Adrian Edmondson is to appear on University Challenge - and people are loving it

16 December 2020, 16:27 | Updated: 16 December 2020, 20:29

Twitter is alive with the prospect of the Young Ones star making an appearance on the actual programme... over 35 after he parodied the TV quiz show.

Christmas TV just got a whole lot better as it's been announced that comedian and actor Adrian Edmondson is to appear on a special edition of University Challenge.

Why is this special? Well, back when Ade Edmondson was in the anarchic 1980s comedy The Young Ones, the hopeless students of "Scumbag College" took on the posh kids in a fictional round of the university-based quiz show.

And, Edmondson acknowledged the irony of appearing on the show he'd parodied nearly 40 years ago, noting: "And lo, it came to pass, that on 22nd Dec on BBC2, television did eat itself."

The new episode of University Challenge will air on Tuesday 22 December and will see two teams of graduates battle it out for supremacy.

Adrian Edmondson is playing for his old uni Manchester, alongside war surgeon David Nott. They will take on graduates from Queen’s Belfast, including writer Kate Devlin and poet Miriam Gamble.

In the 1984 Young Ones episode Bambi, the team of Vyvyan (played by Edmondson), Rick (played by the late great Rik Mayall), Neil (played by Nigel Planer) and Mike (played by Christopher Ryan) took their chances against a team of upper class toffs: Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Ben Elton and Emma Thompson.

The Young Ones H/Q....On University Challenge

However, as original University Challenge presenter Bamber Gascoigne (devastatingly impersonated by Griff Rhys-Jones) explains to the useless Scumbag lads, "the posh kids always win"... until Vyvyan finds a way of evening up the score...

Not surprisingly, fans of The Young Ones went crazy over the news.

"Hope you got one of these in as the end credits started to roll," said one, attaching a gif of Ade as Vyvyan, flicking the Vs at the camera.

Another fan of the show replied with one of the fake "questions" designed to let Scumbag College win: "Who said "lawks a lordy, my bottom's on fire?"

And there was a bit of Photoshopping to recreate Edmondson's younger self, sat on the University Challenge set in 2020:

Plus much Young Ones/University Challenge banter...

The episode of University Challenge is shown on BBC2 at 7.30om on Tuesday 22 December. Up Scumbag! Up Scumbag!