Armageddapocalypse: The Explosioning

The most challenging thing about this show is the spelling of the title – armaggeda…what? – which is by no means a criticism. This is comedy at its revelling-in-dumbed-down spoofiest fun.

Lucien Young, who co-wrote Armageddapocalypse with James Moran, explains in the press release, that the aim is imagine “the stupidest movie ever made” and present it as a remaindered DVD with feature extras, including director’s commentary (it started out as a sexed-up adaptation of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility) and deleted scenes. In so doing, the pair draws on countless film and television franchises and the action thriller heroes they’ve spawned – James Bond, Jason Bourne, Jack Bauer – to come up with their own maverick agent.

Jack Lang (missed opportunity to continue the JB initial tradition) is so maverick he files himself under Q instead of M, so selfless that he snorts all the confiscated cocaine himself so there’s no chance of kiddies becoming addicts, so dangerous that requests to tidy his desk enrage him to “go rogue”.

This is 24 given the loving, and always knowing, Austin Powers treatment in quintessentially Fringe style, with no-budget special effects and a delightfully rough-and-ready performance by a young company. The equally youthful late-night audience lapped it up.