Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

The least promising opening of any comedy series

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    The least promising opening of any comedy series

    Lucy Waterman wrote:
    And G-man, I think we'll have to disagree about the quality of Big Bang and why it has a laugh track!
    Don't get me wrong, it's not lacking in humour (nor in annoying charaqcters, it must be said), though the past couple of seasons have been increasingly mediocre, and I'm not bothering with the new season.

    But the real laugh-out-loud moments are very few. Wolowitz getting his penis stuck in a robot hand was one of the few truly memorable moments in the entire show.

    Comment


      The least promising opening of any comedy series

      Ginger Yellow, aye the Chuck Lorre link explains it.

      You mentioned community - which I felt struggled in season four - and that style of humour is just classier than something you'd see in big bang...don't get me wrong, it goes meta-mental at times, but I know I'll end up going back and watching season five at some point, as when it was good, it was brilliant. 1980's console game episode and the illegal trampoline episode spring to mind.

      You mentioning community got me to reading up on it, and I was heartened to see that Dan Harmon returned for season five as showrunner. I hope the quality picked back up as a result.

      Comment


        The least promising opening of any comedy series

        Lucy Waterman wrote:
        Yeah, the second one - the writers would have constructed the scripts differently. Disagree about "popular mode" though - audience shows are still the more popular, from Mrs Brown and Miranda over here (both of whom break the fourth wall, incidentally) to Big Bang in the States.
        When I say "popular mode", I don't mean the mode for the most popular shows, more the default for comedies across the spectrum. I mean even tat like Cuckoo has gone down this route - it's not just the critically acclaimed ones.

        I can't think when I personally last watched a (contemporary) comedy with a laugh track. Something like The League of Gentlemen (which I'm pretty sure wouldn't have one these days). It's hard to remember though.

        I am interested in the idea that you write a show differently when using no laughter. I can quite well believe that to be true. In some ways it may have been more akin to writing for theatre, though presumably there is a distinction between shows actually recorded in front of an audience and those where the filmed show is merely shown to the audience, and their laughter then added. Personally prefer it written (and thus shown) for no laughter track though, having now had both modes prevalent within my life time.

        And - out of interest - when you say those shows broke the fourth wall btw, do you mean they broke it by interacting with the audience (as opposed to simply addressing the viewer, which you could do with or without audience)? If that's the case then yes, sure, the audience is an indispensable part of the show.

        Comment


          The least promising opening of any comedy series

          miranda is a comedy? I thought it was a documentary about someone with a tumour on her inner ear, that made her fall over a lot.

          seinfeld doesn't just have a terrible forced laugh track that seems to go off at random, but it also has that synth bass which a) is suppose to indicate an extra level of wackiness and jauntiness but b) because it is played on a keyboard rather than strings does impossible things that sound ridiculous.

          Comment


            The least promising opening of any comedy series

            I have to say Big Bang has grown on me, like mould, but grown nonetheless. When it first started I'd catch trailers, or see a few seconds channel-hopping, and be utterly repulsed by its, well, utterly conventional old-school style and 'let's laugh at the clever people' premise — plus the profoundly irritating set-up where there's this bunch of allegedly socially inept dweebs who of course are all very successful and (mostly) live in a beautiful colourful apartment with lots of lovely things and surrounded by attractive young women. Hollywood geekdom, in other words. But I found myself watching one or two episodes with my brother a couple of years back, and the characters turned out to be appealing and largely extremely well performed, and without really realising it I just grew to like them and look forward to watching it.

            That's an interesting discussion about the construction of studio vs non-studio sitcoms. An obvious example for me would be Red Dwarf, which benefitted hugely from being performed in front of a live studio audience during its 'classic' six series from 1987-93, as the actors were able to let their performances flow around the audience reactions. When they revived the show in the late '90s and made two more series that were a much slicker, CG-heavy, quasi-filmic affair, the fact the actors weren't playing for an audience (the laughter track came from screening the finished episodes to an audience for this purpose) meant that — disregarding any variation in quality of the scripts — the episodes came off 'flat' and oddly sterile. As a result, I think I'm right in saying that the recent revival opted to go back to shooting in front of the studio audience again as much as possible to try to recapture that spark.

            It's funny (no pun intended) how radical those early non-laughter sitcoms seemed at the time, indeed how eerie an experience it was at first, because one just doesn't give it any heed now. I really enjoyed Mackenzie Crook's new Detectorists that started on BBC4 last Friday(?), which I assume was laugh-free* as it's a low-key affair, but I honestly couldn't tell you. Definitely the best new sitcom I've seen in a while, helped by having the always excellent Toby Jones as one of the two main characters, and a marvellous comedy-of-small-things.

            *Er, laughter-track-free, I mean. I definitely laughed a lot.

            Comment


              The least promising opening of any comedy series

              Yeah, judging by the first episode (and that's all I've got to go by so far), The Detectorists is one of the best new "comedies" in quite a while. Very much looking forward to the next one.

              It's odd though that we still call them "comedies", thinking about it. There's a lot of darkness and complexity these days. Programmes are no longer strait-jacketed by having to be out-and-out comedies. They can sometimes involve very little humour at all. This has probably been both aided by and itself aided the demise of the laugh track as standard.

              Comment


                The least promising opening of any comedy series

                You mentioning community got me to reading up on it, and I was heartened to see that Dan Harmon returned for season five as showrunner. I hope the quality picked back up as a result.
                Oh, definitely. I don't think it ever quite recovered to peak season 1-3 levels, though, more because of the natural timing-out of the characters (and the loss of Donald Glover early on in the season) than the quality of the writing.

                In case you hadn't heard, he's doing a season 6 for Yahoo's new streaming video venture.

                Comment


                  The least promising opening of any comedy series

                  Velvet Android wrote: It's funny (no pun intended) how radical those early non-laughter sitcoms seemed at the time, indeed how eerie an experience it was at first, because one just doesn't give it any heed now.
                  To me, they felt like the natural heirs to 'this is spinal tap'. I could see the connect.

                  Comment


                    The least promising opening of any comedy series

                    RE: Miranda, she doesn't even fall over properly, more goes down in stages like a footballer who hasn't quite learned how to dive properly, mainly as I get the feeling she may hurt herself if she properly threw herself to the ground. And that's 95% of her schtick!

                    Every Miranda script:

                    *Gurn at camera, fall over, talk/gurn to camera, innuendo, fall over one cardboard box, blonde mate gurns, Miranda gurns, handsome bloke looks scared, fall over, THAT'S A WRAP!*

                    EDIT: There's a kind of genius in miranda being successful, it must make so much money compared to what it must cost to shoot, as it looks like it was shot for a fiver.

                    In terms of slapstick humour, even a 'nerdy' comedy such as community does it in a manner that isn't as obvious or excruciating to watch. I've posted up one of my favourite scenes from community (season 2 episode 7) and centres around a trampoline in a secret garden of eden.
                    The payoff is immense, it's pure slapstick come the end, but it doesn't have to be done on the cheap.

                    Community: This is our place of peace

                    Comment


                      The least promising opening of any comedy series

                      I have read that an example of a programme being shown with and without laugh track is M*A*S*H, apparently shown with laughs in the US and without in the UK - can anyone confirm this to be true? And if so, has anyone seen both - how do they compare?

                      (I've never seen M*A*S*H, discounting the film, at all, so can't really venture an opinion.)

                      Comment


                        The least promising opening of any comedy series

                        It's currently on one of the outer Freeview channels with the laughter track, and therefore unwatchable.

                        Comment


                          The least promising opening of any comedy series

                          Ginger Yellow wrote:
                          You mentioning community got me to reading up on it, and I was heartened to see that Dan Harmon returned for season five as showrunner. I hope the quality picked back up as a result.
                          Oh, definitely. I don't think it ever quite recovered to peak season 1-3 levels, though, more because of the natural timing-out of the characters (and the loss of Donald Glover early on in the season) than the quality of the writing.

                          In case you hadn't heard, he's doing a season 6 for Yahoo's new streaming video venture.
                          I didn't, so thanks for the heads-up. Think I'll start watching season five this evening to see what's what.

                          Comment


                            The least promising opening of any comedy series

                            Andy Townsends Tactics Truck wrote: RE: Miranda, she doesn't even fall over properly, more goes down in stages like a footballer who hasn't quite learned how to dive properly, mainly as I get the feeling she may hurt herself if she properly threw herself to the ground. And that's 95% of her schtick!

                            Every Miranda script:

                            *Gurn at camera, fall over, talk to camera, innuendo, fall over one cardboard box, blonde mate gurns, handsome bloke looks scared, fall over, THAT'S A WRAP!*
                            how did that work on the radio?

                            Comment


                              The least promising opening of any comedy series

                              With great difficulty?

                              That was the TV script I posted there so I did.

                              Comment


                                The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                ^ Hah, that's a really good question.

                                ATTT's Spinal Tap point is a valid one, I suppose it's not like we only ever watched funny things with the sound of audience laughter alongside it, because whenever you watch a comedy film on video/DVD/whatever you have to supply your own laughter solo and unprompted.

                                Likewise Jimski's musing on 'what is comedy?'. I love a "comedy" that can weave in darkness, oddity and pathos. I suppose, of course, that many of the great 'classic' British (in particular) sitcoms have done so in their own way — if only from time to time — for decades, as the loser-as-protagonist is such a strongly established feature of them, whether it be Albert Steptoe, Del Trotter or Victor Meldrew. One Foot In The Grave could be very dark, as much so I suppose as its title would suggest.

                                Comment


                                  The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                  THinking about it, could it be that her falling over is more convincing when done on the radio?

                                  Comment


                                    The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                    Speaking of surprising re-commissions of great-but-under-appreciated sitcoms, The Increasingly Poor Decisions Of Todd Margaret is getting a third season. How that works I do not know.

                                    Comment


                                      The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                      Ginger Yellow wrote: Speaking of surprising re-commissions of great-but under-appreciated sitcoms, The Increasingly Poor Decisions Of Todd Margaret is getting a third season. How that works I do not know.
                                      Not sure myself, but David Cross and Will Arnett are always worth watching. I didn't mind TIPDOTM, there were some great moments, and I found myself happily burning through episodes, but I haven't gone back to watch it a second time.

                                      Comment


                                        The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                        Velvet Android wrote: Likewise Jimski's musing on 'what is comedy?'. I love a "comedy" that can weave in darkness, oddity and pathos. I suppose, of course, that many of the great 'classic' British (in particular) sitcoms have done so in their own way — if only from time to time — for decades, as the loser-as-protagonist is such a strongly established feature of them, whether it be Albert Steptoe, Del Trotter or Victor Meldrew. One Foot In The Grave could be very dark, as much so I suppose as its title would suggest.
                                        The touchstone here is, of course, Ever Decreasing Circles.

                                        Comment


                                          The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                          Ooh yes, I'd never seen that until the BBC did a recent re-run, and I've caught a couple of other episodes in the past few weeks on whichever outlying Freeview channel it's on currently. Even the piano theme music peters off into something minor-key and mildly discordant. Brave of Richard Briers to play such a miserable, misanthropic uptight little-Hitler of a character, especially after the hugely loved The Good Life — although even there remember something he said toward the end of his life about how he now looked at Tom Good as a rather selfish, dislikable prat, so even that's not immune.

                                          Comment


                                            The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                            there's almost no comedy whatsoever in ever decreasing circles. It is however one of the best programmes of its decade.

                                            Comment


                                              The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                              Well, there is, but what comedy there is is often pretty bleak and depressing; leaving aside Howard and Hilda's lighter turns, despite them not being above the occasional scathing remark.

                                              But agreed, it's a marvellous series and not always an easy watch. I suspect lots of people see elements of themselves in Martin Bryce which makes for uncomfortable viewing.

                                              Comment


                                                The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                                it's hard to see it as a comedy once you realise how ill and unhappy martin is, and how this affects the lives of those around him. Particularly his poor trapped wife.

                                                the thing it reminds me most of is This beautiful song

                                                Comment


                                                  The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                                  Velvet Android wrote: I have to say Big Bang has grown on me, like mould, but grown nonetheless. When it first started I'd catch trailers, or see a few seconds channel-hopping, and be utterly repulsed by its, well, utterly conventional old-school style and 'let's laugh at the clever people' premise
                                                  I wouldn't worry about "smart people". Big Bang has been adopted as a badge of honour by many rather irritating nerds, the kind who think that reading Game of Thrones makes you proper smart.

                                                  Comment


                                                    The least promising opening of any comedy series

                                                    Sheldon Cooper's a horrible character as well. I forget the exact lines but one of the few episodes I've seen all the way through has a scene in which he's rather racist to (or behind the back of) a waiter, and the audience reaction is to laugh uproariously.

                                                    Comment

                                                    Working...
                                                    X