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Superfluous characters in good comedies

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    #51
    Forget about Roz, Daphne's brother and mother are probably the most superfluous characters in the history of television

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      #52
      The Major is a documentary.

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        #53
        I liked the Major. And the old ladies. They all served a purpose.

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          #54
          Originally posted by elguapo4 View Post
          Forget about Roz, Daphne's brother and mother are probably the most superfluous characters in the history of television
          They can all get tae fuck. They should delete those episodes the same way the bbc used to cavalier style shit on its archive and tape over diamonds for dogshit. Fuck La Paglia. Fuck him right in the ear.

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            #55
            Originally posted by Jah Womble View Post
            I don't know, I think Polly had a leavening effect on the insane proceedings - and was key to the plot on several occasions, not least the episode about the anniversary party.

            Pte Sponge in Dad's Army comes to mind. He was drafted in following the death of James Beck (Pte Walker), although never cemented as a key character.
            Seeing as he first appeared in 1968 and went on to appear in most episodes then this is wrong. To use a 70's football analogy, he was the Mick Bates of Dad's Army!

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              #56
              Originally posted by Squarewheelbike View Post
              Seeing as he first appeared in 1968 and went on to appear in most episodes then this is wrong. To use a 70's football analogy, he was the Mick Bates of Dad's Army!
              If he first appeared in 1968, then, yes, I'm wrong about that - but not about his never having become a key character. (As indeed Mick Bates wasn't to Leeds Utd.)

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                #57
                Polly is the person who keeps Fawlty towers functioning, and outside of the cook is the only moderately sane character. The Major and the old ladies are the people that kept small hotels like fawlty towers open through the winter.

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                  #58
                  Polly's essential because she elevates the comedy from standard "difficult situation leads to trouble", to the real classic that the show is. Time and again she gives Basil a way out, and if he'd only take it ... but he doesn't. There are those moments when you feel it's over (or would if you were watching for the first time) because the drama with the dead body or the anniversary or the Germans has been averted. Those glimpses of what could be (like when Basil says "well done everybody!" on Gourmet Night), are actually quite moving. You breathe a sigh of relief, and then ... gut-punch, toes curl. If it was only Basil cocking up it wouldn't be half as good.

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                    #59
                    Great explanation, tee rex.


                    Private Sponge is effectively a 'semi-ascended extra', isn't he? He's the most visible of the 'rest' of the Dad's Army platoon, the only one with a name and the occasional line of dialogue that I can think of who isn't a member of the core cast, but basically never gets out of a strange limbo. He's more of an individual than the unnamed, silent, interchangeable background characters – and in fact I think he's nominally in charge of them ("number 2 section"), in parallel with Corporal Jones being in charge of "number 1 section" – yet never to my knowledge acquires any real characterisation nor edges more than halfway into plot focus. He only replaces Walker inasmuch as he just acts as the extra pair of hands when they need one more person for some group task.

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                      #60
                      The replacement for Walker was meant to be Private Cheeseman, but it didn't really work out and he was written out after one series.

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                        #61
                        tee rex and others: yes, I stand corrected. She is the butter in the mental sandwich.

                        Stop, all of you, with the 'Roz' thing. Peri Gilpin is phenomenal. Not many people can get away with 'slut, for comedic purposes, with a splash of occasional intelligence'.

                        And Daphne's family don't count. They were not in enough, to be actual characters.

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                          #62
                          Patrick Cargill in anything, ever.

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                            #63
                            Originally posted by Southport Zeb View Post
                            The replacement for Walker was meant to be Private Cheeseman, but it didn't really work out and he was written out after one series.
                            Good point, I was thinking about Cheeseman before. I've heard conflicting things about his being dumped again: one being that he just didn't blend and audiences didn't really accept him, the other being that he kept getting too many big laughs and the rest of the cast wouldn't accept this! Still not sure which it is.

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                              #64
                              Originally posted by Gerontophile View Post
                              tee rex and others: yes, I stand corrected. She is the butter in the mental sandwich.

                              Stop, all of you, with the 'Roz' thing. Peri Gilpin is phenomenal. Not many people can get away with 'slut, for comedic purposes, with a splash of occasional intelligence'.

                              And Daphne's family don't count. They were not in enough, to be actual characters.

                              I wish Daphne’s family didn’t count. They are in a shit ton of the later seasons, it’s not like they’re Gill peripheral. Whenever it’s on repeats, there’s a good chance I catch an episode with Daphne’s Brassy Ma pawing Marty.

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                                #65
                                It wasn't a knock against Peri Gilpin. She's a great actor and I liked Roz as a character. But Frasier would have been an equally good show without her. In later seasons the writers seemed to be getting increasingly desperate to find things for her to do.

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                                  #66
                                  Originally posted by Southport Zeb View Post
                                  The replacement for Walker was meant to be Private Cheeseman, but it didn't really work out and he was written out after one series.
                                  I think that this is correct - my bad. Was that character actor Talfryn Thomas, who, throughout the seventies, seemed to show up every time a Welsh stereotype was required?

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                                    #67
                                    It was indeed. Glint in the eye, terrible teeth, accent thick enough to lag your central heating pipes with.

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                                      #68
                                      Originally posted by Various Artist View Post
                                      It was indeed. Glint in the eye, terrible teeth, accent thick enough to lag your central heating pipes with.
                                      Yes, but that was Windsor Davies, wasn't it?

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                                        #69
                                        Originally posted by Snake Plissken View Post
                                        And in Hi-De-Hi, there was a posh couple who seemed to get an end of show credit but never actually seemed to do anything.
                                        Do you mean the ballroom dancers Barry and Yvonne? They were fairly integral and actually quite funny, mostly for their incessant bickering.

                                        I'm sure the twins (cannot remember their names) were in the whole run but had very little input and speaking roles.

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                                          #70
                                          Originally posted by Lang Spoon View Post
                                          I wish Daphne’s family didn’t count. They are in a shit ton of the later seasons, it’s not like they’re Gill peripheral. Whenever it’s on repeats, there’s a good chance I catch an episode with Daphne’s Brassy Ma pawing Marty.
                                          I have to skip the scenes they are in or ditch the episode altogether. Cannot honestly think of a comedy I've really liked where I've ever had to do that.

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                                            #71
                                            Hi-De-Hi + 'good comedies' = does not compute.

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                                              #72
                                              OK - apart from the main 4 characters, which recurring character appeared in the most episodes of Seinfeld?

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                                                #73
                                                Originally posted by Patrick Thistle View Post
                                                OK - apart from the main 4 characters, which recurring character appeared in the most episodes of Seinfeld?
                                                Newman?

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                                                  #74
                                                  There were probably a few shit sitcoms, Hi-De-Hi among them, where some female characters were purely eye candy "for the dads", as the sexist saying goes.

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                                                    #75
                                                    Originally posted by Arturo View Post
                                                    Cannot honestly think of a comedy I've really liked where I've ever had to do that.
                                                    Oh, I can. It usually involves the presence of Noel Fielding. A whole series of Taskmaster I've not seen because of that humour vacuum.

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