Comedy Central is a British pay television channel that carries comedy programming, both original and syndicated. This channel is specific to audiences within the United Kingdom and Ireland. The channel is aligned with the original US version of the channel. The channel started as The Paramount Channel in 1995, before rebranding as the Paramount Comedy Channel in 1997 and again as Paramount Comedy 1 in 2004 before finally becoming Comedy Central on 6 April 2009. History 1995–1997 The channel was launched as The Paramount Channel on 1 November 1995. The original schedule was a mixture of comedy and drama, including such eclectic offerings as Beauty and the Beast, several Japanese anime productions acquired from Manga Entertainment, and authentic Paramount archive programming such as The Magician, as well as Nickelodeon's Ren & Stimpy, which was shown on Paramount rather than Nickelodeon due to its rather adult nature at times. It originally aired every evening after Nickelodeon's closing at 7:00pm until around 4:00am, with a testcard featuring a chicken crossing the road and holding up traffic airing during downtime (a segment deemed as "Chicken Tonite") until Nickelodeon started up at 6:00am. 1997–2009 In February 1997, the Paramount Channel became the Paramount Comedy Channel, a channel dedicated solely to comedy. With expansion of Sky Digital on 4 February 2001, the channel no longer shared air time with Nickelodeon and started broadcasting with a daytime schedule beginning broadcasts at 9:00am. On 1 July 2002, the channel renamed itself Paramount Comedy. By 2005, with the timeshift channel Paramount Comedy 2 having gone on the air in 2003, the primary channel was renamed as Paramount Comedy 1. 2009–present On 17 February 2009, it was confirmed that Paramount Comedy 1 would become Comedy Central from 6 April 2009 in the UK and Ireland. Since season 13, Comedy Central has aired new episodes of South Park two days after they aired in the US (i.e., the episodes air on Comedy Central US on Wednesdays, and air on the UK counterpart on Fridays.) At 9:00pm on 6 April, Paramount Comedy 1 was finally relaunched as Comedy Central, with the last programme on PC1 being an episode of Scrubs and the first programme on Comedy Central being a new episode of Two and a Half Men. Comedy Central idents from this era were filmed in locations such as The Gherkin, Forth Bridge and Nelson's Column. Subsidiary channels After no longer