While Frankie Boyle has proved he is both inventive and creative in his stand up routines, he seems to have fallen into a draught when making this series. Basically the joke is, replace humour payoff with extremely depressing or shocking twist. This works once or twice, but an entire series based around this idea gets stale quickly. I have great admiration for much of Frankies work in the past, he was the bright spark on Mock the Week, and did a great job on Never mind the Buzzcox. Tramadol nights however, proves that when given full control and no one raining him in, the results are very poor. This series actually made me feel like I had been in an accident or watched a horror film. I much preferred his humour when it was disappeared with other comedians who lightened the tone, and producers who gave him boundaries. Many of his stand up routines follow the same pattern as TNs, and suffer for it. Hopefully, there is a future for Frankie on television, I hope as he ages he mellows as uses his creativity in a new direction.
