I chose John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight on Boris Johnson to examine. Firstly, this show is on HBO, allowing for looser guidelines on cursing and humour. There are various times where John Oliver curses for comedic effect. This is different from Seth Meyer or Stephen Colbert which airs on NBC and CBS respectively. They must adhere to certain guidelines and as a result, will have limitations on their word choice. The camera work in this segment is very minimal, small adjustments are made to keep John Oliver in the same frame and to allow space on the left for the visuals.

The comedy aspect is worth commenting on. In this episode alone, John Oliver utilises call-backs to earlier jokes many times. Much like a stand-up comedy routine, the call-backs to jokes always seem to get the audience by surprise.  I assume that this would rely heavily upon the scripting of the segment. The visual aid on the left also serves as gags that are timed perfectly with John Oliver’s lines. The visuals also assist with the explanatory parts of the segments, presenting headlines, quotes and sources that often proves the point on what John Oliver is making. A format can be seen with the layout of the images and text to ensure readability and reduce visual clutter.

In this video where John Oliver targets a person and not just a single issue, the way he transitions between topic to topic is interesting. He starts off with more surface and light-hearted aspects to comment on and gradually becomes more pointed. The show uses news clips to demonstrate a point or to highlight the absurdity of a situation. I would imagine that gathering these clips from news stations would tie closely with the scriptwriting process and in itself a challenge to sort through.