Hot Metal is a British sitcom produced by London Weekend Television about the newspaper industry, that aired for two series on the ITV network in 1986 and 1988, along with a special episode for Comic Relief in 1989, that was broadcast on BBC One.

Spam takes the paper shooting downmarket and turns the Crucible into a sensation-seeking scandal rag, very much in the style of the British tabloids of the 1980s, in particular The Sun and The Daily Mirror.

In one episode, the Crucible's Page 3 is spiced up by the invention of "Wobblevision", a method of animating nude glamour photos by means of special printing techniques and 3D-style glasses with moving filters.

This idea has to be dropped due to medical evidence that it causes migraines and vision problems; following this revelation Stringer tells a user, "stop it, you'll go blind".

Spam is helped in his popularising campaign by his ace gutter journalist, Greg Kettle (Richard Kane), who intimidates his tabloid victims by claiming to be "a representative of Her Majesty's press" and produces stories such as accusing a vicar of being a werewolf.