The Consultant Surgeons
Sir Charles Curtis (Enfield) and Sheridan (Whitehouse) are old friends, and highly skilled and qualified surgeons. They spend their time in the operating theatre chatting pleasantly and discussing their engagements for the weekend whilst doing their surgery ridiculously quickly. They are both extremely intelligent, and are able to do the Sudoku in seconds. One series 4 sketch shows footage from a documentary that was filmed when they were at Cambridge University, showing interviews with them and their friend Audrey, and footage of them performing in the Footlights. They are both on a first name basis with the Queen.
- The Ace: They are both highly skilled and successful.
- Catchphrase: 'One always finds time for one's National Health work, Sheridan, it's a matter of principle'.
- Identical Grandson: One series 4 sketch shows their Georgian ancestors, who look and act exactly the same as them.
- In-Series Nickname: Several characters over the course of the series call Sheridan 'Sheri'.
- Verbal Tic: These two often get stuck saying 'Forty, forty five years,' when they are discussing the age of a person or thing.
Bono and The Edge
Bono (Enfield) and The Edge (Whitehouse) are exaggerated parodies of the real
U2 members. These two talk in stereotypical Irish accents, and The Edge lives in what Bono calls a 'shitty little bedsit', which is where every sketch takes place. The Edge's doorbell plays 'Pride (In The Name Of Love)', and Bono enters every sketch in a cloud of smoke. All they eat is beans on toast, and Bono frequently comments on how 'humble' they are. At the end of every sketch, Bono will ask The Edge what he has under his hat today; when Bono takes it off, he sees a variety of weird things, including a chick, cress and some rare mushrooms.
- Catchphrase: 'What #In the name of loooove# is that?'; 'Nice to see you' 'You too' 'Are a great band!'.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: In the sketch where The Edge accidently says he likes Coldplay, the way Bono reacts is almost like The Edge were cheating on him. When he says they 'should split up', he is talking about the band, but his tone of voice and The Edge's horrified reaction makes it sound much more like they are talking about a relationship.
Marcus (I Saw You Coming)
Marcus (Enfield) is a corrupt man who runs an 'antiques' shop in Notting Hill called 'I Saw You Coming'. He likes to take advantage of a certain type of woman (who always have stupid names such as Nutella and Thicko), namely the rich, married, unintelligent women who have more money than sense. He sells things he either got cheap or for free for thousands of pounds, and the women never question this. In series 2, Marcus branches out and opens a shop called 'Modern Wank', (which is to encourage people to mix new toss with their old shit. Apparently, this is a very retro look) as well as several others. The women never suspect anything, and often find his high prices reassuring. In one sketch, he is outdone by a man who has a shop opposite his - called 'I Really Saw You Coming'.
- Catchphrase: "I saw you coming". Marcus also has a habit of referring to his stock as "wank", "toss" and "shit", as in "this chair is very much like the sort of shit you're for".
- Jerkass: Marcus is definitely a jerk, but at least he is open about his intentions to rip these women off.
The Posh Scaffolders
Darren (Whitehouse) and Kev (Enfield) are scaffolders who are usually found having very cultured conversations and speaking in extremely posh accents. That is, until they see a woman walking by. At this point, they lose their posh accents and start heckling the women in the stereotypical way, often using obscenely offensive and sexist language. They keep this up until a sketch in series 2, when a women tells them how offended she is (which makes Darren start crying), and they decide to charm women with their intelligence instead.
- Ambiguously Gay: They both act camp and very rarely discuss women (outside of heckling them, which they only do, according to a tearful Darren, because they were 'trying to be friendly). They are also constantly touching each other. Kev frequently calls Darren 'dear'.
- In-Series Nickname: Darren is often called 'Dar' or 'Dazza', and Kevin is only ever called 'Kev'.
Clive the Geordie
In an alternative present, people from the South of Britain adopt people from the North, to protect them from the awful conditions they live in. There is an RSPN (the Royal Society for the Protection of Northerners), and there are regular charity fundraisers to help improve the conditions in the North, but to also protect the Northerners who are neglected and abused by their Southern owners. One of these Northerners is Clive (Whitehouse), a Geordie who lives with the Lovelock family. They treat him dreadfully, spending their time mocking his accent and humiliating him in public. In his final sketch, Clive is replaced by a younger Northerner, who, after framing Clive for eating the contents of the fridge, ends up getting Clive thrown out.
- Groin Attack: One sketch features the Lovelocks and their friends going to look at Clive having a bath. When Clive realises they are there, he freezes up and covers his chest and refuses to move. The Lovelocks explain to their friends that Clive will think they have gone if they stay still, so they spend ages standing still, while Clive continues to not move. Eventually, one of the women decides to get Clive to do something by jabbing him hard in the groin with a brush-on-a-stick.
- Stoners Are Funny: When Clive is at the vets, he is given a sedative, which, according to the vet, has made him 'appear a little woozy'. Despite the sad nature of the sketch, it is hard not to laugh at Clive's drugged up appearance. He looks half asleep and is grinning in an almost drunken way, and his voice is slurred. He tries to hug Rupert, slurring "Give us a kiss, man!", and only stops acting funny when Rupert tells him to "Get off of me, you brute", at which point you start feeling sorry for him again.
- Noodle Incident: In the first Clive sketch, his owners and their friends are discussing the time they took Clive to Henley Regatta. Apparently, someone force-fed Clive a magnum of champagne, which made him vomit all over the place. Rupert apparently had to throw him into the River Thames to clean him up.
The Multi-Lingual Football Manager
This football manager (Whitehouse) will rush into the changing room at half time and insist that his players talk to each other on the pitch. However, it soon becomes obvious that none of his players speak the same language. He has one English player, but the others are usually French, Italian, Spanish, African, Russian and Scottish, but sometimes they are also Welsh, Irish, American, Dutch and even deaf. This means he speak to each of them in their own languages (or regional accent, or fake sign language), and so none of them have the chance to communicate. In the last episode of series 3, he gets sacked and ends up down in a league where every player is English. Unsurprisingly, he finds it rather boring.
- As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Most of what he says is totally made up, but sounds authentic.
- Catchphrase: At the end of the sketch, he will tell the one English player: "Gary, if that [Insert nationality] bastard gets past you again, break his ankles/leg".
The Cultured Fisherman
Danny (Whitehouse) and his friend Kenny (Enfield) are good friends who spend a lot of their time fishing together. However, their love of fishing is the only thing they have in common. This is because, whilst Kenny has 'normal' interests like football, drinking and women, Danny is far more cultured, preferring to go to the theatre and listen to Radio 4. Danny often tries to discuss things that he has recently seen or heard with Kenny, whilst at the same time not wanting to let on that he liked it. This means Danny spends the entire sketch telling Kenny things that only a person who watched the programme could know, before adding 'or some sort of shit' onto the end of his sentence to cover himself. Unfortunately for Danny, by the end of the sketch, he has always admitted how much he enjoyed it, much to the bemusement and confusion of Kenny.
- Ambiguously Gay: Danny doesn't appear to be attracted to women. He only joins in his friend's discussions about women when prompted, and, even them, isn't very convincing. He also seems to have a bit of a crush on his friend Kenny. In the sketch where he is trying to get Kenny to come to a posh restaurant with him, he sounds like he is asking him out on a date, and he looks so sad when Kenny lets him down.
- Catchphrase: "Or some sort of shit".
The Old Tories
The Old Tories are two old men (Enfield and Whitehouse) who sit in their club and discuss the sexual orientations of the celebrities they read about in the newspaper. Every single time, they get it hopelessly wrong. They often consult their gay friend Bunny for help, but he is often just as useless as they are.
Parking Pataweyo
Parking Pataweyo is a stereotypical African traffic warden, who likes nothing better than to go around and ticket people for the most tiny and pathetic parking infringements. His sketches are done in the style of
Postman Pat, with a narrator speaking the characters' lines for them. The characters who get ticketed will always be dubbed over as saying something like: "Thank you for giving me this well deserved parking ticket", despite them clearly saying something like: "f***king w***r".
- Alliterative Name: Parking Pataweyo. Other characters have alliterative names too, such as: 'Roofer Ronnie', 'Policeman Pete', 'Salesman Steve', 'Parking Pleasant' and 'Delivery Delroy'.
- Jerkass: Pataweyo is probably the biggest jerkass on the whole show. In one sketch, he tickets a man who has pulled over to help an old woman, and then he tickets the paramedic too. In another sketch, he openly admits that he is trying to drive Delivery Delroy out of business.
- New Powers as the Plot Demands: He has been known to develop superpowers if that's what it takes to give a car a ticket.
Jose Arrogantio
Jose Arrogantio, a football manager, has the problem that he can never accept that his favourite player is a nightmare on the pitch. Didier Peskovich spends his time on the pitch deliberately hurting other players and doing ridiculously fake, exaggerated dives. Arrogantio often ends up calling the referee a "tit", and ends most of his interviews doing a pose at the camera.
- Groin Attack: In one sketch, Peskovitch stabs another player in the groin with the end of a flag pole, turning his white shorts red. Arrogantio then points out that, whilst he may have lost a testicle, it isn't the end of the word.
- Jerkass: Didier Peskovitch. Arrogantio isn't much better.
