Catastrophe

Image c Channel 4

Catastrophe
3 / 5

Series: Two
Aired: 2015
Channel: Channel 4
Writer: Sharon Horgan and Rob Delaney
Cast: Sharon Horgan, Rob Delaney, Carrie Fisher, Ashley Jensen, Mark Bonner et al

This was a genuine surprise for me. I watched it with low expectations, not really being a fan of Sharon Horgan (though not disliking her, either) and having no idea who Rob Delaney was (honestly I thought it was Gary Delaney, Sarah Millican's comedian husband...). Suffice is to say, I wasn't sure what I was expecting, though from the premise it didn't sound altogether too exciting.

Sharon (an Irish in England working as a teacher) meets Rob (an American in England on business) and they have a one-night stand. This culminates in a pregnancy and Rob moves over to England to help take care of it all. It's a whirlwind kind of comedy and the nine months pass by in a blur of six 25-minute episodes.

The most surprising thing for me was that it was, at times, laugh-out-loud funny. Sounds stupid, but bear with me. My pre-conceived idea of it, being a Channel 4 comedy was thus: sex, drugs, swearing, young people, idiots, inanity and things of that ilk. It contained none of that, except the sex, which was used with comedic purposes (rarely is it) as is obvious from the plot. It didn't really feel like a C4 comedy, but then again it didn't feel like a BBC one, either (who turned it down at script-stage). It was somewhere in between, something which I haven't seen on TV for quite a while.

Perhaps it has a smattering of the American comedy about it, with Rob's influence, but it felt British to an extent. It has a contemporary look to it and, though one-night-stand pregnancies have been done before, it's a very refreshing take on it. It petered out slightly towards the end before rearing up again during the final episode wherein a new catastrophe became apparent, but the chemistry between Sharon and Rob was undeniable. They had such a good rapport and their relationship was tumultuous as one would expect, and (most of) the supporting cast really helped to mould them in to these roles.

At times it felt a little all over the place, possibly because there were too many characters introduced simultaneously, and a couple of them were irritatingly frequently present, but altogether it was a decent comedy that outshone my expectations rather alarmingly.