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ITV curse affects entirety of channel's output

EVERY programme as well as the World Cup is made inherently shit when broadcast by ITV, it has been confirmed.

The curse, which supposedly makes England lose when playing a football match broadcast by ITV, also turns the channel’s dramas into bland slogs and its news bulletins into hyperbolic parades of biased speculation.

ITV boss Carolyn McCall said: “We can have the highest quality programme possible in the can, but as soon as it’s transmitted it looks like a poorly-made piece of commercial crap. It’s spooky.

“Very occasionally we think the curse is broken when we get a rare hit like Broadchurch. But even that went to shit after series one, which means it must have been the exception that proves the rule.

“Nobody knows where the curse came from, although I suspect it’s a natural side effect of selling your soul to corporate sponsors. That said, being funded by adverts seems to keep the press off our backs for some reason, so it’s a fair trade-off.”

England supporter Roy Hobbs said: “I’m not usually a superstitious man, but I’m going to illegally stream the Senegal match from a foreign network. Can’t afford to tempt fate this far into the competition.”

'See it, say it, sorted' and other slogans that don't quite work

WE’RE bombarded by slogans, but for every iconic ‘Just Do It’ there’s a dodgy ‘It’s not for girls’. Here are some of the most perplexing:

See it, say it, sorted

The next time you’re on a train and see something unusual, text the British Transport Police and ask them to help you enact this grammatically garbled set of instructions. But remember that when they say ‘if you see something that doesn’t look right’ they mean a terrorist clutching a bomb, rather than the fact that the buffet cart has just charged you £7 for a coffee and a Twirl.

When the fun stops, stop

This slogan unhelpfully forgets that for true addicts gambling is addictive, rather than a bit of a laugh. Fun is helping your Nan put 50p each way on the Grand National because she likes the name of the horse, whereas problem gambling is selling her jewellery to put a £400 bet on a South Korean volleyball match. If you only consider stopping at that stage, it’s a bit late.

Don’t be evil

Everyone knows that huge corporations are always evil, so going out of your way to claim yours isn’t just makes your inherent badness even more obvious, especially when your company is well known for collecting data for nefarious purposes and not paying tax. Google has now changed its slogan to ‘Do the right thing’, which might be even worse as it suggests they have a guilty conscience to assuage.

Eat Out to Help Out

Who or what exactly were we meant to be ‘helping out’? The spread of Covid? The introduction and acceptance of continental-style al fresco dining in places utterly unsuited to it, like a narrow pavement next to a thunderously busy dual carriageway? Because apparently it had a negligible impact on the hospitality industry, however snappy Rishi’s slogan sounded at the time.

Va Va Voom

Twenty years ago, people went wild for f**king annoying, meaningless slogans, which is why pubs were full of idiots yelling ‘Wazzuuuuuup’ at each other over bottles of piss-weak American beer. We also fell for hunky French footballer Thierry Henry exploring the meaning of the phrase ‘Va va voom’, as if it was important philosophical discourse and not just a load of bollocks invented to make the lumpy old Renault Clio seem sexy.

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