A 2022 comedy written and starring Alex Horne — yes, the Taskmaster's Assistant himself — and his band the Horne Section (Ben Reynolds, Ed Sheldrake, Joe Auckland, Mark Brown and Will Collier) as themselves. The show is a mixture of sitcom, variety show and behind-the-scenes mockumentary.
Despite having created Taskmaster, "Little" Alex Horne is disgruntled. Overshadowed in his own show by the host Greg Davies, dominated at home by his wife and treated as the Butt-Monkey by everyone except his band, Alex wants to be the bigshot for a change. To that end, he has created a pitch for a show where he can be the star — a show filmed in his own good-sized house (which has an ensuite) where he and the Horne Section will sing odd songs, tell odd jokes, ask celebrities odd questions and generally behave very... oddly.
Somehow, due partly to the help of his wife's producer friend Thora (Desiree Burch) but more largely to an unfortunate email-related error, the show gets commissioned by Channel Four.
The Horne Section soon find themselves facing the many challenges of making a (literally) home-made television show. Will they be able to pull it off, and redefine music and television for a new generation? Will Alex finally receive the respect that is his due and step into the limelight for himself? And more importantly, will he finally shake off the irritating attentions of his biggest fan, who just so happens to be multiple Emmy-awarding winning satirist John Oliver?
- Abhorrent Admirer: John Oliver is this to Alex.
- Adam Westing: All of the cast members playing as themselves are doing it as a comically exaggerated version of themselves, but attention has to be made to John Oliver, who is depicted as an Abhorrent Admirer who apparently has nothing more to do than spend time with Alex.
- Ascended Fan: Played for laughs; incredibly, despite being a huge success in America and having won multiple Emmy awards, working with Alex Horne on his ropey TV show is apparently the sole purpose of John Oliver's entire existence.
- As Himself: Alex and the Horne Section are playing comedic versions of themselves, as do the guests who appear on the show. Greg Davies and John Oliver also play themselves.
- Celebrity Paradox: Lampshaded via Leaning on the Fourth Wall, as at one point Alex delivers a monologue about how he wants to deliver his pitch to Channel 4 without someone who worked with him on Taskmaster to prove that's not the limit of his connections... to Thora, a character played by Desiree Burch, who was of course on the twelfth season of Taskmaster.
- The Dreaded: Even Greg, not shy about bullying Alex outside of Taskmaster, is clearly intimidated by Mrs Horne.
- The Faceless: Rachel, Alex's wife - whilst her voice is heard and some of her body parts can be seen, her face is never shown on-screen.
- Gilligan Cut: On learning that the band forgot to arrange transport to their pitch at Channel 4, Thora offers to give them a ride — but makes it clear in no uncertain terms that she's just giving them a ride, will not be participating in their pitch, is not a part of "this" and, if she does somehow end up in the Channel 4 offices, can be "dragged out by her ankles". You have two guesses as to where Thora ends up in the next scene.Will: Should we grab one ankle each?
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: While trying to find a stand-in to help deliver his pitch, Alex notes to Thora that he wants to find someone who wasn't on Taskmaster to avoid giving the impression that he only knows people who've been on that show. Thora's eyes flicker rather nervously when he says this. Thora is played by Desiree Burch — who was, of course, on Taskmaster.
- Self-Deprecating Humor: Plenty of jokes are made at the expense of Alex, the band, the fact that they're not particularly attractive or youthful, and their rather... unorthodox approaches to entertainment.
- Shout-Out: The first episode contains numerous callouts to Alex Horne's other little show.Ash: Right, well, you've got five minutes.
Alex: I thought we had six minutes.
Ash: Yeah, no, you did, but [picking up a task] your time started when you entered the room.
