Filming of An Idiot Abroad Season 3 Underway – Announces UK Air Date & ‘Derek’ Gets Full Season Pick Up (plus – why Gervais sold the show to Channel 4!)

So…who’s ready for a Ricky Gervais/Karl Pilkington info dump? That’s right, I’ve got all the latest news regarding An Idiot Abroad Season 3 and Gervais’ new show ‘Derek’. Want to be in the know? Then read on!

First off, new on An Idiot Abroad Season 3: The Short Way Round. As we previously reported, the third season of An Idiot Abroad won’t exactly follow the same format as the previous two seasons – it will be a two episode special which will see Karl Pilkington and Warwick Davis (star of Gervais’ show Life’s Too Short) as they travel “along the Marco Polo route from Italy to China” according to Gervais on his blog.

He also went on to say:

The three of us did a bit of filming this week where I explained the route and schedule etc. One of the funniest couple of hours I’ve ever spent. Karl seemed to be obsessed with the idea that Warwick would hold him back, complain about being tired, ask Karl to carry stuff for him, and might possibly “fall down a hole” ????.

Anyway, he can’t pull out now, he’s in too deep. Haha.

Also, a little later in the week Gervais got in touch with the unlikely pair:

I spoke to them both today. Warwick is having a great time. Karl is a bit annoyed that Warwick is having a great time.

“Tell him it’s not a holiday.” Haha. Perfect.

Gervais also went on to announce a vague air date the show will appear in the UK:

It will be on Sky One HD in December and the rest of the world soon after that.

As for Derek, well, Gervais says it all in this post:

I really haven’t had a reaction like it for anything I’ve done. So thank you if you wrote a review, a blog, a tweet, told a friend, or just watched it and enjoyed it. Thanks for watching it even if you didn’t enjoy it. That’s all I ask really. Cheers.

I shot it in 4 days (still wrapping at 3pm. No point in killing yourself is there?)

It was meant to be a non-broadcast pilot, which I always insist on doing, but then I had a cunning plan. I knew there would be the usual furore. You don’t need a superpower to see that coming, as it happens with every project I do. It doesn’t bother me. It’s just so boring and predictable. But what I’ve also noticed, is that this usually dies down after the first episode, and the wind changes, so to speak. People make their own minds up basically. So I thought, let’s put the pilot out as the first episode so people can get over all the noise and prejudice for when the series starts.

I’ll effectively be starting with the second episode. Anyway I think the strategy worked. Everyone has seen it, gets it, and hopefully all the bollocks about it being controversial or cruel won’t cloud the launch of the series. I’m half way through writing the next 6 by the way.

Lot’s have people have asked me why it’s not on the BBC. Well, I didn’t offer it to them this time for a very good reason. I promised Channel 4 over ten years ago that if I ever developed DEREK, they would have first refusal. I think they did a great job of promoting it too. Derek likes Channel 4 too, as his favourite shows are Deal Or No Deal and Secret Millionaire.

For those of you haven’t seen Derek yet, check out our post regarding the show right here – including Trailer and pictures of Karl Pilkington acting.

If you’ve been missing “The K-Man” Karl Pilkington why not download episodes from Season 1 + 2 of the show right here!

• Check out An Idiot Abroad Season 1 – $1.99 per episode or $9.99 for the entire season!
• Check out An Idiot Abroad Season 2 – $1.99 per episode or $12.99 for the entire season!