Like us, you’ve probably been loving Neighbours YouTube fan show, Neighbourshood, but after ten brilliant episodes it’s come to an end – hopefully not forever. Fronted by the hilarious Ben “Stingray” Nicholas, we looked forward to it every week so here are just a few reasons why it’s so great and needs to return!
Ben Nicholas – The Perfect Presenter
Where would Neighbourshood be without its excellent host? Ben Nicholas brings every bit of the energy to Neighbourshoood that he brought to the parent show during his tenure. There was a reason why Stingray was a breakout favourite of his era: Ben has such a natural charm and charisma that he remains a pleasure to watch all these years later. He clearly has a great relationship with the longtime cast he knew from his original stint and quickly seems to have gelled with the slew of newer cast who joined in the years inbetween. He also has a real affinity and affection for Neighbours and that shines through every segment. To be honest, tongue in cheek as it is, we really do wish Neighbours could believably bring back Stingray. His natural comedic skills would be an asset to the show in any era. But with that impossible, we’d love to see him get a chance to wreak more havoc behind the scenes in a second series!
Seeing Cast Favourites in a New Light
One of the things we’ve loved most about Neighbourshood is seeing a number of the cast getting a chance to shine in a way that we’ve never seen them before. Away from playing the characters onscreen, it’s been so much fun to see more of the people behind the actors. Different from the Q&A videos of the past, we loved how natural, relaxed and improvised Ben’s chats with the various cast members have been. Whether it be the cast getting being absolutely terrified by Ben’s pranks, their faux (and sometimes real!) horror at being named the weeks’ caketaker or best of all, the co-host aspect – it’s been so entertaining! The latter in particular never failed to make us smile as Ben’s chemistry with the cast removed any sense of awkwardness or stiltedness and frankly, we could’ve watched several hours of Ben and Rebekah Elmaloglou messing about and falling off chairs!
The In-Jokes
The best part of having a fan show is being able to involve the existing fandom with jokes and winks that include them. Neighbourshood did this perfectly with references to ‘Terage’, the Brennans being topless, many of Susan’s adoptees ending up dead and other references just for fans. And don’t ask us why, but Mavournee Hazel playing the tuba, ala Harold Bishop, during the credits just cracked us up every time. This is a fan show made for the geeky fans like us who love all of the little Neighbours quirks and we love that Neighbours aren’t afraid to poke fun at themselves.
The Pranks
The #BringBackStingray Skits
Never, in the history of all soap, have we wanted to undo a death so badly as we do Stingray, seriously who cares about believability or the fact Stingray’s ashes were scattered, we want him back. Neighbourshood took the perfect opportunity to demonstrate how possible (or plausible) this idea might be in a series of campaign pleas by Ben and granted, it’s not very likely but the sketches were brilliant. The best one? As much as we loved the first one, with Ben recreating the infamous death scene and getting a diagnosis from wonder Doc, Karl, it had to be the witness protection idea. Of course that involved the other fan favourite talking point – is Dee still alive?! In this skit Toadie had Dee in the basement and Stingray had to go into witness protection for his own safety when he learnt about the cover up! Now if only that were real…
Caketaker of the Week
There was someone oddly satisfying about seeing the cast be presented with a nice cake and then be read a series of mean(ish) tweets about their character. Not only did we love the name of the feature, taking us back to the days of spiggin’ huftas and the glorious Timmins family, but the feature gave us a good laugh seeing the cast – sometimes hopelessly – defend their character. It was especially funny when the cast weren’t expecting their behaviour to be judged so harshly and they were left sheepishly smiling, just like Kip Gamblin who has to play useless Brad!
So there we have it – six very good reasons why Neighbourshood was so great and why it deserves more episodes! Make it happen please Neighbours!
Erinsborough 