> home | dvd reviews | dvd archive  
THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMEN Series 3 
Released by Roadshow Entertainment.  2 Disc Set. Available to buy now.

Every so often a comedy TV show comes along that changes peoples perceptions, in the sixties it was Python and Spike Miligan’s Q series, in the seventies it was Not the Nine O’Clock News and for today’s viewer we have the extraordinary League of Gentlemen.

Starring the trio of Reece Shearsmith, Steve Pemberton and Mark Gatiss The League of Gentlemen is like nothing you’ve ever seen before, very dark but supremely funny, the series concerns the activities of the residents of the residents of the small northern town of Roston Vasey ( a nice in joke as Royston Vasey is the real name of foul mouthed northern stand up comic Roy “Chubby” Brown). The guys play at least  90% of the characters, extremely well too it has to be said. Strange things happen in Royston Vasey, from the shop on the dark satanic hill (“this is a local shop for local people”) run by the sinister Tubbs and his wife whose son may or may not be a deranged beast that lives on human flesh and is kept in the cellar, to restart councillor Pauline and her pen obsession to visiting German teacher Herr Lipp. The guys (along with fourth member of the team Jeremy Dyson who doesn’t appear only co-writing the scripts) spent the first two series honing their skills and making the comedy progressively darker before embarking on series 3, this series is genuinely shocking, heavily influenced by the gothic horror of the 1970’s Hammer movies  and containing  all manner of pop culture references, also rather than just being a series of linked sketches the series builds toward a genuine climax, each episode following the same sort of structure but seen through the eyes of a different character each time, for this series the guys ventured outside of Royston Vasey for the first time setting one whole episode “down in London”.

This is exceptional stuff and despite containing several hands over the eyes moments is still full of laugh out loud material, couple that with a fantastic package of extras and you have a release you won’t want to miss.

In 20 years time people will talk about the League boys the way they do about the Monty Python crew.

EXTRAS: A full second disc choc full of them, from a commentary by the boys, interview with costume designer Yves Barre, various out-takes and deleted scenes, extensive photo gallery, isolated music cues, video diaries of the writing process, a half hour documentary  on the making of the series, special effects footage and character bios.