★★★★★ 0/5

Swift & Shift Couriers

Pizza's Paul Fenech is back with another raucous, blue collar, comedy of terrors. But who am I to argue?

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Let’s face it. You probably already know whether you like to comedy style of Paul Fenech or not. His raucous comic style as seen in Pizza isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but it has its fans. As he moves into a new series, Swift and Shift Couriers, he is more empowered to follow the path he has charted –or possibly the road he has a delivery.

Set in a courier delivery company, the characters of this service are as inept as any you have ever encountered. Whether it’s the manager, the call centre staff, the drivers or the bloke in the warehouse, it’s impossible to believe anything is ever achieved. Pushing all reasonable logic, and possible a few genre boundaries, this is a comedy of terrors.

Ian Turpie plays the depot manager Keith, who partakes of a swig of booze whenever anybody isn’t looking. He spends a great deal of time yelling, being abused, and explaining himself to an executive from head office, sent to sort out the hapless, under-performing branch. In this school-marm role is Amanda Keller. Both Turpie and Keller jump into acting roles with a sense of fun.

In the call centre room are any number of caricature roles: they range from midget to obese to flamboyantly camp and everything in between. Melissa Tkautz, rarely seen in a regular role on television these days, sashays as the company vamp. Strutting through the office and causing male heartbeats to flutter, she looks rather fabulous and perfectly cast.

Fenech, who serves as writer / director / producer, is one of several courier drivers who mismanages every delivery they are ever issued. They are boastfully charmless as blue collar staff -as is the comedic terrain for which Fenech has become successful. The warehouse is equally a disaster, run by a trio of lazy Pacific islanders.

As a follow on from Pizza, there is little that surprises in Swift and Shift Couriers, save for some ironic casting and a confidence to fill out the screen with even more over the top characters and visual gags. There are a gazillion roles in the pilot episode, making it impossible to makes sense. But nobody ever said you were supposed to. It’s arguably easier not to fight such an onslaught. Besides, everybody on screen is having such a fun time who am I to argue?

Swift and Shift Couriers airs 8:30pm Monday on SBS.

52 Responses

  4. A great show.This is one of the few things Shameless,Southpark,Top Gear and Movies with Subtitles from Asia I like to watch SBS For and to get the nightly fix of news on nights I get home early from work

  5. bro wtf man why couldn’t we have this on earlier this like da best f*****g show ever like omg can it get any beter bro im going to whatch it the fift time now

  8. Best aussie comedy show ever made< would b craazy not to make a season 2, and for the banned episodes why ban them for?? U know they are going to get leaked so suck on it aussie govo!

  23. This show is awesome !! Pizza was good but this is the best comedy I have ever seen. My whole family gets into it and now & cant wait for Monday nights.
    The only thing that I am worried about is that they will stop making it at some stage and I will have to return to watching “normal” TV which sucks.
    All the characters with there unique personalities are brilliant. Seinfield did it with Newman, the black lawyer, the guy that owned the baseball team but you guys have done it with every character ! Keep it up guys

  25. This show is a hoot! I love it!!
    Who plays the blonde management-trainer though? She reminds me of Janine from Disney Channel,,, driving me crazy!!

    Anyway, top show! Definitely tuning in next week!!

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