Part of BBC4′s Electric Revolution season, it’s provisionally scheduled to air on BBC4 at the end of September. The press release reads…

Following in the footsteps of Screenwipe and Newswipe, Charlie Brooker’s Gameswipe will poke fun at the world of video games and its relationship with the media.Video games continue to be looked down upon by other media and Gameswipe aims to bring some equality into the mix by illustrating how games can be just as dumb or brilliant as TV and movies. The one-off, 50 minute special will premiere during the BBC’s forthcoming Electric Revolution season.

Charlie Brooker comments; “It’s good to be doing more ‘Wipes‘ for BBC4. I started my writing career penning video game reviews, so Gameswipe effectively sees me coming full-circle: it’s evolution in reverse basically. Expect pixels, joypads, some of the world’s weirdest games, celebrity cameos and the occasional sound effect.”

Comedian Dom Joly ventures into the online gaming world and does his best to wind up hardcore gamers as they relax with their favourite games. Other contributors include Graham Linehan and Dara O’Brian.

Electric Revolution, a season of programmes giving viewers a unique insight into how developments in technology have shaped our lives over the past 50 years and charting the rise of today’s globally-linked, instantly-gratified digital culture.

Charlie Brooker’s Gameswipe is produced by Zeppotron, an Endemol Company.

The one-off, 50-minute programme will “analyse and expose the inner workings of the videogames industry” and air as part of BBC4’s forthcoming Technology season.

Charlie Brooker says: “It’s good to be doing more Wipes for BBC4. I started my writing career penning videogame reviews, so Gameswipe effectively sees me coming full-circle: it’s evolution in reverse basically. Expect pixels, joypads, some of the world’s weirdest games, celebrity cameos and the occasional sound effect.”

It’s also been confirmed Newswipe will return for another six-part run.

“The return of Newswipe is both exciting and daunting,” says Brooker, “because it nearly killed me last time. Maybe this time it’ll finish the job. It’s hard to say precisely what we’ll be featuring, because I can’t predict the future, but hopefully we won’t be picking apart coverage of either an intercontinental nuclear war or a global ebola outbreak. Whatever happens, we’ll be staring at it with amusement and horror.”

And, finally, Charlie Brooker’s Screenwipe will also return at Christmas for a one-off review of the year.

Entitled You Have Been Watching, and set to air on C4, it’ll feature the Screenwipe host plus guests casting their eyes over the week’s TV from both the UK and around the world.

A transmission date is yet to be confirmed.

Brooker, in the early stages of ingesting faeces (maybe)

To tie-in with next week’s debut of Charlie Brooker’s E4  zombie/Big Brother-fest, Dead Set, we’ve got an interview with the man himself.

Among other things, he reveals why he could never survive in the BB house: “If I’m sharing a small bungalow with people and there’s one loo, I can’t bear it. I have to wait till they’ve all gone to bed before I’ll have a shit. Knowing there’s cameras around, I just wouldn’t be able to poo. I’d probably start ingesting my own faeces…”

More here >

Jaime Winstone crashes Big Brother

Charlie Brooker’s new comedy-drama, Dead Set, was launched to the press tonight. A zombie drama set in the Big Brother house, it stars Jaime Winstone, Riz Ahmed, Andy Nyman, Davina McCall (who’s very good indeed) and, er, Bubble from BB series two.

The screening was introduced by Andrew Newman, C4′s Head of Entertainment and Comedy, and a fittingly Nathan Barley-esque (now that’s a phrase that’s gone out of heavy rotation) figure. “It’s gripping, dark, excting, gruesome and really original,” he said, before going on to rubbish rival networks.

“E4 stands out as a digital channel that really commissions quality stuff. With so much clutter and millions of programmes coming out in multi-channel TV, E4 only really does good ones. There are other channels, which I won’t name, that launch millions and millions of sketchshows and sitcoms and things. They get the odd good one, but most of them are rubbish. And there are other channels that commission loads and loads of good things that sound very grabby, but when you watch them, you think, ‘God, of course this was going to be rubbish’. E4 doesn’t do that much, but really does programmes that punch their weight in the proper telly space.”

So there.

Brooker himself also had a few words, describing how the idea of Dead Set came to him.

“It sort of started a few years ago. I was watching 24 – and I’m a big fan of 24. Jack Bauer was sort of slicing a terrorist’s knee-cap off and feeding it to him, and I thought, ‘This is great, I love it. But the terrorists aren’t very realistic, they might as well be monsters or zombies’ – because I love zombies. And I thought this was an obvious idea, someone was bound to do it. And, nobody did. A few months later, I was watching Big Brother, and I thought, ‘That’s a good place to hole up during a zombie apocalypse,’ because I’m a big fan of the original Dawn of the Dead and in that they holed up in a shopping mall because that was seen as a symbol of the times. And I thought, ‘Yeah, I bet somebody does that’. And nobody did. So I ended up having to write it, which, frankly took ages. And my arm hurts.”

The five-part series airs later this month on E4.