History Series / Taskmaster

* WillfullyWeak: On occasion, some contestants will either realise a loophole in the task wording that they can exploit but will for some reason fail to exploit it all the way or will inexplicably add a complication or unwritten rule to the task, resulting in a situation where they are essentially kneecapping themselves:

** In the same episode, another task requires the contestants to choose a box in which to collect "pairs of glasses" (referring to drinking glasses, not spectacles as they might have expected) before they leave the caravan. Seconds after reading the task, Rhod Gilbert rushes out of the caravan to see the glasses in order to help him determine the size of the box he'll need. While this is bad enough in itself, as it's an automatic disqualification, in the studio a bewildered Alex notes that even despite this knowledge Rhod still inexplicably decided to choose an incredibly small box that could never fit all the glasses.

*** In "Spoony Neeson", all the contestants had to guide a cupcake with a lit candle through the house to light a candle in the caravan, but Mark was not allowed to say any words that contained any of the letters in the word Taskmaster. He spends most of his time saying the word "fiddly"
** ''Attempted'' elsewhere in Series 5, where Aisling is given a pineapple and has to have its photograph taken in "esteemed company". It rather backfires on the production team when, rather than carrying it around for six months, she decides to post it to her mother in Ireland. It also backfired on Aisling, however, since on receiving the pineapple her mother just took photos of it around town with her iPad, thus failing the task requirements.

** Joe Lycett also seems to have a habit of [[StickyFingers stealing props]] at the end of a task. Over the course of series four he steals a bowl of lemons, some rice, a large bar of cooking chocolate and a mannequin.

** Seems to be a RunningGag with Joe Lycett, who took a bowl of lemons in "A Fat Bald White Man", a small bag of rice in "Look At Me", and the mannequin in "No Stars for Naughty Boys".

** Alex Horne is the show's ongoing Butt-Monkey. Greg constantly insults or mocks him, and in many of the later series the contestants join on. As the assistant around to observe the contestants as they undertake a challenge he also takes the brunt of their verbal abuse when they get frustrated with the task. In the spirit of the show, Alex typically goes along with whatever humiliating things are requested of him. Among other things, he has been made to eat several pies full of unusual fillings in "The Pie Whisperer", eat dog food in "The Last Supper", and put his bare arse into a cake in "He Was A Different Man". For the team task in "The Last Supper", the teams had to make a blooper reel; and Joh, Romesh, and Roisin decided to [[PieInTheFace shove Alex's face into a cake]] before making him fall into a paddling pool full of water. The blooper reel example ends up backfiring on the team, however; after watching the blooper back, Greg pointed out that the team were supposed to make one of ''themselves'' the victim of the misfortune rather than inflicting it on a third party.

** A task in series 9 has the contestants get asked to choose a letter, and then to put as many things from around the house beginning with that letter onto Alex's tray. David Baddiel picked Q, but didn't find any item in the house that actually began with the letter, instead claiming he had a speech impediment that made him start most words with a Q. At the end of the task, Alex revealed that he had the foresight to litter the house with appropriately named objects for each letter, and said that he had stocked up the fridge in particular with quail's eggs, quiche, Quavers and a quesadillato cover the letter Q, just in case someone chose it.

* Series Twelve: Alan Davies, Desiree Birch, Guz Khan, Morgana Robinson, Victoria Coren Mitchell

* InstantlyProvenWrong: In "Legit Glass", the stage task was to make noises of something written on the card and the Taskmaster had to guess what it was. Daisy May Cooper tried to do an elephant impression, which was mocked in the studio by everyone, and when Daisy asks Greg to do a better impression, he tries, and everyone immedietely starts laughing as it was only ''marginally'' better.

* PunBasedTitle: The stop-motion films that each team created in "There's Strength in Arches" (starring a potato) were called ''[[Film/TwentyEightDaysLater 28 Days Tater]]'' and ''[[Film/{{Spectre}} Spectater]]''. Other potato-based names were thrown around such as ''[[Film/NightOfTheLivingDead1968 Night of the Living Spud]]'', ''Mash in the Attic'', and ''[[Film/TheHatefulEight Hateful Potato]]''.

** In the first take in "There's Strength In Arches", Doc Brown only notices not one but ''two'' bridges that he could have used to cross a canal separating a shopping trolley and the items he was asked to put in the shopping trolley ''after'' he's completed the task by wading through the canal. He's still kicking himself over it weeks later in the studio recording. In the same task, both Doc and Jon neglected to check that they put all the groceries in the shopping cart (Jon left the area with some sponges in his coat pockets and Doc missed a can that had fallen into the canal) and were disqualified for not completing the task.

** "The Dong and the Gong" has a task where the contestants have to pop balloons clipped to a washing line in the fastest time. Al remarks that the balloons appear to have been arranged into a morse code message... and it turns out that, when translated from morse, all the contestants had to do to win the task [[spoiler:was to pop just two balloons.]]

* SchmuckBait: Any time Alex asks a contestant if they want to see a triumphant achievement again, the correct answer is "No". It's almost always because he's about to reveal additional footage that will result in a disqualification, although once, in "Peas in a Haystack", it was [[spoiler:just to torture everyone with time lapse footage of Sara Pascoe's adorable icecream snowman -- which had drawn a spontaneous "Aw" from the studio audience -- succumbing to the heat]].

** The stop-motion films that each team created in "There's Strength in Arches" (starring a potato) were called ''[[Film/TwentyEightDaysLater 28 Days Tater]]'' and ''[[Film/{{Spectre}} Spectater]]''. Other potato-based names were thrown around such as ''[[Film/NightOfTheLivingDead1968 Night of the Living Spud]]'', ''Mash in the Attic'', and ''[[Film/TheHatefulEight Hateful Potato]]''.

* WackyMarriageProposal: A task in "Caring Uncle Minpict" involves the contestants making the most irresistable proposal to the Taskmaster.

* ActorAllusion: Johnny Vegas brings in a ''teabag'' for a prize task and alludes to the adverts he used to do for PG Tips tea.

** Richard Osman from the second series (frequently lampshaded by Greg referring to the lineup as some variation on "four comedians and Richard Osman"); he is better known as a producer and television presenter for ''Series/{{Pointless}}''. [[note]]He is, however, a regular on the panel show circuit, to the point that he'd even managed to get a prestigious guest spot on ''Radio/ImSorryIHaventAClue''[[/note]].

* IncrediblyLamePun: A fairly substantial amount of Alex's introductions, segues and attempts at banter involve some kind of hideously tortured pun, often reached by mangling the names of contestants together. This tends to exasperate Greg, who is clearly not fond of puns as a tool for getting laughs.
-->'''Alex:''' Last up, I need to warn you that she might make the noise of a mourning dove and a happy cat at the same time -- yes, Daisy may coo-purr!\\
'''Greg:''' ''[wincing]'' God, I hate you.

** In Series 10, Katherine Parkinson claims to weigh 22 stones (140 kilograms or 308 pounds). This is what ''Greg'' actually weighs and he's more than a foot taller and a lot bulkier than she is.

** "Clumpy Swayey Clumsy Man's" task to 'design the most tremendous legs' was already hard enough, but Iain Stirling made his life even harder by taking it upon himself to design substitute arms for himself as well, to the point where he admitted in studio that he got too deep into it and ended up treating the legs as an afterthought. The result was that not only were his legs less than tremendous, but he could barely move without either falling over or 'breaking' his new limbs.