Take two comedians, put them on one of the ‘World’s Most Dangerous Roads’ (BBC2) and what could possibly go wrong? Well, not a lot did actually and David Baddiel and Hugh Dennis’ Four Wheel Drive through Ethiopia gave the viewer some amazing scenery to enjoy and gave ‘thetvreviewguy’ a new perspective on Baddiel, someone he had always dismissed on the ’smug’ side of the character spectrum. The presenters had been friends since university days, and it showed as Dennis and Baddiel shared an fun trip together (the former being the responsible one, the latter being the khat smoking chilled out dude). The roads were dangerous, strewn with wrecks and unlit (and night, as narrator Aidan Dunbar said, comes quickly near the Equator). The scenery was astonishing, encompassing mountainous passes with precipitous ravines and amazing panoramic views. David Baddiel, a well-known atheist, was moved by the piety of the mostly Orthodox Christian Ethiopian people and both he and Dennis seemed almost reverential at the pilgrim site Axum, supposed resting site of the Ark of the Covenant, where the Ark remains hidden from all but the site guardians (of course it’s there, although Steven Spielberg would say otherwise). The ‘journey’ or ‘road movie’ has been a staple of narratives since Homer’s time and this engaging series lets us travel with our hosts and wanting to see more. And as for the Khat? It seems to give the chewer a light-headed high and Baddiel was of the view that, sure it’d be rude not to;‘thetvreviewguy’ agrees with this point of view.
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