User reviews

Procedural police shows finally get the parody they have been long asking for in this occasionally hilarious and frequently amusing offering from Charlie Brooker. Cloth, the eponymous protagonist, portrayed with a knowing degree of over-acting by the fabulous John Hannah, is that favourite genre trope: a damaged, veteran officer, called in to resolve the 100th annual murder on the unfortunately named Rundowne Estate.

Wordplay and smart exchanges between the chief characters abounds as Cloth and his "Modern Lesbian" DC, Anne Oldman (say it out loud), pun their way through a series of grisly murder scenes. Ably assisting the satire are a slew of other familiar faces portraying similarly cookie-out characters, most memorably Julian Rhind-Tutt as the authoritarian, disapproving Boss.

Where A Touch of Cloth distinguishes itself from other, less effective parodies is that no aspect of the gritty Crime drama TV is safe from its mocking barbs. Direction, sound-editing and pacing are subtly (and, on occasion, not so subtly) exposed to criticism. Cameras follow characters as they do pointless circuits around rooms, mulling over exposition, scenes of violence are repeatedly and unnecessarily revisited with the same sound effects repeating themselves over and over again.

However, in one respect A Touch of Cloth does let itself and its otherwise highly intelligent script down, and that is the sexual humour. While not averse to the odd sex-related gag, and fully aware that this is the 21st Century, these felt out of place and really did not add anything to what is otherwise the finest spoof of procedural police dramas since The Naked Gun.

One of the best cop shows ever. Too many shows out there are renewed year after year even though they dont deserve a pilot in the first place. That money should instead be put into shows like this one, entertaining but smart too so that people dont keep getting dumber by the minute. Great how this pokes fun at overly dramatic tv shows and movies. Both Hannah and Jones are top notch. Great acting, great directing, great writing. More please!

This is, quite simply, one of the funniest things I've seen in a long time. I was chuckling, giggling, and howling with laughter throughout most of the show. When I wasn't, I was most grateful; these small pauses allowed me to breath again.

There's an abundance of visual and auditory gags in every scene, each one as funny as the last. (Very) That, combined with unnecessary stunts and scenes that are funny without needing the above makes a show that most people will watch again and again.

Overall, unless you have had a sense-of-humour bypass, I suspect that you'll be in hysterics after watching this.

If you love "Airplane", "Naked Gun" and "Top Secret" you will love this too. Please make more episodes.

When you think of something different how different do you want it. The usual expectations fall short every time things should be predictable and a new gag is ready. At times not so easy to understand but just review the scene. Nothing is sacred for the writers of the show, anything is worth a laugh. I laughed my head off when the double in the sex scene is not the usual beauty but a bad looking man that doubles a woman. The over the top effects remind us of how we take for granted the language and the standards in movies that are in fact more than real. The English are great at inventing satire from zero and making the obvious seem new. If you want to laugh at all levels of intelligence you can take a chance at ''A touch of cloth'' it will not let you down.

A new and original comedy/crime spoof that had me in stitches from start to finish . I couldn't take my eyes off the screen because as well as verbal lines of comedy you also had the visual effects which included ' datdere yute club' as a black youngster had told officers , and once they got to the club ,thats exactly what it was called. Personally ,the best lines were too many to mention but the scene in the morgue where a body was missing a tongue and the attendant mentioned that it appeared cunnilingus had taken place , 'wheres(wears) the tongue ?' the officer asked and the reply came back ,'yes it certainly does!' Genius writing mixed with great acting helped this become 1 of the funniest things i have seen for some time and i cant wait for the next episode :) If you enjoy a laugh that includes spoken and visual effects ,this is for you

Unlike radeburger2000 I am actually going to criticise this show, not rant about how bad it is without explaining why. He says he can't write a good, funny movie; he can't write a good, insightful review either.

First of all A Touch of Cloth was not 10/10, as other reviewers have said, nor was it 1/10. It was a mix of some superb jokes, some good ones, and some duds. When you watch it remember, do not take it seriously. I found it did such a good job of LOOKING like a cop drama a part of me was trying to take it seriously, forgetting that this was just supposed to be silly and fun no matter how serious it was trying to seem.

I would say the pacing of the jokes was too quick at some points, barely giving one a chance to process one joke before another comes. Also the number of visual gags, some of which you might miss first time, are numerous. You CAN have too much of a good thing but overall I found the jokes more satisfying than not.

I wouldn't say it felt as natural as films like Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, Naked gun, which it shares similarities with, sometimes appearing a bit smug in its knowledge of the subject it was parodying.

BUT as I said, overall I found it satisfying with more jokes hitting than not. The actors did a good job and like I said, it looks like a very convincing cop drama. I just hope they don't overload the next reported episodes and give the jokes a chance to breath

All of the negative reviews of the show centre around repeatedly stating the fact that this is not Black Mirror or it's like Airplane, it isn't Blsck Mirror get over it, it is like Airplane that was the intention get over it.

I watched an interview with Charlie Brooker before seeing this so maybe the fact that I knew what to expect before watching helped.

The show was brilliant from beginning to end, the jokes were well timed and numerous holding me between a smirk and out loud laughter all the way through.

The only reason I gave it 9 and not 10 is because there's always room for improvement.

Very enjoyable send-up of your standard police procedural. Some of the clichés used like: "Come and have a look at this, Guv" and "I heard it from the boys down the station" are so familiar that I laughed out loud.

I notice a couple of reviewers had trouble seeing the funny side of this show and compared it with others like Naked Gun. I liked the Naked Gun movies, but they also had some flat moments, especially in the later entries. Not everything works, it's just what you get out of it overall, and I found a Touch of Cloth an amusing diversion.

I've always thought comedy is the most difficult genre. Not everyone can laugh at a pie in the face, nor can they laugh at a long self-deprecating monologue. It's what strikes your fancy that works and this one struck mine.

The comparisons elsewhere to the likes of the Naked Gun and Airplane franchises are certainly accurate. But the closest analog to this series is a wonderful US basic-cable product that followed a few years later - Angie Tribeca. Both are weekly sitcoms that deserved longer runs than they got. The versatile John Hannah leads this cast flawlessly, with everyone knocking out their deadpan lines and takes perfectly. Be sure to keep your hand on the remote. The series emulates The Simpsons in amusing-to-hilarious background signs that you'll only catch by rewinding and pausing.

Being a fan of Police Squad I have to say that I found much of this show cringe worthy as it essentially tried (and failed) to remake a classic.

Some of the jokes were funny and some were not, some of the visuals were funny and some were not but one thing they all had in common is that I'd seen and heard them all before…

This show would have been very funny had it been original but if you really want to watch such comedy then watch Police Squad… or Sledge Hammer for that matter.

is this 10 lines yet IMDb?

A Touch of Cloth is great fun, brings me back to the golden days of spoofs and slap stick comedy. Hotshot, Aeroplane, Naked Gun.. etc. I has very clever writing and word play. Well done Mr. Brooker you did it again.

Re-watch value is really good as a lot of things happens in the background so keep your eyes peeled for some jems.

The acting is good and the dead pan expressions from John Hannah go well with the comedy.

It a really good laugh and I would recommend it to anyone who is up for some silliness.

Charlie Brooker basically doing for dour British police procedural what Airplane did for hysterical disaster movies. In fact this is so closely modeled on the Zucker spoof principals means that in some ways this is more of a tribute to them than it is to the UK crime shows. It's so niche a tonal combination that it alienated many at the time and it has been consigned to the cult bin. Good. I live in there.

This takes the form of three "series" composed of a single plot each - much like the ITV Britcop dramas it lampoons - John Hannah and the great Suranne Jones are magnificent as the "straight-faced" leads although Rhind-Tutt's camply pompous Tom Boss never quite works. The wider cast is a minor who's who of British character actors like Brian Cox, Stephen Dillane and Adrian Dunbar and in the last series you even get a pre-Hollywood Karen Gillan which feels genuinely insane. The first and second are notably stronger than the third but I'm secretly quite glad it didn't get the twelve episodes it was initially mooted to have (!)

The style is a heady cocktail of overwhelmingly relentless sight-gags, puns, format parodies, background jokes, wrong-footers, double entendres - you name it. It's a breathless whirligig of humour - not all of it lands, some of it is dated already, or childishly scatological, or incredibly clever, or baldly hilarious, or absolutely brilliant. It rewards repeated viewings, it's tremendously fun and it's almost exactly my sort of thing so fair play to it for that and it's the sort of thing I'm nearly daily reminded how glad I am that it even got made in the first place.

I really don't know how the actors kept a straight face through this. We would love to see the outtakes.

Double entendres & puns abound! Kind of Monty Python in a cop show. We love it.

It makes Inspector Clouseau look serious!

Produced by Adam Tandy (The Thick of It), Charlie Brooker's new cop show "A Touch of Cloth" (penned with TV Burp writer Dan Maier) is quite simply brilliant. In every scene, every line of dialogue, you can almost taste Brooker's bitter, vitriolic view of the universe, and that makes it very funny indeed.

DI Jack Cloth is beautifully underplayed by John Hannah, who I still cannot watch without expecting him, at any moment, to utter "stop all the clocks," and burst into tears. Cloth has the usual arbitrary, drink soaked, tragic past, and he and his partner Anne Oldman (pronounced Old Man) soon find themselves at Rundowne Estate, investigating the grisly murder of a pensioner. As the murders stack-up, and the blood splatters gratuitously, the gags come thick and fast. Naked Gun meets The Comic Strip. Airplane meets CSI Miami on the set of The Bill.

Brooker & Maier employ visual and verbal repetition with the flair of Seth McFarlance, and use deconstruction delightfully – like when police chief Tom Boss tells his team to get over to crime scenes "during the ad break". The script may be a little unsubtle at times, but who cares. Watch it, record it and then watch it again.

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I've seen Charlie Brooker's work before, his books, and various 'Wipes', and in today's all-inclusive, homogeneous, participation medal world, his way of railing against the system is a welcome breath of fresh air.

I've never really watched his other, fictional stuff before- not really my thing, but after having bumped into this by accident, I've changed my mind.

It's a kind of intelligent slapstick- Euclid meets Airplane! The Movie. And like Airplane! There's so much going on, so much in the background, that multiple views are a must.

It's just a shame that there's only six of them, but they pack in more content than any twenty six episode season of practically any other show.

Ideal with a six pack and a pizza.

10/10

Now..., what's this 'Black Mirror' thing..... 🍄

There are a wealth of fine British programs in action, crime, comedy genres. This isn't one of them. The puns and humor are sophomoric and pointless. If this is supposed to be following the pattern of films like Airplane, Naked Gun and the like, someone should tell them it's time has long since passed. This isn't funny. It's just ridiculous. Don't waste your time.

American and British humour are very different, and it takes a very funny show or film indeed to make it across the Atlantic (in either direction, I suspect); and there was a rash of similar ones back in the eighties and early nineties - including 'Naked Gun', 'Airplane' and 'Hot Shots!' - that made it eastwards.

Episode 1 of this show seemed a bit like a Brit try at one (or all) of the above and, while a bit scatter-gun for my liking, was quite amusing; but not really "British".

Episode 2 seems to have calmed down a bit, and is none the worse off for it. Perhaps it takes a show like this a little while to find its comedy 'beat' (as it did BlackAdder), and I hope that, now that it has done, it's given the chance to prove that it works - or not.

On the evidence that I see, Episode 2 was a lot better than Episode 1, because it relied more on words and acting, and less on sight gags. And I have to say I was glad to see the last of PC Cardboard Cutout (I hope). Good sight gag; but not worth repeating. And to be honest, if it settles down even more in the next series, I don't think I'll mind at all - but please guys, keep DC Asap Qureshi and the doff of the head every time Oldman says "the boys down the station".

It probably doesn't hurt that I'm a big fan of both stars - John Hannah and sexy Suranne Jones (I'm so glad we Brits can still produce top-class crumpet who don't look like Barbie dolls) - especially as both are known for their intensity rather than their comedy skills.

So far, what I see is a funny, quirky show that seems to be getting better. Looking forward to the next series.

Not a crime show, fortunately! Found this amazing show on Amazon by chance and was absolutely hooked in minutes. The writing is pure genius, 100% exceptional dry, deadpan humor performed with perfect timing and great chemistry amongst the actors.

I'm not even through the first episode, yet and already know that this is going to be only the 2nd television show ever for me to watch over and over without it ever getting old. Will be searching for the outtakes!

I first started watching this, not realizing that was supposed to be a spoof. It made its way into my watch list because I like John Hannah and thought, why not check this out? It starts out seriously looking and then goes goofy. Definitely a British version of "Naked Gun" style goofy. :)) Is it perfect? No. Will be there be duds? Flat jokes? Scenes where the "haha" attempt was overdone? Yes. But overall, it is very much worth watching - if you're into that that kind of humor.