John Oliver's best bits on Last Week Tonight

John Oliver has had a phenomenally successful 2014. His HBO current affairs show Last Week Tonight has been a critical hit from the off, mixing political satire, hard-hitting investigative reporting and, like all good comedies, a 6ft-tall gecko in an astronaut suit.

Oliver’s jokes have tended to fall into one of three categories. The first is smart quips about organisations and people you already knew you didn’t like, such as racist police forces, homophobic governments, Isis and Vladimir Putin. Here he is discussing a typical Thursday for the Russian president – the sort of Thursday that ends in eating truffles with Silvio Berlusconi at 3.30am.

The second is eye-opening investigative reporting that brings comedy and journalism together, highlighting diverse subjects such as native advertising or the use of US drones in Iraq. Here he is lifting the lid on the shocking behaviour of Fifa in the run-up to this year’s World Cup. Oliver managed to do in 10 minutes what an inept England team normally take 90 to achieve: making the World Cup a whole lot more miserable.

Here he is explaining not only what net neutrality is to people who had no idea, but making it entertaining to boot.

The third strand to Oliver’s comedy has been surreal jokes that feel as if they were dreamed up by writers in search of light relief. The best was surely the doggy supreme court. Making a serious point about its refusal to allow proceedings to be televised, while featuring a chicken as a stenographer, this was a very Last Week Tonight sketch.

Oliver makes American politics both ridiculous and terrifying. One segment on the prison system in the US, in which it was revealed that there are more Americans locked up than there are people in Slovenia, stands out, as does a lengthy take-down of the increased militarisation of US police forces and the racial inequality that led to the recent tension in Ferguson.

The first season is over, but the show is already confirmed to return in 2015, no doubt buoyed with the confidence of a stellar debut. What are your highlights of the series?