Read our review of Taskmaster: The Live Experience.
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With over 160 episodes of Taskmaster having aired since the show first debuted in 2015, all of which we’ve seen, you’d think we would have known not to take every challenge at Taskmaster: The Live Experience at face value. Much like in the series, there’s often an obvious solution to the challenges put before us in this new immersive version of the show, but we’d be lying if we said that being able to find them while the clock is ticking down was something that came naturally to us.
Taking over DockX, a vast warehouse on the waterfront of Canada Water, Taskmaster: The Live Experience allows visitors to experience what it is like to participate in the popular Channel 4 series and discover first-hand that there's a huge difference between watching someone else do a task from the comfort of your sofa and doing it yourself.
Photo: Avalon
Taskmaster: The Live Experience is split into two halves - alongside the main ticketed experience, there's also a Taskmaster Museum, which displays a collection of props and artwork from the show's eighteen previous seasons, as well as a recreation of numerous recognisable locations from the show, which are all open to the public without a ticket.
Long-time fans of the show will take great pleasure in seeing so many pieces of show history under one roof within the Taskmaster Museum. Items on display include the typewriter used in the opening titles, the first-ever whistle blown by Alex Horne in the show, numerous pieces of artwork by the likes of Joe Lycett and Noel Fielding, and the golden bust of Greg Davies's head awarded to each season's winner. The Museum is a lovingly curated collection of both the items painstakingly created by the show's production team and the nonsense created by contestants, including Fern Brady's toilet seat lid self-portrait, which was painted with raw sausages instead of brushes.
Photos: Immersive Rumours
Elsewhere in the venue, there's a series of photo opportunities outside of the Taskmaster house, including the huge white statue of Greg Davies that's been a mainstay of the show's garden for several years, Linda the Cow (affectionately named so by Rylan, who christened the cow with the same name as their mum) and the caravan. Also scattered around the venue are numerous activities visitors can attempt while waiting to enter the main experience, including a recreation of the infamous 'Get this potato into the golf hole' task from Series 2 of Taskmaster (let the record show that we managed it in two attempts).
Those with tickets for the main experience can expect to have a bit of time to explore all of this, as well as a gift shop before being called into the Taskmaster house roughly 15 minutes after the time printed on their tickets. That may be just long enough to enjoy a Bin Juice cocktail from the bar, but nowhere near enough to take in everything else on offer. We'd recommend setting aside at least an hour to explore all of it, either before or after the main experience.
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Heading into the Taskmaster house, visitors are split into groups of up to 14 people to take on the gauntlet of tasks on offer over the course of 60 minutes. There are two different experiences on offer here - Melon Buffet and Absolute Casserole. Both have four main challenges that everyone takes part in, as well as a final task for the five best contestants in each group. If you want to be a completionist and do all 10 tasks on offer, you'll need to book both experiences separately. For our visit, we took part in Absolute Casserole, which was a combination of mental, physical, and observation tasks.
Photo: Avalon
We're not going to give away exactly what the tasks were, as that's not in the spirit of the show and may well give readers a leg up over their competition, but each task felt like a faithful recreation of what's typically presented in an episode of Taskmaster. Beginning with some introductory projections and videos of Greg Davies and Alex Horne outlining the rules of the game, the pair explain that in their absence Little Little Alex Horne will be overseeing and scoring our performances in the tasks as we progress through a recreation of the Taskmaster house. Tasks take place in scaled-up versions of the study, lab, garage, entrance hallway, and a scaled-down version of the studio.
With the default Taskmaster's Assistant outfit of a black suit with no tie, our Little Little Alex Horne was as warm and friendly as you could ever hope for, with an unwavering love of the Taskmaster that came up in their conversations with the group more than once. Armed with an iPad that displays the remaining times for each task, they commentate on, critique, and champion the performances of everyone in the group. If you crash and burn, you can expect them to make sure everyone knows about it, but equally, they will give you your moment in the spotlight for a job well done. One particularly proud moment, in which we asked Little Little Alex Horne a specific question during a task, led to them highlighting our ingenuity in the post-task debrief (let's ignore that despite that, we got zero points).
Based on our time playing through Absolute Casserole, it's fair to say that most tasks had a hidden shortcut to success, much like they often do in the show. The scoring system also mirrors that of the TV show, with five points being rewarded to the best performing in each task, going down to one point for fifth place. Updates to the overall scores come at the end of each task via screens, which live updates as the results come in. In a cruel twist of fate, despite the Taskmaster themself not being present, the scoring can also be influenced by elements outside of the contestant's control. In one particular task, the solution was offered up on a platter to the tallest participant, giving the rest of the group a marked disadvantage.
Photo: Avalon
Across the four main tasks that everyone participates in, one is a group task that requires contestants to team up in pairs. Again, the key to success was right under everyone's noses, but in the chaos of everyone competing, it went unnoticed until Little Little Alex Horne pointed it out. These gotcha moments are just as infuriating to find out about in real life as they are for the contestants on the show, and you'll likely be kicking yourself for not spotting them sooner.
The final task of Taskmaster: The Live Experience takes the form of a studio task, with the five highest-scoring contestants battling it out in front of the rest of the group. Going into this final task, the scores are wiped, and all five finalists start on a level playing field. For the overall winner, there's a medal and complimentary souvenir photo up for grabs, with the audience of lowest-scoring contestants being given one last chance at glory in a mini-task to win a golden duck with 'Best of the Worst' printed on.
Reviewing an experience without revealing a lot of the content is a challenge in itself, but all of the above is to say that Taskmaster: The Live Experience delivers on the promise of putting visitors into the shoes of the comedians who take part in the TV series. Long-time fans of the series will no doubt find it a rewarding and enjoyable experience, even if they walk away empty-handed, and those unfamiliar with the show will likely be won over by the sense of humour and quirkiness. The thought put into the creation of the tasks by Alex Horne and the show's production team is easily on par with that of the series and offers plenty of chances for us non-famous people to find out if we'd actually be any good on the TV show.
Photo: Avalon
The elephant in the room when it comes to Taskmaster: The Live Experience is the price. At peak times, individual tickets can cost up to £100, which does feel far too high, despite the experience's high production values. The show is running a biweekly ticket lottery to purchase up to four £25 tickets, which does alleviate this problem for those lucky enough to win, and off-peak tickets are available at £50 per person, which is a more accessible price point for many.
For those wondering, despite our disqualification in one task and a run of low-scoring tasks, we did manage to redeem ourselves in the final task and are now the proud owner of a golden duck. Our companion for the experience also went on to win the final live task, which is something this reviewer will never be allowed to forget.
Photos: Immersive Rumours
★★★★½
Taskmaster: The Live Experience is running at Dock X in Canada Water until 25th January 2025. Tickets start at £50.00 and can be purchased via taskmasterliveexperience.com
For more reviews of shows like Taskmaster: The Live Experience, check out other recent immersive reviews here.
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