We Will Rock You proves a blast with added poignancy post-pandemic - Mayflower, Southampton

Bonkers, brilliant and gloriously silly, We Will Rock You remains a total blast – just as it ever was.

But maybe there is added poignancy post-pandemic in this tale of rebels fighting to bring back live music and entertainment after an evil force has temporarily buried them.

Well, maybe that’s reading too much into it.

But it’s certainly fabulous to see the show again, especially in this new updated version which, cleverly and funnily, even references our Covid-style “protection.”

Ben Elton’s rock musical, linking together the songs of Queen, is set in a future where music has been banned by a massive corporation which wants us stuck on our phones abandoning all individuality in favour of collective interchangeability.

It’s a truly nightmare vision. Thank goodness, then, for the rebels, particularly Galileo (terrific from Damian Walsh), a man whose thoughts are filled with scraps of prohibited songs, the Dreamer who can lead the rebellion in this spoof Arthurian quest in which the sword becomes an axe…

Along the way Galileo hooks up with Elena Skye’s Scaramouche, comfortably the night’s best performance. And what a brilliant invention her character is, the mocking bubble-pricker who laughs at all Galileo’s pretensions and pomposities.

We Will Rock You is never going to be a show which takes itself too seriously, but Scaramouche is the character that lets it get away with all its sillinesses – and Skye plays her brilliantly.

Excellent and hilarious too from Michael Mckell as Cliff.

Opposite the goodies, Jenny O'Leary as Killer Queen and Adam Strong as Khashoggi play the baddies with pure panto villainy.

It’s all great fun which develops superbly in the second half after a first half marred by woeful sound mixing.

It was maddeningly bad. Most of the lyrics were lost. Not even the biggest, belt-iest voice could compete with the band.

Sound-wise the second half, while not quite perfect, was a big improvement. Odd though that the problem wasn’t rectified much more quickly.