Cliff Notes – Channel 4 comedy branded ‘a gift’ to be greatest comeback of 2025
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David Mitchell and Robert Webb are set to return with a new sketch show, Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping, premiering in September 2025 after a 12-year hiatus since Peep Show.
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The six-part series will feature a mix of established and emerging comedic talent, including Kiell Smith-Bynoe and Lara Ricote, aiming to revitalise the sketch comedy genre.
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Early reactions to the preview suggest a blend of awkwardness and absurdity, with fans expressing high expectations for the show’s comedic depth and originality.
Channel 4 comedy branded ‘a gift’ to be greatest comeback of 2025
They’re back! After more than a decade, David Mitchell and Robert Webb are bringing back the sketch show with a brand new comedy.
Channel 4 has finally released a first look clip and image from the upcoming series Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping, a brand new sketch show hitting screens in September 2025.
The six-part season reunites comedy giants Mitchell and Webb on screen for the first time since 2017’s Back and 12 years since the end of Peep Show, where they’ll be joined by the next generation of comedy heroes, including Ghosts star and Great British Sewing Bee’s best-ever host Kiell Smith-Bynoe, Lara Ricote, Stevie Martin, and Krystal Evans.
The first preview of Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping shows a flustered Mitchell sweating his way through airport security, manifesting our biggest fears while also feeling terrifyingly accurate.
It’s painfully awkward, completely absurd and fans are already calling the show ‘a gift’.
While many viewers of the preview said they ‘can’t wait’, Mitchell and Webb fan Henry Shevlin has high hopes the show will be even funnier.
First look at Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping shows the comedy giants at their best (Picture: Channel 4)
He wrote on X: ‘Mitchell & Webb are probably my favourite British comedians so looking forward to this. The sketch itself isn’t that brilliant but maybe C4 went for one with “broad appeal” and the actual show will be weirder and nerdier.’
Ahead of its launch, Mitchell and Webb said: ‘When Channel 4 asked us to do another sketch show we were startled, bemused and available.
‘It’s a perilous time for the industry and so it’s our hope that relaunching the trickiest genre of comedy is a brilliant piece of counterintuitive commissioning.
Mitchell And Webb Are Not Helping will lead the next generation of comedy giants (Picture: Channel 4)
Mitchell and Webb’s Peep Show ended 12 years ago on Channel 4 (Picture: Channel 4)
‘And we’re confident that unlike Roger Moore with his shoe on the bonnet of a car teetering on the edge of a cliff in For Your Eyes Only [REPLACE WITH 21ST CENTURY REFERENCE?] we’re not about to give British TV comedy a final lethal nudge into the abyss.
‘We’re looking forward to working with our brilliant new cast despite their youth and talent and would like to encourage viewers to watch the advert break carefully and do their best to buy something.
‘It doesn’t have to be a car but, you know, a box of chocolates or an app or something.’
Smith-Bynoe added: ‘Getting to join this project with comedy legends Mitchell & Webb feels like getting to sit on the grown-ups table that you’ve been trying to get on for years, then you realise the grown-ups are just as funny, silly and they’ll let you have a sip of Advocaat.
‘I’m really excited to be a part of this long-awaited return of comedy royalty.’
The duo’s last sketch show, Mitchell and Webb Look, won them a Bafta for Best Comedy and ran for four seasons on the BBC.
Mitchell and Webb Are Not Helping launches on Channel 4 next month.
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