the five fic titles that got called out had either been posted or updated in a relatively recent window. So like in the last maybe two weeks or something like that, I think maybe we can have two weeks. So they maybe didn’t, you know, scroll back a lot.
You know, when they were looking for something. And the other thing that it seems to be is they go after, excuse me. Like suggestive titles I think is something that they enjoy, although definitely there are some outliers there where you’re like, this doesn’t seem to match their pattern. What is their criteria for selecting these things?
It’s truly fascinating.

TK
Yeah, it really is. And I know that we our group had a very long, in-depth discussion in person about this and online when we went back home about, you know, like some of these titles, like, why did they pick that one? Because like you said, it was kind of an outlier. And it’s like, it’s not like Daddy’s Little Screamer.
Like easy, easy

Amanda
It’s gonna get laughs. It’s Greg, you know, catnip. That one is he’s going to be like all about that.

TK
Yeah right. But like, Big Strong Hero, Jester and the King. Neither of those necessarily are like, immediately you hear it and you’re like, haha that’s hilarious right. Like if I mean like maybe Jester and the King but like he is you know I don’t know maybe it’s all relative but it’s, it’s so interesting and I, I truly do want to know who is actively going to this website and picking these fics and, actively typing them up and printing them out so that they can read them.

Amanda
Is it someone on the Taskmaster or the Avalon side, or is this something that, you know Seth Meyers set up on his side?

TK
I don’t,

Amanda
we just don’t know for that one.

TK
Yeah. We don’t. So if, if I ever get to figure that out, I mean, this is like my top question at this point is like, who and if and if and I swear if Greg is like, no, I do it, I’d be like, I’m not.
I don’t believe you

Amanda
Well, that’s that’s the thing perhaps, you know, slightly less focused, shall we say, fans of the show might not be aware of is like every single thing that Greg and Alex says you have to take with the largest bucket of salt that you can possibly carry, you know, possibly two buckets of salt if you can get them, because they’re liars who lie in, you know, as long as whatever is that they say is going to be funny, they’ll go with funny over the truth every single time.
So if you ask them straight up, you know, who’s the one who read through this? If Greg thinks, it’s funnier to say that it’s him. He’ll absolutely say that. Cannot pin down these guys.

TK
No, it’s it’s so frustrating. But it’s it’s also very, very fun.

Amanda
Yes. It’s it’s part of the toolbox and part of like this, this weird morphing that they do between what is fact, what is all of the different kinds of, you know, canon and stuff like that. It’s it’s just fascinating to try and play with it.

TK
Yeah. It really is. Well, I think we’re going to wrap this section up. So Amanda, thank you so much for coming on our pilot episode of the podcast.

Amanda
Thank you, T.K.,

TK
and helping us, get through it. I’m going to keep you on here. Which I don’t know, I probably won’t do for future guests.
Just to go through our a little last bit here, so we’ll say goodbye to the guests.

Amanda
Thank you very much for having me.

TK
Thank you for coming. Dun dun dun dun dun dun dun. All right. And then, suggesting fan work. So my suggestion is the five shout outs from Seth Meyers. Go read. Okay, so there were five.
So there was Big Strong Hero.

[intermission music]

TK
There’s My Good Boy. That was the first one mentioned, I believe, on Seth.

Amanda
Yes. And that’s, you know, somewhat suggestive.

TK
uh, see, all. One, two, three. Oh, yeah. Make Alex Finish, Your Time Starts Now.

Amanda
That’s right. And Alex, quite uncharacteristically, says we thought about that for a task. Hang on, Alex Horne that’s quite risky for you.

TK
Yeah. So yeah go check out those those five folks. What else? Yeah. That was the, the pilot for the Transformative Taskmaster podcast. We are on BlueSky. We are on. What else are we on? I’m not on the socials.

Amanda
You might do a slightly tighter version of this where

TK
we’re online somewhere. Oh, actually, I know

Amanda
where you get your your podfics.

TK
Yeah, we’ll, we’ll be on Spotify. I don’t know if this will be on Spotify, but we’ll be on Spotify. We’re on Tumblr. We are on the website. The the website. We are on tftaskmaster.uk for all of your links, and updates, which we will do soon and we are also on email. So if you want to email us with any fanmade recommendations, podcast suggestions, or really anything else you’d like to say. R.E. , I started to say, R.E the other day and somebody was like, what are you talking about? R.E as, like like the email thing, you know, like regarding, Yeah. Regarding, like, oh, we talked about this, but we didn’t go too in-depth on it. Challenge accepted. Tell us, tell us what you want us to go in depth on, because that’s literally why we’re here.

Amanda
And we can,

TK
and we can, and we will. That is a threat. If you want to reach out, for anything, email us at fans@tftaskmaster.uk. And we will take your words into consideration.

VO
Are you playing a radio four panel game?

TK
But anyway, I gotta figure out, like an outro. Yeah. Thanks for for listening and we’ll see you next time.

[trumpet]

TK
Thank you for listening to Transformative Taskmaster. You can find us on our website at tftaskmaster.uk, which has links to our socials, previously recorded episodes, and updates. If you have any fan made recommendations, suggestions for the podcast or anything else you’d like to say. Email us at. fan@tftaskmaster.uk.
Set outro video. No, I don’t have that.

Amanda
Wow.