Saturday Morning Archaeology: Motormouth

[@Jehannum2000]

Chesney Hawkes: "Hair like a piss fountain". Still chuckling at that one.

[@dinogoldie9716]

8:36 A similar thought occurs to me every time I channel hop onto a repeat of Bullseye. The host is dead. The contestants are dead. Most of the studio audience will be long dead. All those Bully's prize board prizes are now landfill. And that caravan/speedboat crumbled into dust twenty years ago. This too shall pass.....

[@garethjohnstone9282]

But they live on in our memories for now..

[@ackerjawaka1966]

​@@garethjohnstone9282lovely great smashing 😜

[@TheCultOfNick]

"The most erotic moment of Neil Buchanan's life" - should probably have been the click bait title of this one. Long laughs at that one.

[@stephenhough4957]

One of the most erotic moments of my life, don’t know about Neil…..

[@Gidsonlives]

Lost media mixed with a Screenwipe format. This Staurt... Is brilliant. You've inspired me. Cannot understand why you haven't hundreds of thousands of subs

[@bletheringfool]

I wonder was anyone like me? I used to flick back and forth when certain cartoons like Ghostbusters were on or when the boring agony uncle sections of Going Live were on. With fewer channels back then we were more forgiving of shite I think. There were a couple of other shows I remember. The sketch show called on the waterfront with Andrew O'Connor and Kate Kopstick etc. and Parallel 9 which seemed to evolve each series these were summer replacements on BBC 1.

[@gcooper642]

Yeah I did that too. You just choose whatever is least boring.

[@olivere5497]

A few years ago, i met frank sidebottom, i told him i loved watching him on motormouth,he informed me it wasnt him and if it was him on telly he'd be in trouble with his mum.

[@cambs0181]

Saw Steve Johnson a few years ago in a pub in Brighton. I didn't speak to him myself, though when someone was chatting to him I think he mentioned something about running a BnB.

[@shockz16]

I've got to say i watched Motormouth nearly every saturday morning. If i remember rightly they used to run the Police Academy cartoon on it. On a side note. Wtf even was Frank Sidebottom? I think i was a bit too young to understand what he was all about in those days, he just kinda creeped me out, still does a bit to be fair.

[@sd-11-11-sd]

He was a curious creation at the time navigating between adult and kids tv shows with equal absurdity.

[@cartoonhead9222]

A man very proud of his papier mache head he made.

[@nektekket852]

You know he was, he really was...

[@edgarbeat2851]

Samuri Pizza Cats used to be shown. The crazy cartoon. I loved Frank Sidebottom as a kid. Had a kinda Rick Mayall vibe to him.

[@zyourzgrandzmaz]

Sucks there is so much lost media 😭

[@chefexcellence322]

Motormouth and Ghost Train, the two Saturday morning shows I watched when Going Live and Live & Kicking went on their summer break.

[@FranzSanchez-ky9up]

I knew one of the lesbians from the first episode of Bottom was in a Saturday morning kids show around the same time! Thanks for letting me know I'm not going completely mad, Stuart. I'd forgotten how much a bit'uh alright, Lesley Garrett was and probably still is.

[@JamesGillComedy]

This is phenomenal work. These videos are incredible.

[@_Piers_]

"The British Hulk Hogan" You're just a genius Stuart :)

[@LordmonkeyTRM]

I was always aware that BBC kids and ITV kids were two very distinct breeds. I was squarely in the hipper, cooler ITV camp. burgers not steak. Tiswas, Motormouth, Get Fresh, No. 73. were my Saturdays If I wasn't outside on my bike...

[@pipoo1]

I started out as a BBC Kid when it was Saturday Superstore but Going Live left me cold, it just always felt slower and cheaper than Superstore (and the ITV shows) to me, so Motormouth it was for me after that with Ghost Train in the summer.

[@Nosaveddataretro]

Gimme 5

[@80srenaissance67]

Get Fresh

[@1emmajones]

I loved frank. I saw him live. He was from Timperley you know.

[@TheAlexmynameis]

RIP all the singing doggies😢

[@80srenaissance67]

"Steve will be an irritant throughout" 😂

[@retrogiftsuk4812]

I used to love Motormouth and particularly the behind the scenes comedy bits. Far better than the repetitive catchphrase stuff of Trev and Simon. Also loved What's Up Doc as the wolves "Bro and Bro" endlessly eating the children in the studio was brilliant TV. It's the reason that even now me and my brother (both in our 40s) still write birthday cards to each other "To my bro".

[@alisoneales]

Another fantastic video, thank you. I loved Chesney Hawkes so there is a non-zero chance I watched that edition when it went out. I could tell you what the song at the end is called, who wrote it, and the single to which it was the b-side. I am (as ever) appalled at myself.

[@leedobson]

Neil Buchanan was ITV's Cheggers

[@Trefor1981]

“Dressed like he lives in an abandoned arcade in Gotham” - amazing

[@Perfect_Rice]

Lame to fame: I once had dinner at a Chinese restaurant in Islington with Sandi Toksvig's writer Elly Brewer. It was only the two of us, and she paid. I don't remember much else, mainly that a random guy threatened to stab me when I was walking home.

[@StuartMillard]

Screen name fits

[@therespectedlex9794]

Did you feel violated and melancholic as a result? I mean after the threat, not the dinner.

[@stephenhough4957]

Dinner with Brewer. Death threat with a skewer.

[@80srenaissance67]

A succulent Chinese meal ?

[@COL321]

I really enjoyed watching that. Frank Sidebottom and the Manics? Those lucky viewers. Also, you don't see Russian acrobats much these days, do you?

[@caro_lam]

so disappointed we didn't get to see richey edwards doing backstage skits about potatoes with lesley garrett

[@markmckinney4149]

"Yeah you love spuds, you love spuds...."

[@matthewlawrenson3628]

I was slightly past Saturday morning kid's TV's target audience by this point, but I always watched Motormouth to catch Samurai Pizza Cats. The rest of it I didn't think much of.

[@sambwoy3]

Can't wait for What's Up Doc?- that weird enterprise where TVS joined with Warner Bros to produce a Saturday morning show- though as we'll see the actual content probably did little service to the name of the wonderful Looney Tunes. Bro and Bro the wolves were a puppeteering marvel though.

[@ruleninetyone]

Loved “How2” to bits! lol 😝

[@dab88]

15:42 "the British Hulk Hogan" lmfao

[@Jaspacat1965]

FYI, not all the tapes have been wiped, No73 is appearing now and Motormouth is slowly being put online again

[@MrDannyDetail]

I think it's more that they were made (I think?) by TVS, whose archive was bought by a company who was bought by another company who was bought by another company who was bought by Disney. It seems that TVS's tapes did not follow the same set of movements at TVS's legal paperwork for the same shows, and thus it has proven almost impossible for anything by TVS to be legally cleared for home video or streaming, particularly as Disney are believed to be largely unaware that they even own a former ITV franchisee.

[@Jaspacat1965]

​@MrDannyDetail TVS was bought by IFE. While IFE changed hands, the archives kept going. TVS programming was still being shown right up to the point when the archives needed to be moved out of Maidstone Studios by Flextech. That's when tapes and paperwork were binned by Disney. There was a lot of the archive saved and stored. Made In Maidstone are showing not only TVS archive stored in Maidstone, but also Southern archive believed wiped.

[@sd-11-11-sd]

Lovely find and analysis here sir, had almost forgotten about this old gem. I love the analysis of the multi channel presenter Andy Crane hopping like 'Razor Ramon' 😂

[@mattcast44]

Another great video, cheers! Looking forward to the next one already!

[@PooperScooperTrooper]

Love these videos. Thanks 🙂

[@ethansmith6873]

Do Big Breakfast next. Cheers, Ethan from America

[@StuartMillard]

A Big Breakfast video is coming next month

[@LovecraftComedy]

There seems to be a lack of footage of this, and internet discussion, but it'd be good to have a look at On The Waterfront. Obviously a lack of footage hinders this, but I at least recall The Flashing Blade, Lantern Jaw, a sketch about continuity and Bernie Nolan giving away a Nolan's album alongside every competition prize.

[@JurassicRod]

Anyone remember What's Up Doc? The Saturday morning ITV show in the early 90s?

[@theaaroncarruthers]

I just found your channel today it brings back so many memories and has made laugh so much. Would you do a video on Get Fresh please? I found a clip on KZbin that was filmed in my town that had Aswad as the musical guest that I was at as a 3 year old in a buggy.

[@StuartMillard]

A Get Fresh video is in the pipeline.

[@flemishdog]

What a shame the Welsh were denied motormouth for a minute or so. Those poor bloody HTV viewers.

[@WallyPyneoil]

With the Barnett Formula, asymmetric national devolution, etc, they have compensations.

[@roscovb]

I am become death, destroyer of worlds. S.Millard 2022

[@GlassTarantulah]

Great stuff sir! 3:05 I bet Neil got the shot in first of all and they had to make him do another and miss.

[@mattl_]

Terror Towers own Steve Johnson!

[@everyone06]

I use to watch that show Series 2 was the best.

[@dycebastion]

Which was the ITV show with the wolves? That was a good one.

[@tabithacole5964]

As a middle-aged lesbian, I'm appreciating younger Gabby Roslin quite respectfully.

[@csurname]

15:20 those shirts really say YES

[@MT-cd7cs]

+1 for What’s Up Doc? .. don’t remember Motormouth per se but I do remember Mouse Trap IRL and I definitely had it in my head this was its own programme, that Buchanan only presented Art Attack while I was alive and nout else, Roslin only had The Big Breakfast and Crane had Bad Influence.. if only 5 year old me had paid more attention to ITV and less to Ed the Duck!

[@eddiepurple]

Great video, thank you!! I never watched Going Live!, or CBBC for that matter. ITV had the better cartoons, where you're less likely to learn something. I'm pretty sure I watched all 4 series of Motormouth, but can remember very little apart from in the first series where they all sat inside a giant mouth, although I'm honestly not sure. Steve Johnson's "It's Torture!" was good, children tortured to death with various gunge tanks etc, which evolved into the inferior "Gunge Em In The Dungeon", then "Mouse Trap". I thought the children were actually being murdered on air. 28 years old I was etc.

[@garethjohnstone9282]

I used to love weekend TV. Getting back to school on Mondays and talking about it with friends. Even watching the programs knowing your mates were almost certainly watching at the same time, too. Modern life doesn’t have that with on demand and being able to just stream whenever. And being able to just talk about it on WhatsApp.

[@markdavidson9100]

Excellent video thank you, the hockey and basketball playing was like a YouBet challenge

[@johnnycrawford1584]

Stark exposition of the human condition. Ta much Mr M.

[@edgarbeat2851]

Was the intro not done by the same people that dis the classic Smarties advert. Would not suprise me. They used to show Samuri Pizza cats a catoon made by cocain. The original stores scripts were lost and the English dub was Hilarious. Between 1990, 91.

[@LittlePixelTM]

Get Fresh!

[@stephenhough4957]

‘Ordinary basketball’. Erm ok, Mr Able Bodied……

[@piggo64]

TISWAS!

[@RememberTheRegs]

God. I didn't recognise Motormouth until the Mousetrap section popped up.

[@noneofyourbusiness4616]

Trying to imagine Vincent Van Gogh about to cut his ear off and being confronted with a vision of a future in which his act of pain is used as entertainment for children.

[@simondavies419]

Frank Sidebottom was genius...

[@townsjim]

Hi, just wondering if you'll be doing a video on What's Up Doc? That show was a treasure trove of weirdness.

[@StuartMillard]

Absolutely. Once I've built up the courage.

[@townsjim]

​@@StuartMillardhaha yeah I get you 😬

[@mathuxley7264]

Please get on What's Up Doc. Birthed from the shitty cultural resurgence of the Tazmanian Devil but host to characters like Naughty Torty that felt like a many-faced demon was taunting us by flaunting its presence on live tv. The nearest Yvette Cooper ever came to the actual supernatural

[@Tomurow]

There was always a bit of disturbing malevolence behind Andy Crane's pseudo-curtains...

[@cartoonhead9222]

This episode is sponsored by: POTATO

[@SMlFFY85]

I'll not hear a bad word against What's Up Doc'

[@LovecraftComedy]

Sorry to go on, but I have an interest in programmes that had shite or unexpected bands on, acts you'd never heard of. Eggs 'N' Baker was good for this, Cheryl trumping up unknown acts as if it were Madonna or Bros. I recall a girl group called the Marines and also the never-popular band PELE. I'm sure Fresh might've cropped up too singing 'Did I Say Te Amo'. And maybe the Osmond Boys. There's also the appearance of rave act Oceanic trying to make a comeback on Tricks and Tracks, with the utterly lame 'Celebration'. I'll shut up now as I've started thinking about Kelly G (Ray from Grange Hill) doing his single 'Teach Me" on Blue Peter...

[@pipoo1]

It's the only show other than SMTV that beat the BBC during the winter months, ITV often won the summer thanks to No73, Get Fresh and Ghost Train. I loved Saturday Superstore but I never ever got into Going Live! It always seemed slow and boring to me. Motormouth was just bigger, set, features etc and actually in hindsight a lot like Saturday Superstore, with Andy Crane cast in role of Mike Read even the set from series 3/4 was vaguely similar to that of Superstore with it's cocktail bar in place of the coffee shop.

[@MrDenzal27]

Boss, the world was a million times better than today. I was aloud to think, and hold views. We had much better comedy. We was so much more free in those days. I love reminiscing about these days in ur vids. :)

[@zanducktv2398]

Steve Johnson was an annoying weirdo. What was the point of the backstage sitcom, so tedious. Poor Neil with bubbly Lesley Garrett, so much cringe 🤦‍♂️ Wonder what things would’ve been like if Schofe had landed this one and Andy got Going Live 🤔

[@msgrime1981]

So, was Ghost Train before or after Motormouth?

[@PotatoPirate123]

Ooh-aaah

[@snailo9650]

I think it was before

[@pipoo1]

Same time, Motormouth 88-92 Ghost Train 89-91 Motormouth was the winter series and Ghost Train the summer one. With the Chart Show year round at 11.30. This was by far ITVs most successful Saturday morning lineup until SMTV at the end of the decade.

[@snailo9650]

@@pipoo1 All I can remember is Barry Mafia and some kind of hilarious fight game 😂

[@billyhodges7194]

BBC ruled ?? Not in my house.... We were strictly Tiswas and I swear there were kids in my street who couldn't watch Tiswas under any circumstances, and my parents were very keen on moral punishment but luckily had a sense of humour.

[@lanceuppercut3498]

Only ever saw bits and pieces of Motor Mouth back in the day. And what I saw just looked poor and unappealing compared to Going Live, to me was just better in every way. Although I have seen full episodes (thanks to Made In Maidstone channel) of Motormouth recently. It was okay, but still Going Live was still far superior. And as for Steve Johnson, to me at the time he was the most unfunny annoying man on Children's TV at the time, couldn't stand the guy.

[@thedivinemrm5832]

5:55 - is that not James Dreyfus, effete star of "Gimme, Gimme, Gammon" and "The Thin Blue Line (between biological sex and gender expression is not a real thing so let me shit on the trans folk from my lofty position as the acceptable face of right-wing homosexuality)"? If 'kippers and brexiteers had only known he'd done kids TV...

[@eatmywords]

surely crackerjack. CRACKERJACK is on the agenda?

[@StuartMillard]

It is indeed on the list