00s britcom play-off: PEEP SHOW vs THE THICK OF IT

Both great. Both reveal brutal home truths about mankind's many flaws, but I have to go for Peep Show I think.

peep show more like poop show

^^^

Bored with the Peep Show backlash now. It deserves it for going on too long, I suppose.

peep show voters should be outed and effing shot

― Jefferson Mansplain (DG), Tuesday, 25 January 2011 00:16 (14 hours ago)

I watched an old one last night and found it quite funny. I don't think I ever saw an entire episode of the original TTOI with the Actor Whose Name We Cannot Speak, was it as good then?

The Thick of It towers over all on a technical level, but Peep Show relates to my own life a hell of a lot more, and thus has perhaps given me more pleasure (and discomfort) over the years... Will have to make a snap decision at some point.

xpost - I think better. I kind of miss Hugh.

Nicola is a better character than Hugh I think. You don't really need both Hugh and Glen.

nah hugh is totally different

shades of grey

That radio thing the Disgraced Actor did, People Like Us, was awesome, whatever happened to the guy who wrote it?

The first series of TTOI is a lot more sit-commy than the second one because Paedo Chris is, by default, a sit-com actor whereas Front has made her name in satire/pastiche.

TTOI by a nose, because it's probably more important, somehow.

oh shit, just remembered I haven't seen the entire second series of TTOI despite thinking it the best show we've had since Father Ted

Xmas/Easter 2-part special was just unbeatably brilliant tho

TTOI by a fucking furlong obv

The Thick Of It by a kajillion miles. Peep Show has not aged well for me..

<3 Father Ted too!

Xmas/Easter 2-part special was just unbeatably brilliant tho

That was the first time I saw it, still hasn't been bettered

peep show is rubbish

first of those two is the best episode of British telly I've ever seen live xp

TTOI but voted Peep Show because democracy just doesn't work.

The supporting characters in The Thick of It are a lot better than the supporting characters in Peep Show, Superhans excepted. In Peep Show they're mostly either a great performance masking a weak joke (Johnson) or just a bit one-dimensional.

The first series of TTOI is a lot more sit-commy than the second one because Paedo Chris is, by default, a sit-com actor whereas Front has made her name in satire/pastiche.

― Inspector Anthony Slade, Tuesday, 25 January 2011 14:29 (59 seconds ago)

idk if people rly get how awes langham is in those early episodes, he's an incredibly subtle actor and even without the nonce revelations the inner death of hugh abbott is perfectly pellucid -- the grim repartee of thanotic inertia, coffee stains, sexual jealously, fluorescent lights and dead pot plants

not sure if anyone has embodied haut-bourgie self hate better since cassavetes' finest protags

capaldi also is better in the first series and the second special (perhaps the apoggee of ttoi), by the second series he becomes an overwritten self parody, playing 'malcolm tucker' rather than the anonymous apparatchik skulking the sunless corridors of the early episodes

a defining post by nakh

Yeah, I'd like to see the Langham episodes, he is so great in "People Like Us"

the second special is SLIGHTLY behind the first when it comes to sheer belly-laughs, but it's arresting as fuck, one of the darkest and most disturbing hours of television there's been. felt genuinely sickened at the end, but glad I'd seen it

the movie is basically 85 minutes of 'lolololol' and then 5 minutes of 'oh fuck' and that works out pretty well too

similarly by the last series the supporting character tend towards ciphers, glen will be 'the man from the menswear dept at selfridges' and little more, but there is still a lot of great stuff so they can pretty much make as many episodes as they want imo

ugh spelling gone to shit today

hated Langham's acting/persona before TTOI.

only problem with the last TTOI was maybe the gulf in excitement between when Tucker was on screen and when he wasn't (he was stealing too much of it) - also no Jamie.

I think my favourite episode of the last series, the radio show ep, is the one with the least Malcolm in it. Anything with an Ollie vs Phil scene is always going to be great.

I can see how one might prefer Hugh's weary resignation to Nicola's incompetence and crushed idealism.

front is great in her own way

srsly i think i have watched each episode in the first series at least a dozen if not twenty times, and i hardly ever rewatch tv episodes

julius and malcolm in the pantry is all time

'team building, character building'

I think my favourite episode of the last series, the radio show ep, is the one with the least Malcolm in it.

the shouting match between Malcolm and his oppo equivalent is not only the highlight of that ep but the best 5 minutes of UK TV since Fischerspooner performed 'Emerge' on TOTP ever

that was def the best moment for stuart, very much a 'tyson vs fedor' bit of omg it's actually happened deathmatch action

Also most of the TTOI main characters have an obvious real-world inspiration (Tucker: Alastair Campbell, Nicola Murray: Harriet Harman, The Fucker: Andy Coulson etc etc etc) whereas Hugh is more of a throwback to a kinda Yes, Minister-ish "generic politician". Not as a criticism, but that's why I think the first series is more "sitcommy". I mean, Yes, Minister was pretty sitcommy, and at it's best it was better than TTOI for sure.

The Fucker isn't Andy Coulson though, he's that other dude. Nicola and Harriet Harman??!?!?!?

nah, fucker is def coulson, stuart is steve hilton

not really seeing harman in murray, harman is famous for her lack of concern/awareness of being seen as a schoolmarmish nanny statist, which seem to be murray's main anxiety

Nah, the fucker is Coulson and Stewart is Steve Hilton. Iannucci says Nicola's based on Harman on the commentaries, and that Peter Mannion is actually meant to be David Davies rather than Kenneth Clarke.

xp

Ah, got the Fucker and Stuart mixed up

ha, mannion is far more clarke than davies

jowly easygoing minor public schoolboy & thatcher era junior minister vs flaky lower middle class territorial army psycho

And looks like Christopher Hitchens too

chemopher hitchens tbbr ;_;

I have no love for Harriet Harman but she's a hardy perennial whereas Nicola is surely closer to a class-of-2001 type promoted because they'd exhausted all the good candidates?

never seen the thick of it, don't really want to either. feels like something people who listen to radio 4 watch.

hi NOEL

:-)

peep show were student rubbish

pizza? what were that some middle class shambles change the channel guigsy

the shouting match between Malcolm and his oppo equivalent is not only the highlight of that ep but the best 5 minutes of UK TV since Fischerspooner performed 'Emerge' on TOTP ever

― idgi fridays (blueski), Tuesday, January 25, 2011 2:55 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

otm

voting TTOI. need to revisit the most recent series, didn't give it my full attention at the time. there were some amazing moments but i think they overextended themselves with eight eps; and i don't really like rebecca or the other woman. (dom thinks she's the best sitcom character ever iirc.)

find both of these shows a bit depressing -- not while watching, but still.

I'm voting peep show because I don't understand a single post itt

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I voted Peep Show because TTOI fans are more naturally annoying and I'm really immature.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

thought so.