How to be a Chris Morris fan in 2006

[Neil]

I just found this lying on the ground outside Chortle and thought you lot might be able to help add to it:

Relentlessly lower your expectations as Morris' output gets steadily worse with every single new project.  Defend shows using any means possible, e.g. 'Maybe it's not MEANT to be funny, maybe it's meant to be a drama!!'

Whenever you see someone say 'but where are the jokes?' you must sneer at them as if you're a punk fan who has just been handed a prog album.  Jokes are for squares, daddio.

Bind the phrase "you missed the point" to a fucking macro.

Act as if you belong to an exclusive club and are so much better than those plebs who enjoy Friends or anything else that's lazily equated with mediocrity.  Don't forget: the fact that Chris Morris used the word "stultifyingly" in an episode of Brass Eye means that you ARE cleverer than everyone else, and you must remind them of this at every single oppurtunity.

Bind the phrase "Nathan Barley was more than just a mere sitcom though" to a fucking macro.

Loudly and rudely tell people that they have 'missed the point' of the sophisticated satirical game called Cock, Muff, Bumhole.  Quietly make your excuses and leave whenever someone responds by pointing to that 'guff up my muff' nonsense, or indeed that sub-11OCS line about 'breaking down the brown door and painting it white on the way out.'

Bind the phrase "Nathan Barley was a little too close to home, essentialy you ARE Nathan Barley" to a fucking macro.

Accuse anyone who disagrees with you of being 'an obscurist', insist that if some crayons drawings Morris did in play school were suddenly unearthed,  then they would be celebrated as the best thing he's ever done.  Because that's dead original.

Bind the phrase "negative and bitter" to a fucking macro.  Use it relentlessly until you've worn out each and every function key on your keyboard.

[Neil]

Pretend that Richard Ayoade has talent, and that Dark Place was good.  Pull a face if someone says 'fuck off, it was Acorn Antiques without the jokes' and say 'dinnerladies, anyone?'  Pretend also that he's only disliked on here because he used to post sub-Blue Jam bollocks to forums like this one.

[TJ]

Have no interest whatsoever in tracking down rare radio shows or unseen Brass Eye sketches, but fall over yourself to say "LOL! nice one" whenever some lame cutup or photoshop mong is hailed as his work even though it probably isn't.

[Darrell]

"I've never really got the *point* of the old GLR shows..."

Though to be honest I speak as someone who's practically renounced all of his Morris fandom except the Iannucci collaborations. I just cannot enjoy any of his solo stuff anymore, the awfulness of recent times just sullies it too much. Even bloody Brass Eye, which I know is wonderful but I can't appreciate nearly as much anymore due to the spectre of the future Morris dangling down from above and being a dickhead.

I only mention this because the fact his current core fanbase seem to be such arseholes has been one of the main things wanting me to disassociate my tastes with his work. Which is sort of relevant to the thread.

[Bogey]

To "bind [something] to a fucking macro" is not a phrase I'm familiar with. May I ask what it means?

[TotalNightmare]

Slap together one swear word and one household item to create your very own Morrisism SwearMaker

eg

Fuck + spoon = Fuckspoon

Twat + hammer = Twathammer

or even

Candle + Wank  = Candlewank

Sink + cunt = Sinkcunt

[Neil]

To "bind [something] to a fucking macro" is not a phrase I'm familiar with. May I ask what it means?

Oh well in some programs you can bind frequently-used key-strokes to save yourself some time.  Then you can reproduce what you've typed by just hitting an F-key or whatever.

[Neil]

Though to be honest I speak as someone who's practically renounced all of his Morris fandom except the Iannucci collaborations. I just cannot enjoy any of his solo stuff anymore, the awfulness of recent times just sullies it too much.

Oh, you should really make the effort with the 93 GLR shows Darrell, they're absolutely outstanding.  I'm doing the Tumblies certificates tonight and then getting stuck into re-patching the next one of those, there's some great stuff coming up in them.  Gawd knows what the 'Morris doesn't do jokes and I've never laughed out loud at his stuff' brigade make of them!  Man, wait'll you hear this particular Wayne Carr...I'm saying no more.

[Bert Thung]

Even bloody Brass Eye, which I know is wonderful but I can't appreciate nearly as much anymore due to the spectre of the future Morris dangling down from above and being a dickhead.

I'm always good at mentally seperating comedians into their talent and post-talent  eras. I have to be, otherwise I wouldn't be able to watch Rutland Weekend Television with out thinking of Spamalot or Fawlty Towers without thinking of pensioner webcasts.

[thewomb]

Compile together any recurring criticisms of your opinions into some kind of online encyclopedia or messageboard list, so that you can sneeringly point to them when challenged as proof of your comedic and intellectual superiority.

Respond to any reasonable explanation of some of Nathan Barley's strengths by binding 'DAN REACTS!!1!!1!" to a fucking macro.

Inaccurately paraphrase all those who disagree with you, while determinedly refusing to answer any literally phrased question. Resort to sneering schoolboy sarcasm when further pressed.

Pretend that Friends wasn't 75% shit to demonstrate just how far beyond the expected range of comedic opinoins your tastes lie.

If anyone gets wise to your bullshit, compile yet another online encyclopedia or messageboard list, as a way of pre-empting any future criticism and eliminating the need to use honesty or accuracy in your debates.

Be sure to take any contray opinion entirely personally, and accuse all those who disagree with you of having an ulterior motive / being deliberately controversial / trying to prove their intellectual superiority.

Never, ever forgive someone for pointing out a joke that you missed.

[Munday's Chylde]

oh womb! you allowed yourself to be hooked! for shame!

[Catalogue Trousers]

But eurgh! You guffed up my muff! And in a very real sense we are ALL Nathan Barley LOL!!!!!!11111

[thewomb]

thewomb reacts.

[Johnny Yesno]

Slap together one swear word and one household item to create your very own Morrisism SwearMaker

eg

Fuck + spoon = Fuckspoon

Twat + hammer = Twathammer

or even

Candle + Wank  = Candlewank

Sink + cunt = Sinkcunt

Hey! Fun.

Fuck + kettle = Fuckkettle

Twat + collander = Twatcollander

Arse + tenderiser = Arsetenderiser

Shit + whisk = Shitwhisk

Wank + wok = Wankwok

The sad thing is I could go on and I haven't even left the kitchen...

[Neil]

oh womb! you allowed yourself to be hooked! for shame!

It wasn't about him*, just a compilation of some of the most irritating attitudes on here over the last gawd knows how long.  To be honest, I don't think I can be bothered photoshopping thewomb at the centre of the universe, with it spining round him and Zaphod Beeblebrox shouting "oi".  

Anyway, if it's okay with thewomb and his ego perhaps we can get back to the scheduled programming now.

* Seriously, I even decided not to do a 'talk like a fucking broadsheet columnist when referring to Barley, swatting away huge portions of the actual show and instead just wanking on about how it's essentially about a heroic struggle, or some such sub-Lawson shite' bit.

[RHX]

Shit + whisk = Shitwhisk

I feel guilty for laughing.

[Munday's Chylde]

oh womb! you allowed yourself to be hooked! for shame!

It wasn't about him]

Oh I know, I've been reading actual comments like the ones you've listed long before his arrival. A lot of comments. In fact you could just have easliy bumped the nathan barley thread if you wanted a comprehensive list!

Lets add another that was there before he started doing it too then:

/ assess the posters ability to be humourous themselves if they've been criticising morris and reccomend they be ignroed if they fail to be so. Or the 'you must earn the right to attack the king through funnies' stance.

[Johnny Yesno]

just a compilation of some of the most irritating attitudes on here over the last gawd knows how long

I may have this wrong but surely he's just added to it from his perspective.

[thewomb]

We may never know.

[Banana Woofwoof]

This kind of guff:

Great post. Totally agree. Morris' work for me too has never been about laugh out loud-funniness, its about exposing and highlighting the tragedy and problems in today's society in a humourous fashion. Like the above chap said, I too would have been disappointed to find 'jokes' in Nathan Barley. Its very far from the likes of The Office and Little Britain in its intentions.

And also believing that you and Morris are so close that you even have a clue what his intentions are better than the rest of us plebicites.

[Hoogstraten'sSmilingUlcer]

"I don't think there should be jokes in Gulliver's Travels. Swift's above writing jokes. If you laugh at one of his jokes, then you haven't really got it. It's SATIRE, not COMEDY."

[Johnny Yesno]

I've not seen thewomb's posts on comedy so I can't comment on the "centre of the universe" thing. But he is right about "DAN REACTS!1!1!!" - that should go on the list, really, every bit as much as "If you don't get it you're Nathan Barley".

[jutl]

Wonder what's supposed to happen when fan-sites that get tired of their subject.

[hands cold, liver warm]

they close down

[slim]

They turn into GD.

[poor fool]

I think that's going a bit far.
This article is a sneer at those people who do find Nathan Barley/Ayoade etc. funny on it's own merits. That's not very fair, and more to the point is directly hypocritical of itself. You take the view that those who do like the recent output are vastly self satisfied and smug individuals, and that simply isn't the case. Some of us just like it, y'know?
Can't we all just accept each over and get along?

[humanleech]

This is a bit cliched isn't it? All these tired old quoted quotes?  Morris can't do comedy any more, so he's gone into acting.

[Munday's Chylde]

I think that's going a bit far.
This article is a sneer at those people who do find Nathan Barley/Ayoade etc. funny on it's own merits. That's not very fair, and more to the point is directly hypocritical of itself. You take the view that those who do like the recent output are vastly self satisfied and smug individuals, and that simply isn't the case. Some of us just like it, y'know?
Can't we all just accept each over and get along?

I agree. But I think you'll find Neil isn't singling out people who simply find Nathan Barley/Ayoade etc funny on their own merits at all - more people who resort to the types of cliches listed when 'discussing' it here. The potential goodside of a thread like this would be that people raise their criticism and arguments above that level.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

I'd also like to nominate 'apples and oranges', 'straw man' and 'we're going around in circles here' as tedious debate-stoppers. Although they're not limited to Morris chat.

[poor fool]

The potential goodside of a thread like this would be that people raise their criticism and arguments above that level.

Can you really do that when it's simply a matter of taste, though? There's not much of an argument beyond:
'I find this funny'.
'I do not'.
Perhaps that's why it frequently dissolves into insults - there's nothing more to say.