Those happy looking fellows in the photo are Tim Key and Mark Watson and along with Alex Horne they host a new TV comedy quiz show – yes another one, but they’re fun, aren’t they? This one, which premieres on BBC Four this week, is called We Need Answers, and it’s one hell of a brave, clever commission on the part of the Beeb, because it actually started life as a raucous late night show at the Edinburgh Fringe. Frankly, you must watch it.

As a fan of live comedy, the fact that three bone fide stand-up heroes like Key, Watson and Horne should get their own show – and that that show has been allowed to keep almost all of its eccentricities and quirks while making the transition from Fringe to telly – makes me very happy indeed. Being in the audience for the recording of two of the three episodes was also rather cool…

Mark Watson, the main host, is the one you’re most likely to know already thanks to appearances on Mock The Week, Never Mind The Buzzcocks and the like. Then there’s Tim Key, one quarter of the sketch group Cowards whose own BBC Four show came to end last week (I hope you were all watching!). He’s the question master, and his interaction with the guests is a wonderful thing to behold. In this first episode, which has the theme of Reading (no, not the place), the frankly startlingly high profile guests are Germaine Greer and Michael Rosen, and his lack of reverence is just hilarious. Finally, Alex Horne works the back projections and offers ‘analysis’ on the quiz. Some are pre-prepared, others are done on the hoof; all very very funny.

As you can tell, this is not your average quiz show – there are more hosts than contestants for a start, and the guests’ bewilderment at the strange goings on around them are just brilliant. Ooh, and all of the questions have been texted into one of those services where you can ask anything and they’ll text you back an answer (I’m sure there’s a quicker way of explaining that….), meaning that they can be pretty odd. It’ll be fantastic to see how over two hours of footage is edited down to 30 minutes, but from what I saw they have plenty of great stuff to work with. The following two episodes will (loosely) be on the subjects of Motoring and Wine.