Brand X with Russell Brand

Brand X is fun in a Real Time with Bill Maher way. Both shows offer thoughtful political and sociological commentary wrapped in funny, so it goes down easily. Host Russell Brand has an engaging personality, impish and self-deprecatingly honest, which keeps viewers interested in where he's going with a topic. He's also clearly sharp and well-read, going both high- and low-brow by referencing such personages as Nietzsche and Shaquille O'Neal with equal gravity. Brand's Britishness is a boon to the show, too. If an American suggested Warren Buffet is a "priest of the religion of capitalism" it would come off as merely mean-spirited. Said with an English accent, the Buffet joke becomes a keen cultural observation from an outsider.

On the other hand, the show's decision to focus almost entirely on Brand at the microphone is a bit numbing. There are no guests, and Brand's American co-anchor only pipes up briefly. Brand does go some interesting places as he rants on topic, but listening to one person talk on and on is a bit reminiscent of a school lecture. It's a lecture from a very groovy professor, however, one with long hipster hair and tattoos, who says amusing things like "I don't agree with Mel Gibson doing that anti-Semitism thing, but Apocalypto, great film! He really created a mood there!"