The IT Crowd - Classic or Dud?

I saw episode two being taped and it was excellent, at least on par with the best of Black Books.

I think it will be the show that makes Richard Ayoade into a (deserving) star.

Chris Morris is excellent in it too.

It also guest stars Adam Buxton and Noel Fielding.

I hope it is at least as good as Hippies. (Actually, it is a good premise for a trad sitcom of the BB/FT style so am looking forward).

Bring back good "laugh-tracks" (they were always from a studio audience anyway). I never had a problem is the sit was right.

I think Morris is obsessed with hipsters.

HI DERE (dollsnatch)

that Jaaaam soundtrack thing came out on warp.

the person who did technical consultancy popped up on the slashdot thread about it. said they had real geeks dressing the set and making sure all the references were ok. he says they did a good job.

thread:
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/12/1556232

post:
http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=173780&cid=14458539

I thought it was pretty weak (though the aforementioned set design is amazingly detailed - down to the Dan Clowes' Pogeybait action figure on the Robert Pollard lookalike's desk). Don't know that I'd watch it again.

The jokes are apallingly lazy, and that is the world's worst Dylan Moran impersonator. It does get better as it (the episode) goes on, mind.

Morris is CJ; Father Ted-style edgeless silly; live audience not a bad thing - never seemed to hinder my enjoyment of Porridge or Ever Decreasing Circles; blah blah blah.

But, I killed the online version after 8 minutes cos I felt bad watching something new without the missus.

Katharine Parkinson was pretty good but underwritten, I enjoyed her detailing her computer skills at the start.

how did hyperdrive get past initial scripts eh?

I read somewhere that Linehan wanted him mainly for his slightly bizarre way of speaking. Matt Berry was better than him as Dixon Bainbridge in Boosh though (Ayoade was Bainbridge in the pilot - which had a laugh track OH NO!)

Darkplace had some good moments too.

If I had something better to do, I wouldn't have watched all of this. As it were, it was 1/2 an hour well spent, since I now know that this is a rubbish show, with paper-thin acting, rehashed stereotypes masquerading as characters, and the worst comedy script I've experienced outside of Last of the Summer Wine. I laugh easily, and for me to go the entire time without laughing once is quite a feat. The girl was okay in it (I can see what you mean about her part being under-written) but she still didn't elicit so much as a smile from me.

I don't have a problem with a laughter track, I have a problem with rubbish shows. And I cannot stress this enough - this is a rubbish show.

Charlie, you really aren't missing anything.

Yes, it's as if he hasn't quite decided how to play it - gruff Yorkshire industrialist, Eton-educated blusterer, bit of Ted Maul, etc...

-- Michael Jones (tourajsig...), January 28th, 2006.

Both David Mitchell and Robert Webb (peepshow boys) are from footlights.

where can i download episode 1?

Ah, well - there you go, another nascent theory blown out of the water.

Each episode of Drop the Dead Donkey on DVD is preceded by a blurb about current events in the week of broadcast; so much of that show's cachet was its topicality. It had a bit too much of the trad-sitcom theatrical overacting in it for my liking; maybe it was easier to get away with that in 1992 or whenever.

luckily (or suspiciously) next friday is a double bill of the first two episodes.

saw the flying spaghetti monster poster in the advert. i think playing spot the reference will be the funniest aspect given the actual content of the trailers (aren't the trailers meant to be the best bits?)

(Frustrated iBook person upthread, the episode will play in Opera, though not Safari.)

I had to switch off after the joke where the nerd walks into his new bosses room and she's on the phone making plans and the nerd guy waits for a while and then she hangs up and goes 'yes what do you want?' and he goes 'I just came in to connect your phone..'. Not only was that a joke from the shitty depths of half-arsed sitcom hell, but the laughter track people actually CLAPPED in hysterics at that. Oh, and the laughter track in itself made one real shitty show around 15% shittier.

Shocking that Chris Morris is involved with it. The sharpest comedy brain of recent years has now been reduced to doing a pisspoor copy of CJ from Reginald Perrin with a ropey accent. I'd love to hear what he has to say about this show. Me, it's one of the worst things I've seen on TV in years.

Also I liked Ayoade's delivery of the "hello? hello?" joke, and thought it (combined with Witless on the other phone) was good observational IT department comedy. My tolerance for that will definitely fade over time - there's a reason I don't read Dilbert/User Friendly anymore.

This is so touching! Can anyone beat eight minutes?

I like Dixon Bainbridge.

Maybe he's not as precious about his reputation as you are. Award-winning scriptwriter with a great track-record and with whom he's worked before asks him to do a turn as an eccentric boss in a sitcom he's just had commissioned for C4. What's he gonna say? "Sorry, Graham - jokes are a bit obvious. Wouldn't be seen dead in this. Have my adoring fanbase to think of. Yrs, CM."

Do you really think this is such a ridiculous thing to say?? Morris has been known for being pretty precious about his reputation in the past, I wonder what changed.

But yeah I see what you mean, "Hi Graham! Yeah this show is fucking dreadful with a script plucked straight from the dustbin of Two Point Four Children but hey, I'm a notorious media whore who'll appear in anything and everything so yup, I'm in!"

It's unforgivably bad when set against shows in a similar time slot, like Peep Show, CYE, Brass Eye, etc. Compared to show like My Hero it's a shining beacon of brilliance but uh.. has it really come to this? "Yeah, this sandwich is stale and tasteless but it's better than that piece of mouldy bacon rind I found down the back of the cooker."

If CYE stands for "Curb Your Enthusiasm," I am really confused.

I always find I dislike first episodes of stuff.

Peep Show has been killed by Ch4 bosses. Similarly, Nathan Barley won't be back for a 2nd series. But I get this awful feeling that IT Crowd will be back again and again and again.. Can someone explain the workings of TV comedy market, Adventures In The Screen Trade style?

I'll tell you, after I watch a bit

the set-up needs to move beyond the mismatched boss/worker dynamic, and quickly. and the characters are pretty uninsipiring so far. oh, and it needs more jokes.

fucking hell, and i had high hopes for this too.

Maybe I should explain myself. I've seen obviously one episode of The IT Crowd, and maybe three or four episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm. CYE has more subtle acting, and is probably better-produced technically. On the downside, though, it isn't entertaining. At all. The IT Crowd has some bad and obvious jokes, but it does at least have parts that raise a smile, which is more than you can say for CYE.

I *like* that it isn't all self-consciously trying-to-be-cutting-edge. Which praps makes it self-consciously trying-not-to-try-to-be-cutting-edge. But I prefer the latter to the former.

OTM, alas. Whereas Nathan Barley was satire on a world that hasn't quite materialized yet (that was both its appeal and its problem, the fact that it was both conjuring and dismissing lifestyles which remain "aspirational"), IT Crowd "connects with ordinary people". While the man on the Clapham omnibus is disturbed by Nathan Barley coming into the mouth of a girl a phonecall tells him is just 13, or jerking off a straight builder in a "stray scene" pub, he can identify and deal with the joke:

"Tell them about what happened in Amsterdam!" X leaves room, Y (predictably) recounts "risque" tale of hiring prostitutes in Amsterdam and taking them to a funfair, "risque" tale is apparently so shocking that office party is ruined, X comes back, asks if Y has told the falling-into-the-canal story, realises something is amiss and screams (a little bit too loud, as if to say "We know this is an old routine, but here it is, louder and in quotation marks") "WHAT DID YOU SAY?"

no problems w/ it really. couple of crap jokes but don't mind. glad there are only a few characters, just now. no point in talking about n barley, re: this. or m boosh or anything, really. I thought it was, like zoe said, charming. wee bit "wacky" instead of the dreaded "surreal". the two guys reminded me, at times, of mr. don & mr. george, a little. c morris and his changing accent was fine, too! characters as cliches/riffs on "classic" sitcom characters are OK. liked the guy that was in n barley and the darkplace, here -- much funnier than I thought he was, before. hope n fielding isn't really in it. depends which one he is, though, I suppose

I will watch this, again, if it's on and I have nothing better to do, I think

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don't really like the woman and sometimes dislike the first guy, too, but not so much that it affects what this is

It's the difference between uncomfortable and comfortable laughter. Uncomfortable laughter wins prizes and appeals 20 years later, comfortable laughter gets good ratings and a second series.

would I?

maybe if I heard it and liked it

don't really read record reviews

It's not laughing with helpdesk geeks, it's laughing AT helpdesk geeks, isn't it?

I often look in vain for a record that is "comfortable", or even better, one that is "comforting". There is nothing wrong with this.

Is this programme designed to appeal to the Red Dwarf crowd?

It can be the oldest joke in the world, but as long as the context hits the mark, or something like that, it's fine. As you can tell, I'm trying to reserve judgement until I hear/see it. Bit like the Arctics. For example,

Ste, seriously don't bother. I'm still bitter about wasting 10 minutes of my life on that. The only reason I didn't switch off after the first couple of
-- Affectian (niche_ia...) (webmail), Yesterday 1:28 PM. (later) (link)

.. I nearly excel'd as it made me laff, but about half the laffs wa the context, above.

That distinction doesn't work because the best sitcoms are Extreme/familiar.

The trailer I saw the other night actually made me chuckle, with the guy techno-babbling down the phone. I presume it will be repeated throughout the week on E4?

another yawn.

Also, I shall be away so won't get to see the opener episodes.

Julian Barret should have taken the chris morris role. However, maybe he actually read the script.

I watched about two minutes (the not answering the phone bit). It was unappealing. No way could I watch an hour of it. Is the boss Chris Morris? It was like a minor character from Father Ted only not very funny.

I met GL once and he said good luck to me for some reason, so I say good luck to him for this.

Am I right in thinking that Katherine Parkinson is the lady from the Heat magazine ads? (as in [in a doctor's surgery]"Excuse me, I don't see your copy of Heat magazine" "Do you have an appointment?" "Do I LOOK sick????")

the "funny" camerawork on the mildly funny "if you're still stressed afterwards...YOU'LL BE FIRED!" joke detracted somewhat

the funniest bits in the second episode were funnier than the funniest bits in the first (the huge pair of doc marten's) but, overall, it was slightly less funny, I think

nick told me g linehan compared IT to seinfeld, in some interview thing, saying he had to intertwine storylines, etc. unless there is some serious shift in structure, that was a silly thing to say

bad endings

this is still OK and makes me laugh, at times!

it did remind me of father ted, somewhat. it also reminded me of a sort of...70s sitcom. it didnt really feel like today.

The accompanying clips were, unfortunately, fairly awful. Maybe I need to see it. But I don't know how on earth to make those C4 links work. Can anyone tell me?

I was disappointed. I wanted to like it so much and I just didn't think it was that good. Everybody shouts too much and I'm not sure that these guys play to a large studio audience as well as the actors in Father Ted did. I can't help thinking that GL is better off writing with a partner, and that it would be better if someone else directed it. It all needs to move a lot faster, with less mugging and no Chris Morris. Someone else would be less distracting in the role, because you wouldn't be expecting them to do anything other than deliver the lines.

It would really make a great children's show.

"Have you tried turning it off and on again" made me snicker each time, even tho it's been a trope since DinosaurCorp got IT.

i should be offended, but that's pretty fucking funny.

you are all mentalists. it works fine as long as you've installed that thing microsoft recommend instead of windows media player ... flip4mac WMV.

anyway, enough IT geekery; what about these IT geeks? i watched it again last night - saw the first episode for the second time and the second episode for the first time, if you see what i mean.

the first ep is much funnier than i gave it credit for. perhaps this is because my expectations were lower. even so, i chuckled loudly at certain points. and the second ep is fucking wonderful. i laughed loudly throughout. the "profanity button" was superb, as were the big doc martens. okay, a lot of the brilliance was down to chris morris - the richard ayoade character became quite annoying quite quickly - but still. i like. a lot.

morris's turn trying to stress out the lady was funny

that was the wholesome singer whose name i forget rather than Ted and / or Dougal themselves. (ah, Eoin McLove)

i enjoyed IT Crowd despite thinking i wouldn't. i liked the titles, the Underwurlde and Alien8 posters and the email to the fire brigade. Ayoade does a good job of acting socially inept (with this and Dean Lerner in Dark Place it's easy to think he just can't act but i'm giving him the benefit of the doubt). female characters need to be less 1 dimensional. the Doc Martens bit was very father ted. Chris Morris was funny for being out of character (i think that's the most ridiculous we've seen him given that he normally plays staid anchormen).

Although, he could just stand there and he'd still brilliant.

Other than that, I thought it was v. poor.

I like it more because PF likes it, too

crosspost

to behonest, i note the appeals to allowing this time to develop, give it time etc but i never watch tv on a friday night, so this programem had one chance to grab me and get me to torrent the rest, when i was ill and staying in, and whether its rubbish or gentle, obvious or well-worn, irt didnt make me laugh at all. except for the bit where he reached for the coffee cup. and the bit where chris morris said "everyones job here is to be sexy and have affairs" or something. i felt pretty embarrassed by about 15 mins in so just watched my dvd instead.

as comedy is there to make me laugh, it pretty much failed and i doubt i will see it again. i think the idea of it bein a childrens show is a prety good one.

the last programme i found very very funny was "people like us" and that sank without a trace so go figure, i guess TV comedy aint for me.

i think what i wanted from a show like this - if it's going to go for all-out goofiness - would be something more akin to the register's "bastard operator from hell," which shows a much more "br'er rabbit" attitude than any of these people seem capable of.

I have to say, I identify more with the other one myself.

Also, I was tickled by all the comics stuff round the IT office, being the comics geek/scholar that I am. Chris Ware, Daniel Clowes, Peter Bagg... yes yes, I did like that.

don't like n fielding

clodia - i downloaded ep 4 torrent off isohunt. Really only to see aforementioned n fielding, though.

I think they've missed something with the nerd though. All the best nerds/geeks(what's the difference?) are very clever but incredibly stupid at the same time. This one's just Dougalish dumb.

I like the scene best, where Jen asked him to close the door and he does and she tells him, no from the other side and he does so and then stands there and goes "Oh ...".
Classic.

-- clodia pulchra (spa...), February 12th, 2006.

But the problem is he doesn't seem convincingly in touch with things computer programming related.
He's not mentioned Linux, Skype, rootkits or anything liek that once.

That "Oh..." sounded *exactly* like my ex-bf.

he doesn't seem convincingly in touch with things computer programming related.
He's not mentioned Linux, Skype, rootkits or anything liek that once.

That's cos it's not written by a geek. If he *had* it would probably seem false and forced, and we'd all be going "bah, all those references to Linux and Skype were just shoved in to make him sound more geeky."

(talking of Linux, has anyone worked out what the "code screen" shown briefly at the end of the opening titles is exactly. To me it looks rather like a Linux register/stack dump followed by a forced reboot, the sort you'd get by pressing various magic SysRq keystrokes in sequence, but I'm not entirely sure - the download version isn't high enough resolution for the text to be readable, apart from one or two things. It's readable enough to show that it is some sort of Unix machine shutting down, though.)

haha, i did single frame through that on the tivo in order to see. yes, generic kernel panic type stuff. will do a screengrab if i remember.

I thought the stuck under the desk thing was funny.

It was weird that the computer thing with flashing lights was a different size depending on where the camera was pointing from.

I think it may be the highlight of Chris Morris's career.

That's like saying appearing in Harry Potter is John Cleese's career highlight.

-- PJ Miller (pjmiller6...), February 18th, 2006. (PJ Miller 68) (later)

No offence, but you need to be sectioned.

kind of fancy jen.

And, funnily enough, the Irish guy was wearing a Guided By Voices' t-shirt on Friday's show. This show is really fucking dire isn't it? Terrible terrible acting from the Irish guy and the red-haired woman (shouting isn't actually that funny). The Goth thing was terrible. So that's Noel Fielding is it?

Yes, Suzy, got your mail, composing my reply...

Their arrival at "Mesijos" in 3 had me in stitches.

I watched 5 online when I was a bit drunk and I can't remember much about it.

This is a very wise observation.

Maybe not, but "there's me with a graph" was pretty funny.

I like Jen when she's not shouting, and I like Moss. I don't like The Irish Guy.

crosspost

Laughing at characters in a comedy series - who'd've thought it?

i know -- and the guys in this are so... geeky.

he is so RUBBISH!!!!!

Yes, Graham, we've all seen Invasion of the Bodysnatchers too! Great!

DO THINGS THE OFFICIAL WAY IF POSSIBLE.

That's my maxim.

But it is only UK-based Browsers.

http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/I/itcrowd/interviews/katherine_interview.html

There blimmin is. Or there was last weekend when I watched ep.5

http://geo.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/I/itcrowd/video/index.jsp

I'm not sure there is an official way to watch The IT Crowd on the BBC site.

http://geo.channel4.com

*polite cough*

That and the fact that I am so hi-tech I don't understand the concept of TV stations anymore.

i haven't!

however, i have seen the wicker man

the n fielding one had some funny bits (c morris, again, really) but he made it a little bit so RUBBISH!!!!!

my name is earl was much better though

My Name is Earl is perfectly watchable and well-put together, but is massively overrated (yes, I would say it is technically better than the IT crowd, but I'm plumping for the home-grown underdog here).

Is that the last episode then?

could they already know they have a second series?

should have spoken to cutty

agreed. it just seemed like a home for all the jokes they couldn't work into other episodes.

Having said that: Ayoade is ace.

IT crowd has lots of problems, but I'll probably keep watching for Ayoade and Morris and the occasional Fielding appearances (though he's not being used to the best of his abilities at all).

Only if you're saying "You know what's fucking shit? The Mighty Boosh!"

vince: your face is ambient. pure ambience. it's like the orb's third album.

crosspost

Why? So we can all marvel that some posho Oxbridge hipster has heard of The Orb and worked them into a line in one of his comedy sketches?

?! That's so weird that you'd read the line like that. The Orb aren't really obscure, to our generation anyway. The line is a bit like that record-chucking scene in Shaun of The Dead where they agree that Prince's Batman album can go. The Orb are ambient, a funny way to describe someone's face, but as understand it, the funny extra layer is that people don't really remember their third album. It's like Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld, U.F.Orb and then err... forgettable, like Howard's face. In fact I still can't remember what the third album is.

Yes, there's a certain in-jokiness, but there's barely such a thing as pure comedy that relies on no pre-existing cultural knowledge on the part of the audience. It's fine!

Didn't make me laugh much, though. I think the pacing/delivery/something's a bit off in the first MB series.

bainbridge: naboo! are you in a trance?
naboo: no, i was listening to fleetwood mac.
bainbridge: (excitedly) RUMOURS???
naboo: no, tusk.
bainbridge: (LOOK OF CONFUSION AND DISGUST)

are you saying that the fleetwood mac joke is funny?

: s

i hate you people.

mighty boosh boys: 'it's a show written for a small percentage of the population that thinks tusk is a better record than rumours. and who can't remember the name of the orb's third album'

man from the bbc: ....

:)

"You've just had a huge dose of electric shock therapy..." or something.

Not very funny either. I sold the album at some point, like almost everybody else, I bet.

The "hip" references have never really bothered me in The Mighty Boosh, but they usually do.

(tho i don't like father ted either, so I can be safely ignored on this subject)

does this make sense?

Well, there's 'Flight of the Conchords,' which could be pitched as Tenacious D by Kiwi people. Coming to HBO soon.

oh so you're the one!

The Armando Ianucci Shows
Black Books (series 1 only)
Dave Gorman's Important Astrology Experiment
The Dave Gorman Collection
Director's Commentary (borderline, this one)
Happiness
Harry Hill's TV Burp
Help (best thing on this list)
Otis Lee Crenshaw- London Not Tennessee (one-off special, but I'll allow it)
The Office (Christmas special was awful, tho)
Peep Show
Phoenix Nights
Rich Hall's Cattle Drive
Rich Hall's Fishing Show
Rock Profile
Shoreditch Twat (may need to see this again)
The Thick of It
Video Gaiden

Only kiddin'. Nice to see someone else liked those Rich Hall shows. If we're talking viewing figures, I bet 50 people watched Nathan Barley for every one who stumbled across Rich Hall.

xp

xp

Yeah, those Hall shows are weird... I get the feeling someone really high up in BBC commissioning is a massive fan of him, and just lets him keep putting out this weird minority interest comedy shows that have no chance of ever crossing over to BBC 2 out on the digital channels.

Eh, one of the reviewers is part of the Scots comedy Still Game/Chewing the Fat comedy mafia, plus the online show it comes from (www.consolevania.com)'s review of Batman Begins may be the funniest thing I've seen in my life.

Rich Hall lives and works in the UK now, he said that it's because British stand-up comedians are pretty bad so it's easier to earn a living from it over here.

Not too likely to be a second series for obvious reasons.

xp

did The Keith Barret Show really start in 2000? or was this radio version?

ie It was fucking shit.

The Thick Of It remaining in a state of permanent postponement on the DVD front. (Iannucci's cursed with DVD releases, isn't he?)

My Life As A Popat is best though.

Finally watching this. Apparently they're working on pilot for an American version, and Richard Ayoade will be doing Moss in this version as well.

http://www.sitcom.co.uk/news/news.php?story=000111

Anything Richard does I laugh at, b/c i can't hear anything else but Dean Learner's voice.

Come with me, come to the land of mediocre British sitcoms

Well, I liked it. But that's cos I kept going "ooh, look, a ZX81. ooh, look, a Flying Spaghetti Monster poster. oooh, look, a Hokusai print"

i think the US version may have been picked up? 'the thick of it' crashed and burned.

there were some lols in this show but i can't remember them now. would watch a new series, but it's not one for the ages, unlike 'nathan barley', which remains godhead.

That one guy who secretly liked both Hippies and the Eddie Izzard vehicle "Cows"

chris morris "comedy is dead" [Started by titchyschneider (titchyschneider), last updated 0 seconds ago] 4654 new answers

i think the US version may have been picked up? 'the thick of it' crashed and burned.

US version of "IT Crowd" was picked up by NBC and starts in the fall.

"The Thick of It" is far from dead. ABC passed on it, but Mitch Hurwitz has the right to show it around, and Showtime, NBC, and HBO have all been meeting on it.

oh shit, i didn't know they'd cast oliver platt as tucker. that sounds awesome. given the swearload, probably a better bet for showtime/hbo.

http://nymag.com/images/2/daily/entertainment/07/05/23_itcrowd.jpg

and Moss will still be britishes in the NBC midseason replacement series

i actually think this will work better as an american sitcom
(or it will suck and make me eat those words)

i kind of wish they did replace moss with an american though, just because. and maybe b/c moss reminds me of someone i sort of know - seriously, the resemblance it is weird

so: am i the only one who thought the first ep of the second series was the funniest half-hour of TV this year? honestly: that was joyous -- up there with prime father ted.

there's no way they can keep that up throughout the series. is there?

the second series has begun? yesssss

We were laughing our arses off. So no, you're not the only one!

cutty: it's on again, on C4+1, right now.

i'm gonna watch it again. no, really.

i'll d/l tonight

i only saw the second half of this but i still laughed my arse off.

it was better than ok. i lol'd plenty.

for reasons i don't understand i saw another ep of hyperdrive the other night. :-/

I laughed once.

what, for 30 minutes?

Yes, for 30 minutes. Just not the 30 minutes when The IT Crowd was on.
I didn't actually mind it, but Laugh Out Loud funny? Nah.

it was quite funny!!!

I laughed a lot, out loud. Hilarious.

actually seemed like it was aiming to be v slightly seinfeldian (having just looked, upthread, at what I said g linehan said) but, obviously, still w/ a much smaller world

was good, over all, and rather funny, at times

geekiest thing spotted in background (thereby exposing my own geekiness for spotting it etc) : a 7" record on the Type Label pinned to the wall. the odds of a lolcat t-shirt making a future appearance must be pretty high.

IF RJG SAYS ITS GOOD ITS GOOD, KUDOS

odd thing out: a mr scruff poster

actually seemed like it was aiming to be v slightly seinfeldian (having just looked, upthread, at what I said g linehan said) but, obviously, still w/ a much smaller world

he said, in the sunday telegraph this week, that was what he was going for.

i lolled.

yeah, he wishes

Still not funny.

love this show.
m.

i thought it was great, i seem to remember chuckling at the first series but last night was lol most of the way through (drink may have been taken, but still...)

I was wondering if "Gay - The Musical" is actually the new Darren Hayes album

i like the 'message' that the 'credits gag' sends too.

odd thing out: a mr scruff poster
Nah - the Irish guy is totally a Mr Scruff fan. Look at his jeans - he did computer science and applied engineering at Manchester Uni from 1995 - 1998 and fell in love with Mr Scruff and the whole Ninja Tune rosta - he is every IT support person I have ever worked with. Ever.

I thought it was really funny and I couldn't be bothered to watch the last series.

There was a spoof cop show on telly a few years back, which I caught in a daze. It made me laugh, but Richard Ayoade is the only thing I remember from it. He played a Scouse detective who spoke as if he was in NYPD Blue: "ten foah". What was it called?

he's sort of amazing that guy.

I agree with those who said last Friday's episode was pretty funny esp. Jen turning to the bar to see Moss.

Was surprised to see that in the opening scene lovely Jen appeared to be reading the Love & Rockets 'Heartbreak Soup' paperback. Major props.

Probably just found it on Roy's desk and was just flicking through out of boredom but still...

This better be good after the misery I'm going through to install 4oD (DRM updates, WMP reinstalls, etc, etc). Still not there yet (and when I do, I'll only have 48 hours [before 2/9] in which to watch the whole episode - I have kids, it may not be possible!).

I'm glad I downloaded series 1 illegally if this is what you have to go through for a kosher copy.

can anyone tell me what fremantle media actually is?

braqnch of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RTL_Group

basically.

irish guy's face as he was raises/lowered onto the wheelchair bus was classic

funniest moment was when she turns around and ayoade is the bartender

that was an incredibly funny moment - the timing is perfect on that shot. the performances seem to have been toned down considerably in this new series. the overacting, especially from the irish guy, was the biggest barrier for me in series 1.

yeah he was spot on last episode... really funny

Now I might watch it hearing he's calmed down a bit.

Many people of IMDB do not share the love...

I thought Katherine Parkinson was especially funny, she seems to have toned it down a bit which made for more laughs. Esp. when the guy tells here she looks a bit like a man, even though you can really only see her eyes, it was hilarious.

This was shit.

the whole Gay thing was a bit overdone admittedly.

This was shit.

-- Stevie T, Monday, August 27, 2007 10:39 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Thank you, Kenneth Tynan.

I put the same effort into my review as Linehan evidently did into that script!

Touché!

it was meant to be overdone

it was a gay musical called gay

i love weeenies

i mean overdone in using the whole 'is he gay - no he's not - oh wait he is' thing rather than the OTT musical thing itself.

but no problems with the script really. little details like '"Not as long as some musicals" - The Banner' always good.

Cutty likes a shitty British sitcom, part #234.

cutty, it was willies not weenies.

I LOOOOOOVE WILLIES

agree that 'is he gay' plot was lame, but man, that episode was WAY better than all of season one, the two non-moss main characters are infinitely more tolerable + wheelchair bartending antics was pretty well done sitcommerce!

ps. sitcommerce is the art of creating a sitcom, i made it up, and yes i know "sitcomedy" makes more sense

and nathan barley was in it and the guy from the advert for drink-driving what does the impressions was in it

I'm laughing all over again just thinking of the bartending bit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-aPXUfdXOI

Still not finding this funny enough but still fancying Jen. Good thing is there is a lot less mugging in this series from woman and Irishman. Noel Fielding character is a waste of time/space.

Jen looks a lot like my sister-in-law.

Crikey!

that episode was pish.

I laughed. What did I laugh at? Vibratey phone. Chris Morris. Fighting with vicar - well, grinned at least. Other things I've forgotten already. Key thing about this show (apart from Moss) = Father Ted style editing - well timed surreal-ish scenes cut in at random. Well, not random. Or surreal really. You know what I mean.

That scene with Jen smoking the fags, watching eastenders, can of beer, just chucked in there. That kind of thing.

v obvious over all but slightly funny in part

http://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/1480000/images/_1480733_age_of_consent_150.jpg

KP in 2001 (in character phew)

lol linehan deleting all negative comments from his blog

the jen smoking fags shot was gold. the vibrating phone at the funeral was utter dross.

"sorry for your loss....move on"

that was a great line -- channel 4 put it in every trailer in every advert break last week though gah.

"i totally pimped your phone, girlfriend"

it's a bit flimsy but funnier than fucking 'entourage' at the moment. not a comedy golden age.

comedy golden age

only mark s could really do justice to that.

i thought the second one was even more Father Ted than the first one but at the same time not as good/funny - highlighted predictable phone in church thing a prime example - but the priest was funny ("DEATH!") as was the fgs thing (i half expected Morris to exhale and the smoke spell out "lovely fags" tho, Linehan's recycling stuff but not as well as when he first used it).

what was the deal with the other Boosh bloke playing Denham's son - i'm assuming the way he ran into the church and knocked the coffin over was a pastiche or reference to a film but no idea what. it was all lost on me and seemed very clumsy as a result.

i don't know how i feel about killing off chris morris for matt berry

a comedy golden age is when there are lots of good comedy shows on television, for purposes of internet banter. ie not now. mark s's version of justice seems to be weirdly pass-agg at the moment.

xp
mmmm symbolic sacrifice of elders

a comedy golden age is when there are lots of good comedy shows on television, for purposes of internet banter.

What's the shortest an age can be - 5 years? 3 years?

And how many good comedy shows would there need to be on in that time? 5? 3?

3 or 5

not that i disagree that there are no truly great comedies on at the mo. the early 00s may end up looking a lot better than the late 00s. you may be able to say the opposite about the 90s altho the good stuff is mostly in the middle.

Saxondale thread v quiet I notice

it wouldn't take too many, or last too long -- wouldn't get too worked up about it really, but this isn't one. partly coz people think it it. mighty boosh returning for a third series, 'little britain' on hbo, ricky gervais back on top... golden years...

xpost

haven't even watched 'saxondale' 2

millions of xposts
"a comedy golden age is when there are lots of good comedy shows on television, for purposes of internet banter."

hmm. what's at fault here, the definition, the use of it, the necessity of it...?

youtube, the internet in general, us and uk tv, tv beyond 5 channels, comedy as defined beyond shows aimed at overgrown metrocentric adolescents (eg the it crowd), radio..

are these to be admitted into a comedy discussion? (i'm not saying i'm the one to do it, far from it). cos then it becomes a bit less binary.

need to be at work to do boring semantic discussions about why people falling over/jamming trailers/doing karaoke on youtube isn't comedy in the five-word throwaway line in my post... yes i meant british tv, no i didn't mean just the five channels, i didn't think of radio but it's a training school for the people who end up on tv so i guess it can't be great, "the internet in general" is unknowable...

but i don't think there's any 'necessity' to the definition.

"people falling over/jamming trailers/doing karaoke on youtube isn't comedy in the five-word throwaway line in my post"

thought you'd take this snarky tack. this is kind of what my grandad would say about youtube.

"i didn't think of radio but it's a training school for the people who end up on tv so i guess it can't be great,"

wooow.

"the internet in general" is unknowable...

no, that won't do, whatever you mean here. i'm not an internet junkie so can't give too many examples but i know there are a good number of sites which have comedy series, eg yacht rock, there was that recent british series that started (blueski help out here), there's sooo much more than that that is known and knowable but not to me.

your average late teen reading and viewing the net, taking adavantage of digital to spot things on bbc radios 2, 4, 7, internet radio, sketches on myspace etc., obsessed with Garth Marenghi (which i like incidentally) and Daniel Kitson might well say this is a comedy golden age, and us crusty oldsters would try and disabuse him of this notion - to what end? And why? We both misuse it and thus the term is redundant in every concievable way.

this is kind of what my grandad would say about youtube.

naked ageism.

i'm thinking about radio 4 of course, which to be fair has been part of the oxbridge-edinburgh-radio 4-tv chain for a long time. i dunno who else commissions comedy but read my posts 1) talking about tv, not other stuff, 2) 'wouldn't get worked up about it'.

any vague statement about golden ages relies on selectivity of reference, that's a given; it's an impressionistic phrase rather than a descriptive one. i'm not an auditor of all performed* comedy.

*is part of the working definition of 'comedy' in the sentence i wrote. if i meant "things which are funny" and included youtube, lolcats, etc, that'd be something else. but no, i was talking about tv shows.

xpost ah radio 2 does?

1) then your defintions at fault, 2) am not, am having pleasant time while listening to cricket.

"if i meant "things which are funny" and included youtube, lolcats, etc, that'd be something else. but no, i was talking about tv shows"

youtube has many things which have been, are, could be and will be, material or indeed the foundation for situation or sketch comedy which may be shown on tv. or on youtube, or on internet tv, which is often how i watch the daily show, a comedy which be on tv.

lolcats. i ask you.

I just saw the first two episodes of this on my flight back home. It was very funny!

youtube has many things which have been, are, could be and will be, material or indeed the foundation for situation or sketch comedy which may be shown on tv. or on youtube, or on internet tv, which is often how i watch the daily show, a comedy which be on tv.

i know. i just reviewed a film that went into this stuff a bit. youtube lols being used on local tv is something i've noticed happening a lot. it's mostly rubbish not performed comedy which is what i was talking about. 'the daily show' is american tv, which i usually watch on tv cos errr their corporate overlords usually have it taken down asap and also "if there's one thing i enjoy more than watching a tv show, it's watching a blurry version of a tv show on my computer".

good, are you two done?

i thought the second one was even more Father Ted than the first one but at the same time not as good/funny

this is dead on. i mean, the bit when he's walking past the graves was pure, unadulterated ted ... but then when you find yourself thinking that before the gag's even finished, you know something's not right.

the difference in styles between the two episodes is phenomenal, i think: from tightly plotted, slapstick-heavy, old-fashioned, self-contained half-hour comedy to a much more loose-limbed, scene-setting, post-boosh scattergun thing ... it's hard to believe they're the product of the same pen, to be honest. i preferred ep 1 by far, but still: i think this series rules.

however: woah, i'm buying series one on DVD. this, from wikipedia, is joyous:

The first series was released in the UK as "The IT Crowd - Version 1.0" on November 13, 2006 by 2 Entertain Video Ltd. The DVD start-up sequence and subsequent menus are designed to resemble a ZX Spectrum game, even to the extent that the loading sequence features the famous striped border. Games similar to Jet Set Willy and Head Over Heels play while menu choices are made; characters are replaced with representations of the characters in the TV show.

Also included on the DVD are subtitles in leet. The leet subtitles, for the first episode, are not a direct translation of the show and include many references to geek culture that were not included in the original episode. The second episode has the subtitles ROT13 encoded, episode three has all the words in the subtitles sorted in alphabetical order, episode four has the text base64 encoded and the last two episodes are direct leet translations.

I love the second episode. So much of the stuff at the funeral was just gold. The condolences outside (not just the "move on" but also Moss's lunge); the maniac vicar with his DEATH; the videos being presented (especially the second one with its "If you're watching this, it means my son has made a surprise entrance and is cracking on to some trollop".

Derek Pippin's loathing was hilarious too, Jen continues to crack me up, and Matt Berry almost made me not mind Chris Morris leaving.

alba, i can't quite explain this but richmond reminds me of you. i think it's something in the vocal intonation.

i mean this in a good way.

(if you counter that with "moss reminds me of you", i'll be cross.)

I don't mind. You've reminded me how much I liked his cameo this week. "What funeral?" I don't think you're like Moss.

I've just remembered how great the boardroom meeting before Reynholm threw himself out of the window was too.

"oh my god i totally forgot about ITV"

Exactly!

i have had the series 1 dvd sat on my shelf for ages (it was a freebie*), i totally need to watch the subtitles now...

*hilariously, it's quite possible it was leftover (unopened) from a certain spa hotel in b4d3n-b4d3n summer 2006, who'd have thought j0hn t3rry and the lads weren't into office-based humour...

joyous. esp the stealing back of the policeman's shat-in helmet. and "fine young cannibal". and the closing music.

i'm beginning to love this show.

I thought that one was a bit of a letdown. The copyright film was funny though. What was the closing music? I wasn't paying attention.

it was the german dude playing the theme tune on his big guitar cello.

i liked the soviet fag break scenes but overall i thought this was completely terrible. can't believe i liked episode 1 so much.

Copyright thing was great, soviet stuff was good, married couple stuff was great - we've all been there right. Right? er... anyway. Main story was a bit weak I guess but enough comedic moments throughout.

Matt Berry jiggling slightly in that cricket jumper makes me laugh a lot. Everything else is an added bonus.

the anti-piracy bit has 'gone viral' (as they say) - i've had links to it on youtube from digg, daring fireball and e-mail.

Home knitting is killing fashion.

The cello bit was awesome. I loved it all the way through though actually. I can just watch RA all night long really.

So far I would say...

1>3>2

i lolled. "i never knew there was a south korea."

jen has strange pronunciation. adds to hottness.

even when not trying russian accent, i mean.

really odd seeing RA with the american cast, wonder how thats going to work out
http://www.nbc.com/Fall_Preview/The_IT_Crowd/

in return there should be a uk remake of '30 rock', set behind the scenes of 'eight out of ten cats'.

like annually retentive with jokes?

yeah, if they did 'annually retentive' as a comedy, that'd work.

I like Annually Retentive!

it's ok. i'm all about proper jokes though. 'not going out' FTW on that one.

Richmond on the ceiling was brilliant

Another so-so episode. Why have Jen being worried about the IT blokes ruining her dinner party when her friends were all wAcKy weirdos themselves?

I think that was the joke. Well, a joke.

This series is growing on me.

I thought last night's was the best of this series so far.

it was again LOLful enough. sadly Not Going Out was a bit old hat - apparently episode 2 of every new sitcom has to be the gay episode now :-(

I thought they could have done better with the Peter Fyle thing.

Yeah, I thought that was kind of stupid, and WAY over played. My favourite bit was the three lads' attempts to look normal and relaxed.

The entrances of the three women were pretty good too.

Also, Jen and Peter's opening supermarket brie story.

I have run out of things that were good.

The audience seemed to go wild when Moss said "We've all changed" and started smoking, but I was relatively unmoved.

It's no Captain Butler

i missed it. you all make it sound very intriguing. perhaps i shall try to construct a vague narrative in my head from the scraps of information here.

or perhaps i'll go and find out when the repeat's on.

so i can miss that as well, no doubt.

tits.

You could download it from theb0x.bz or ukn0va if you really cared.

You couldn't from the latter, because of the dvd release date.

Oh yeah. Now I remember why I used theb0x to get the first episode.

A bit too much fawlty towers/the office hands over face awkwardness for my liking. Best bit was Game of Pricks over the end credits which is a sad reflection on a) the show and b) me.

This show is vaguely enjoyable.

A bit too much fawlty towers/the office hands over face awkwardness for my liking.

Exactly! Felt very stale that whole thing.

You could download it from theb0x.bz or ukn0va if you really cared

not on dial-up from my father-in-law's kitchen, i couldn't :/

that said, will be back in glasgow briefly on wed eve so might try then.

not on dial-up from my father-in-law's kitchen, i couldn't :/

If you really cared, you would.

Check it out!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/peterstringbender/1391211282/

I missed an episode beacuse they changed the time and I recorded sodding Phoenix Nights instead.

Oh man, this was really bad

I laughed a lot.
The whole epidsode on youtube in one go.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVihffSGUc4

Memory IS Ram!

I'm sorry but that just made me laugh, again.

The geek in me corrected that to 'RAM is memory'

Best bit was Game of Pricks over the end credits which is a sad reflection on a) the show and b) me.

The Irish guy's resemblance to Robert Pollard has been pointed out before on this thread

This was really fucking bad

oh dear.

Terrible. Really really poor.

not the best, no.

back on broadband and currently getting myself ep04 ...

that seemed like one of the better episodes to me, definitely lolwise. so inconsistent tho.

Oh man, this was really bad

-- That mong guy that's shit, Monday, 17 September 2007 09:10 (5 days ago) Link

This was really fucking bad

-- That mong guy that's shit, Tuesday, 18 September 2007 11:30 (4 days ago) Link

You really don't like it then?

I enjoyed it again last night. I think I may be retarded when it comes to comedy though, I'm pretty much laughing at everything at the moment (with the exception of Saxondale).

i guess it helps when you want it to be funny.

Last night's was good.

I loved Reynolm's severed arm trick sequence. I could see it working as a Perry Bible cartoon, though the final frame would probably be him looking glum in police custody.

Never saw this before:

http://www.reynholm.co.uk/helpdesk.php

Douglas Reynholm reminds me of a cruder version of Elaine's boss in Seinfeld, Peterman. Especially after last night's opening scene.

watched the dinner-party one last night (at last) ... thought it was wonderful. up there with ep01. the whole dinner-party thing, esp moss and the drunk woman, was a joy. but yeh, the "peter fyle" thing felt tacked on.

i like that the reynholm industries logo looked like a WILLY!

the last one was terrible.

http://www.reynholm.co.uk/helpdesk.php

They've gone to almost NIN-levels of complexity there... you can log in to the staff intranet and get your own ID card.

But yeah, as a season closer, last episode = pffffff.

i'm watching this now and ...

Reynolm's severed arm trick sequence

... oh jesus, the pain in my sides.

(although some of that is residual from charlie brooker beforehand.)

Ever more wow - that Reynolm website is done by some fan.

http://www.reynholm.co.uk/disclaimer.php

That's pretty dedicated.

0118 999 881 999 119 725

3

Best bit was Game of Pricks over the end credits which is a sad reflection on a) the show and b) me.

yay!

i'm enjoying the second series a lot, even if jen is my least favourite character

Another so-so episode. Why have Jen being worried about the IT blokes ruining her dinner party when her friends were all wAcKy weirdos themselves?

-- DavidM, Saturday, September 15, 2007 3:59 AM (7 months ago) Bookmark Link

This was actually the one episode I saw visiting some people in the UK, I think. Liked it quite a lot. You Brits crack me up.

wait til you see the new Ade Edmondson sitcom

Well, I'm enjoying series three, even if no-one else is. Last night's (the football/lads/robbery) one was inspired, although the Jen-related subplot did feel a bit tacked on.

Pretty much everything Richard Ayoade does or says now is a joy.

Missed last night's, didn't think much of the first ep though.

I'm amused by it winning an award, I thought no one liked it.

I've never seen it (blah blah no TV etc), but I have often wondered whether it revels in lamer jokes about IT support people - blimey, they tell you to shut up and reboot! some of them are a bit nerdy! watch the roffles roll in!

^^^ running joke in the first series was "have you tried turning it off and on again?"
I think that basically the show goes for easy jokes, where I'd prefer it if there was more Ayoade. Lineham has this annoying habit of setting up interesting situations (dinner party from hell in series 2), but then blowing it by reverting to cheap gags instead.

chris morris's replacement needs to go

I was hoping for it to be a running gag that the boss offs himself at the start of every series.

chris morris's replacement needs to go

I love that bloke. I missed him this week.

roy has become the funniest character. the actor's expressions are priceless.

troo^^

Just watched last night's on the iplayer, and it was pretty funny, the best episode I've seen. I particularly enjoyed it as a man who doesn't get football. The boyfriend who looked like a magician was a wonderfully imaginative gag as well.

the first shot of the magician guy made me LOL. great casting.

Roy is great. Jen's gurning has let every episode of every series down. And I don't like her on the Maltesers ads either.

The football thing was good although silghtly reminiscent of Armando Iannucci's dinner party pies.

I saw that ad a few months ago and wondered if there'd be a third series.
"They're so light"
YES WE KNOW THEY'RE FUCKING MALTESERS WE ARE AWARE OF THEIR LIGHTNESS IT IS THEIR USP OK!!!

Richard Ayoade was always the best thing about this, and he was my favourite from 'Barley too.

this is terrible

I'm managing to keep up with this series in Spain. Perhaps the sad lack of good comedy on TV here is making it seem more awesome than it is. (And British TV in general suddenly seems pretty bloody great.)

Most episodes have had veeeeeery sketchy subplots and meh moments but when it's sharp it's very good. As simple as the gag was, Jen believing the internet was contained in a box was entertaining. It's all very quaint, I think, in a good way.

Jen's character needs some better writing. Wasted.

the last one was terrible.

― That one guy that hit it and quit it, Monday, October 1, 2007 4:52 PM (1 year ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^ smart dude

Perhaps the sad lack of good comedy on TV here is making it seem more awesome than it is. (And British TV in general suddenly seems pretty bloody great.)

It's incredible how good British television is when you're in almost any other country.

Of course, the selection is limited to the good stuff (cf: American TV in the UK(

Or the bad stuff, if you live here.

this show is okay, but getting worse.

I must stop being so insightful.

latest episode was better than the previous two imo

Laughed almost all the way through the last one.
Fuck the haters.

best thing on TV imo!

british ppl u have so much 2 answer for

it grew on me

Most episodes have had veeeeeery sketchy subplots and meh moments but when it's sharp it's very good. As simple as the gag was, Jen believing the internet was contained in a box was entertaining. It's all very quaint, I think, in a good way.

this episode was so terrible btw i mean really i used 2 be a man????? lame. pacing is kind of weird too or i guess the rhythm of the jokes like the have the nerdz kind of pause after zings i guess so that ppl can laugh uproariously or w/e but its so awkward!

also its a stupid complaint (lol 30 rock) but this show kind of doesnt have anything to 2 w/IT?

they're the IT department?

i.e. tech support.

two dudes and a ginger r the IT dept. for some huge corp? also those dudes are kind of nothing like actual IT dept. dudes irl?

irish dude seems pretty much like the kind of person you get in tech support in UK.

U.S. people can stream the first series of this on Netflix. I thought it was pretty hilarious but I'm a big Father Ted fan too so :/

The two dude actors are pretty meh but the woman is funny and the writing is great so it evens out.

Most of the IT dept guys I've worked with are ex-military/ex-frat guys, which aren't really comedy stereotype gold for that setting.

i like it well enough from the eps i saw. lol'd at the idea that typing "google" into google it breaks the internet.

i didn't think this was anywhere near as good as Father Ted though I did think it was decent.

irish dude seems pretty much like the kind of nerd you get in dorm rooms in america. and y is their office in like the basement and stuffed w/gay stickers and almost no hardware? or like, anything that it ppl even tech support might actually need? ime it ppl are some careerist motherfuckers but... idk i guess i get what they were going 4 but it seems so cheap and off

stuffed w/gay stickers? Which ones are those?

wait, are we all talking about a us version here or something?

They did try to make a US version; I think it lasted maybe 5 episodes...?

p.s. there is lots of stuff in this show that isn't "real" like a goth dude living in a secret room and a room being on fire for several hours so complaining about a lack of verite re: IT people seems a little uh dumb

Watched Spartacus the other day and was struck by the young Peter Ustinov's resemblance to Chris O'Dowd.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v417/albaalba/digitalfuture-1-1.jpg

lame. pacing is kind of weird too or i guess the rhythm of the jokes like the have the nerdz kind of pause after zings i guess so that ppl can laugh uproariously or w/e but its so awkward!

This used to be my complaint about Spaced.

stuffed w/gay stickers? Which ones are those?

warp records

yah n/a i no whining about verisimilitude in sitcoms is retarded but - i guess if the premise 4 a lot of the jokes is kind of lampooning a subculture and its relationship to the wider office culture and the show doesnt seem to have any relation to that actual subculture it makes it hard 2 like or even understand. like the goth thing - i dont care that a situation isnt plausible i care that the premise for the show seems like aliens tht it up.

also realistically the jokes are really stale

I think the US version never made it past a pilot.

i guess if the premise 4 a lot of the jokes is kind of lampooning a subculture and its relationship to the wider office culture

see I'd disagree with this, the show doesn't really seems to be "about" IT or office culture at all, those are just the milieu for absurd jokes

I don't know, it made me laugh a lot, that's all I'll say.

can't see any resemblance to father ted from the one or two episodes i managed to watch of this.

n/a on the money, it's just absurdist jks in the end, not a comment on IT culture really.

i could only bring myself to watch 1 full episode and it was kind of all about IT stuff - the chick and office ppl not knowing anything about the internet well + the fat executive dating a postop. fair enough if the others are more uh character based (?) or w/e

This used to be my complaint about Spaced.

There was no laugh track or studio audience or whatever in Spaced though? Also it's only Graham Linehan who writes this, the other Father Ted guy isn't involved.

no no, just the awkward silences between jokes really.

ayoade could be reading the phone book and i'd probably still dig it

Best joke they did was the bit where Jen's boyfriend looked like a magician. That almost reached Ted-esque levels of inspired absurdity.

i liked when Roy first said that and Jen nodded "yeah!" and walked off only to re-enter a few seconds later and go "what?"

So, a couple months after I learned about it on that Best TV Shows of the '00s Poll thread, my wife and I have become addicted to this, via Netflix. We're done with the first two seasons, about to start the third one. In fact, she likes it even more than I do. But we have a question: Why why why did the seasons only have six episodes each (which doesn't add up to much, for half-hour shows especially)? Is that Standard Operating Procedure in the U.K.? If so, it's really screwy...

yeah, 6 eps is standard. Maybe sometimes you'll get 8.

that's standard for the uk where comedy shows tend to be written by one person or a two person partnership.

A 22-ep "season" of the IT Crowd would probably make me hate it.

22 would be way too many, right. But I dunno...10 or 12 might make sense. At least enough where you couldn't fit the entire season onto one DVD. Had no idea before that this was S.O.P. in the UK though.

It's more a way of life than a S.O.P. Some Brits are pretty obsessed with the idea that quality control is utterly dependent on 6 episodes per series and very few series overall (2 series total/12 episodes if you're hardcore like John Cleese or Ricky Gervaise). Maybe they could do more if they had bigger budgets.

probably more a question of manpower than budgets, although i wonder if the culture of UK comedy producing few episodes per series was shaped by the experiences of Spike Milligan, who was writing 26 episodes a year of the Goon Show in the 50s and suffered several mental breakdowns due to the pressure

There doesn't seem to be the same style of "writers room" culture in British TV that there are in American shows, where it's necessary to spread the work just so that many episodes can be produced in a season on time (w/rare exceptions like Aaron Sorkin, who is sort of notorious for trying to do this, downplaying the contributions of other writers on his shows, burning out horribly and going nuts).

In general I think that it's pretty hit or miss (and sadly mostly miss) BUT the episode where Moss and the Irish dude whose name I can't remember accompany Jen on her date to see Gay: The Gay Musical, is one of the funniest things. The whole episode is just brilliant. "What kind of disabled are you?" "Leg. I'm leg disabled".

Matt Berry totally makes this show for me, I fucking love it (it didnt move me much when I saw S1 initially but by S3 I was hooked).

I'm a huge Garth Merhengi stan though, so there you are.

"You know, I don't think I have ever looked in this drawer before..... WOW, a GUN!"

Yes, he is the best thing about it in general. I love him. (snuffbox not IT crowd but still <3 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHx9khi_QxI)

Repeated viewing has made the IT Crowd grow on me quite a lot.

"I've got a ruddy gun!"

lool i love that scene so much

I love Moss's swears.

Series 4 is starting this month? And series 5 has been commissioned. It'll be interesting to see if it still brings the lols in series 4 and even more so in series 5 when Linehan has said that he's thinking of using a more US style group of writers.

While I am a big fan of Matt Berry, I've gotta say the Chris Morris episode where he was trying to alleviate stress was one of the funniest ones.

Love this show.

Lolll that snuffbox clip cracked me up! WTF is that show!? Is it a sketch show? Never heard of it!

Snuff Box is pretty fantastic when it's on target, but has an iffy hit to miss ratio, and kind of crapped out in the last few episodes. Still, the whole thing's only six episodes. Much preferred Garth Marenghi's Darkplace, though that show could probably turn off anyone who isn't really into the sublime campiness of it.

Whats the deal with Snuffbox? From the few YT clips Ive seen it seems to vaguely revolve around Berry being a prison hangman alco or... something.

Rich Fulcher is great. Never seen him in a show before. God, I'm so out of the comedy loop haha.

Yeah, that was a running theme through the programme (he was a hangman - like his father before him like his father before him) and Fulcher was his hapless pal and they used this to sort of link a load of sketches together in a vague story line for each episode (I think - tbh a lot of the episodes kind of roll into ine in my mind) but it was basically a vechicle for them to do their thing.

Fulcher was funny in The Might Boosh as well. The programme went downhill without them imo.

It's pretty surreal, the sketches loosely connect to each other like they're parallel dimensions with variations of Berry and Fulcher. About half of it is an ongoing storyline with the "main" versions of the characters, but it still doesn't really make any sense. The jailers are an example - it's a recurring sketch and Fulcher/Berry are playing versions of themselves, but it doesn't connect to the main story at all. Fulcher weirds me out like crazy, especially his strange mixed accent.

tbf, I don't think any of these shows are very popular besides IT Crowd, and in the US nobody's heard of even that. I don't know, is Matt Berry well known in his homeland?

There doesn't seem to be the same style of "writers room" culture in British TV that there are in American shows

There's just not that many talented comedy writers in the UK!

TBH I only found out about Berry thru seeing Darkplace on youtube, and then seeing IT Crowd. None of these other shows have been on here (well ok Boosh has, but somehow Ive managed to miss seeing that completely, I really should get my TV working again some day).

xps

Do you mean Rich Fulcher? I think Matt Berry is pretty well known in is homeland. At least there were a lot of people at a book signing I stumbled on once (and by people I mean students).

I really would like to knwo what Matt Berry's like in real life. I'm under no apprehension that Fulcher is any different offstage than onstage but Berry's accent and demeanour is so preposterously louche I can't imagine anyone being like this in real life.

Berry's also a really talented musician and apparently wrote and recorded all the music in Snuff Box himself o_O

Yeah, you can actually find him on YouTube, singing that hilarious song from the last episode of Darkplace, live in clubs! Throwing in "In the Air tonight" with it. It's crazy.

It was kind of funny when Berry shows up for pretty much no reason in Moon.

Charlie I had the exact samethought! He surely isnt like that IRL, his characters are always so exaggerated. He'd either be an awesome FAP companion, or a see you next tuesday, its hard to tell.

But his schtick is pretty consistent through-and-through. I first saw him (and Richard Aoyade) in Garth Merenghi, and found their voices so funny. Yet both seem to put these on during whatever they appear in. So it does feel as though they are only slightly emphasising their real selves on screen.

I struggled through the first few ropey episodes of Boosh on the strength of ILX opinion on a 'Boosh vs Conchords' thread, and now I'm pretty sure it's the best thing on british TV since Fr Ted.

But I just can't watch the IT Crowd. I must catch the Musical episode, I know ENBB and others have raved about it on other threads.

i can't remember when i gave up on the IT crowd

matt berry is good, and there are worse things out there, but it's not funny enough

garth marenghi was completely underwhelming too. i only half-remember it, but the fact it's a cult tells you everything abt the low standards, and indeed, moral fibre, of modern british comedy fans

x-post Like I said, I don't like the show but that one episode is so good only now I'm afraid you'll be let down as it's been talked up so much.

My favourite IT Crowd is the "Stress" episode with Chris Morris. I think this is also the one where they set fire to the fire extinguisher. The musical episode is also pretty awesome. The boss character manages to do something that countless female comedy actors have been failing to do for years.

boooohiss history mayne... you're starting to sound like lex on an indie music thread.

don't forget the marenghi spin-off, Man-To-Man with Dean Lerner