History Characters / Taskmaster

* Series Seventeen[[note]]Joanne [=McNally=], John Robins, Nick Mohammed, Sophie Willan, Steve Pemberton[[/note]]

* [[Characters/TaskmasterNewYearTreatFour New Year Treat IV]][[note]]Deborah Meaden, Kojey Radical, Lenny Rush, Steve Backshall, Zoe Ball[[/note]]

* [[Characters/TaskmasterSeriesThirteen Series Thirteen]][[note]]Ardal O’Hanlon, Bridget Christie, Chris Ramsey, Judi Love, Sophie Duker[[/note]]

* CharacterTics: Whenever he's particularly disappointed -- particularly if a contestant is caught cheating in a task, or an entire line-up is disqualified -- he's prone to slouching in his chair and taking off his glasses, often while rubbing his forehead or temple.

* BewareTheNiceOnes: Alex occasionally demonstrates he can be very cutting in his remarks, such as when he insulted Claudia Winkleman's tan in New Year Treat II. In Champion of Champions 3, [[spoiler:Sophie Duker]] asks that [[spoiler:she]] be put down as part of a task and this led to Alex making some very personal attacks on [[spoiler:her]] overall performance in Taskmaster and resulted in genuine hurt feelings.

* Series Seventeen[[note]]Joanne [=McNally=], John Robins, Nick Mohammed, Steve Pemberton, Sophie Willan[[/note]]

* * Series Seventeen[[note]]Joanne [=McNally=], John Robins, Nick Mohammed, Steve Pemberton, Sophie Willan[[/note]]

* [[Characters/TaskmasterNewYearTreat2020 New Year Treat]][[note]]Creator/JohnHannah, Krishnan Guru-Murthy, Creator/NicolaCoughlan, Rylan Clark-Neal, Shirley Ballas[[/note]]

* [[Characters/TaskmasterNewYearTreatFour New Year Treat IV]][[note]]Deborah Meaden, Kojey Radical, Lenny Rush, Steve Backshall, Zoe Ball[[/note]]

%%* [[Characters/TaskmasterNewYearTreatFour New Year Treat IV]][[note]]Deborah Meaden, Kojey Radical, Lenny Rush, Steve Backshall, Zoe Ball[[/note]]

* CharacterTics: Whenever he's particularly disappointed - particularly if a contestant is caught cheating in a task, or an entire line-up is disqualified - he's prone to slouching in his chair and taking off his glasses, often while rubbing his forehead or temple.

-->'''Greg:''' But think about the spirit...\\

'''Alex:''' ''looks sheepish; nods''\\

** Greg considers tea such SeriousBusiness, he [[DisproportionateRetribution disqualifies]] [[spoiler:Josh]] for adding milk first. Though this could also have just been a joke at the fact that the tea was supposed to be made in a mug, not what was clearly a wheelbarrow with a mug-handle poorly attached to the side.

* CharacterDevelopment: Greg's Taskmaster persona becomes increasingly cruel and egotistical as the seasons progress, less likely to humour Alex's gags, and dismissive of other people's opinions (including fans'). Greg's relationship towards Alex also becomes more abusive from Season 3 onwards, with a sexual and then (more rarely) romantic edge as time goes on.

--> '''Jessica:''' Oh yeah. Yeah he could. HOLD HIM UPSIDE-DOWN! HOLD HIM UPSIDE-DOWN!

** For all his seeming arbitrariness and trolling tendencies, he does overall try to be fair for the most part. For example, in a task requiring the contestants to "erase an eraser", the otherwise mild-tempered Joe Thomas was genuinely angry when it looked like he was going to come last despite having gone to painstaking effort to wear down his eraser after pretty much all the others simply flushed it down the nearest toilet, which he viewed as a low-effort and uncreative "wanky workaround". Greg does mark him last based on his time, but acknowledges that he has a point about the injustice of the situation by granting him three bonus points, meaning he technically comes second.

* TallIsIntimidating: Taskmaster himself (6'8" Greg Davies). Case in point, in "OLLIE", when James Acaster [[DidIJustSayThatOutLoud made a flippant insult at him]], Greg stood up and took James aside for [[TranquilFury a quiet but stern talking to]], with James clearly terrified the whole time.
* WorkplaceAcquiredAbilities: Greg's time as a teacher gives him authority, but occasionally comes up in more specific ways: from giving Nish and James "teacher talks" at the back of the stage to questioning Aisling and Sally about whether or not they sneezed. In "Twelve blush majesty two", the live task has him guess the contestants' facts through lip-reading, a skill that he likely acquired from working with Deaf and hearing-impaired students.

* TheComicallySerious: His general role is to act as the deadpan observer to the ludicrous efforts of the contestants, and so much humour tends to come from his dry, serious reactions to absurd situations. One particular example comes from the "entertain this toddler" task, during which his interactions with Nell, the toddler in question, come off like he's giving her a job interview.
* ComplexityAddiction: The tasks he’s written for the series began getting quite a bit more complex by Series 7, including more clauses to complete or avoid and adding parts to the whole task. [[LampshadedTrope Lampshaded]] by Ed on the podcast, who theorises that Alex wants to avoid contestant outthinking the task like Richard did with the yoga ball task. It was also Lampshaded repeatedly in “Run Up a Tree to the Moon” when Greg and Lee note that the tasks have gotten lengthier and the latter needed to re-read the task because he already forgot the first half of it.

* ExtremeDoormat: Alex will do just about any degrading thing contestants command if it is in line with the task, including eating dog food. He also lets Greg belittle him in every studio segment.

-->'''Jamali:''' Oh you're being sarcastic. Okay man.

* [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech “The Reason You Suck” Song]]: Aisling, Bob and Sally’s song “Quite Good, Considering” is filled with the trio insulting poor Rosalind based on what little they know of her, topped by a memorably profane chorus.

* JustForPun: His nationality has been used for a pun, with one task involving him and the vegetable also called a "swede".

!!!Appears in: Every UK episode, Every USA episode