Ayoade took over as host of the Channel 4 game show "The Crystal Maze" in 2017, following the success of a celebrity charity special revival hosted by Stephen Merchant. His style of presenting has been described as being "a more cerebral and intense version" of his "IT Crowd" character, Maurice Moss. Ayoade made a cameo appearance in the comedy sequel "Paddington 2" as a forensic investigator in 2017 and was amongst the voice cast for Vampire Weekend Ezra Koenig's animated series "Neo Yokio" in the same year. His second book, "The Grip Of Film", was published in October 2017. Written in the perspective of clueless film fanatic Gordy LaSure, in its canon is an A-Z of films and what makes them good with footnotes by Ayoade. Beginning in late 2017, he has guest hosted a number of episodes of the panel show "Have I Got News for You". Ayoade starred in an advertisement for HSBC in 2018, which addressed other countries' cultural impact on the United Kingdom ahead of Brexit; appearing in four more in the following years Ayoade voiced Treebor, a Stone Age caveman, in the Aardman Animations stop-motion comedy "Early Man" (2018).