Sitcom Option: Man Like Mobeen and Friends
Studying the Set Sitcom Extract
For the sitcom option, the exam board sets an episode of Man Like Mobeen as the contemporary product and a ten-minute extract from Friends as the sitcom from the past. In the exam, a three-minute extract from the set episode is screened twice, then Question 1 (20 marks) asks you to analyse media language or representation in that extract, and Question 2 (10 marks) tests your knowledge of media industries, audiences or contexts for the set programme.
The set episode is series 1, episode 2 of Man Like Mobeen, called “Wifey Riddim”. It was produced by Tiger Aspect, part of the Endemol Shine UK conglomerate, for BBC Three, and first appeared on iPlayer in December 2017. The show is written by Guz Khan, who also plays Mobeen, and Andy Milligan. The character began life as YouTube videos Khan made in character while working as a secondary school teacher in Coventry, before BBC Three commissioned a full series in 2016.
“Wifey Riddim” is series 1, episode 2 of Man Like Mobeen. Guz Khan (who plays Mobeen) co-wrote it with Andy Milligan. Tiger Aspect (Endemol Shine UK) produced it for BBC Three; it launched on iPlayer in December 2017. Khan and Milligan won Best Writer at the 2020 Royal Television Society Midlands Awards.
Media Language: Genre Conventions and the Circular Narrative
Like most sitcoms, “Wifey Riddim” follows a circular narrative. The episode opens with an equilibrium — Mobeen going about a typical day looking after his sister Aqsa. This is disrupted when Aqsa arrives home suspended from school and accuses Mobeen of not parenting her properly. The “problem” this creates — Mobeen deciding he needs a wife to give Aqsa a mother figure — drives the comedy, and is resolved by the end when the characters agree they are happy as they are. This return to the original situation, rather than a genuinely new equilibrium, is a classic sitcom convention that reassures audiences.
The episode also uses familiar sitcom conventions of setting and iconography: the family home, the local shop and the market outside the mosque are the recurring locations. Mobeen’s Maharishi coat became iconic enough that fans asked on Instagram where to buy one. What makes this sitcom less conventional is that it is filmed entirely on location in Small Heath, Birmingham, rather than in a studio, and it uses a popular music soundtrack spanning several decades — both unusual choices for the genre that create a strong sense of verisimilitude and regional identity.
Visual codes construct character. Mobeen’s open body language — hugging his friends and saying “give us a cuddle, man” — connotes his warmth and community ties, while close-ups in the supermarket scene align the audience with his reactions. Costume distinguishes generations and cultures: Mobeen’s kurta, baseball cap and Maharishi coat show him caught between cultures; Aqsa’s school uniform establishes her age; the uncles’ traditional dress reflects their faith and generation.
Technical codes guide the audience through the community. Tracking shots follow Mobeen from behind as he moves between locations, and high-angle establishing shots of Small Heath — including the mosque centred in frame — signal its importance. The supermarket scene uses a split screen to show Aqsa texting Mobeen and his phone receiving the message at the same time, and a vertical wipe reveals the teen magazine cover lines alongside Mobeen’s reaction, both creating comedy through editing.
Dialogue marks identity too. Mobeen switches between “roadman” vernacular with his friends and the formal Arabic greeting “as-salamu alaykum” with Khadijah’s father. Misunderstanding jokes come from his friend Eight, who mishears “sexting” as a shape, and Aqsa’s confident lines — like telling Mobeen he should explain his own parenting mistakes — establish her as the one really in charge of the household.
Representation: Challenging and Reinforcing Stereotypes
The programme was created to challenge the under-representation and misrepresentation of working-class British Muslims on television. Mobeen is British Muslim of South Asian heritage; his friendship with Nate, a Black British character of a different faith, connotes racial harmony. Small Heath is shown as a culturally diverse community living well together — what the theorist Paul Gilroy calls “cosmopolitan conviviality” — challenging media narratives of cultural conflict.
Mobeen’s masculinity is deliberately complicated. He is represented as a maternal, caring figure — his job is a care-worker, and he is called “highly domesticated” by his Uncle Habib — which challenges stereotypes of masculinity. At the same time, references to his past as an “ex-roadman” and former drug dealer keep some stereotypical traits in play, showing the duality of his identity as he tries to leave that reputation behind.
Aqsa and Khadijah challenge passive stereotypes of Muslim women: Aqsa instructs her older brother on how to parent her, and Khadijah arrives with prepared interview questions for Mobeen. By the final scene, Mobeen, Aqsa and his friends Eight and Nate sit together on a sofa outside as a non-traditional family unit — a representation of family and community that is central to the programme’s message.
Man Like Mobeen constructs progressive representations of ethnicity, gender and family to challenge stereotypes. By contrast, the specification notes that Friends offers a more conservative representation of the diversity of American society, though it is slightly more challenging in its representation of gender.
Social and political context shapes the episode’s comedy. Jokes about arranged marriage, and later episodes referencing Islamophobia, police profiling, food banks and the NHS, reflect issues in British society at the time the series was made. Later series even reference politicians such as Priti Patel, tying the sitcom directly to its political moment.
Friends (season 1, episode 1, 1994, certificate 12) is studied as the ten-minute extract from the past. It was originally broadcast by NBC in the US and shown on Channel 4 in the UK — a terrestrial broadcaster buying in an American import, unlike the BBC producing Man Like Mobeen in-house. The specification notes that Friends uses sitcom conventions in a fairly typical way and offers a conservative representation of the diversity of American society, while being slightly more challenging in its representation of gender. Comparing the two shows how sitcom conventions and representations change over time and between broadcasting contexts.
Media Industries and Audiences
Man Like Mobeen was made for BBC Three, a public service broadcaster funded by the licence fee, which gives it freedom to commission distinctive content rather than chase ratings alone. It is produced by Tiger Aspect, part of Endemol Shine UK — an example of conglomerate ownership in the television industry. BBC Three itself shows how the industry has converged across platforms: it was an online-only iPlayer channel from 2016 until BBC Three returned to linear television on 1 February 2022 (timesharing with CBBC), while series 1 of Man Like Mobeen was itself later shown on linear TV on BBC One, and the series is also available on Netflix, allowing audiences to binge-watch it as a boxset.
BBC Three targets 16–34 year olds, and 63% of Man Like Mobeen’s audience is under 35, fulfilling that remit. The BBC marketed the show through an interview with Guz Khan on BBC Asian Network, social media discussion, a feature on BBC Bitesize’s careers pages, and the enigmatic iPlayer boxset tagline “Roadman or Role Model?” Blumler and Katz’s uses and gratifications theory helps explain its appeal: it entertains through slapstick and dialogue comedy, informs audiences about a culture they may not know well, and lets fans interact on social media about the storylines.
Man Like Mobeen has grown in popularity: series 3 peaked at 600,000 viewers and drew more iPlayer requests than the first two series. 63% of its audience is under 35, matching BBC Three’s target of 16 to 34 year olds.