Watchdog

That's the problem they've had since they merged it with Rogue Traders - which didn't take itself as seriously - and extended it to an hour. I much preferred the format they had before Anne came back.

Totally disagree, I think the juxtaposition with the Rogue Traders inclusion works well and helps create an hour of consumer affairs awesomeness.

It's helped that when Dan 'left' after his benefit fraud sentencing, Rogue blended more into the Watchdog format. The first series where Rogue was incorporated into Watchdog was awful.

I'm going to Trading Standards over the use of "consumer affairs awesomeness".

How does that work when you report on dodgy car dealers and try to make it funny,
considering people may be in unsafe vehicles, plus have lost money?

They aren't making fun of the situation, the danger of the situation or the victims - precisely the opposite. They are using humour and ridicule to make a very obvious statement and to bring very obvious attention to the "Rogue Trader" in question. It also makes for somewhat more entertaining TV than a Roger Cooke style effort. (There's no point making a consumer show that people don't watch...)

Personally I prefer the hour-long format including Rogue Traders than the half-hour Watchdog only format. The Nicky Campbell + Julia Bradbury incarnation was very 'earnest' and a bit humourless. (Though the least said about the first hour-long series after Annie returned the better)

Documentary programmes don't necessarily have to be entertaining to make them watchable, they simply have to be interesting.

The Rouge Traders portions of Watchdog, are about 5 or 6 minutes worth of useful content, stretched out with irrelevant crap and split up to help fill an hours' worth of airtime (with the C4 style, 'That was Part 1, coming up in Part 2..... nonsense) . It's more intrusion of 'cheap and cheerful' daytime TV production techniques, finding themselves in peak viewing

Exactly my point.
If the story is well told it does not have to be reduced to a children's programme.
It is aimed at adults after all. I they trying to make it look like "That's Life!"?
From memory they handled the serious and lighter much better.