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Quarantine for alienating comedy opinions

Started by Clownbaby, May 20, 2020, 11:51:36 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

spaghetamine

South Park - great when the plots are based around mundane events or surreal wackiness but any time they try and do a social commentary episode it comes across as smug and preachy, also trey parker has a super irritating voice

Jockice

#61
Quote from: M-CORP on May 21, 2020, 12:51:21 PM
I did once watch a Josh Widdicombe stand-up gig on the telly and I enjoyed it, probably because of the emphasis Widdicombe placed on jokes that were prepared way in advance and well-rehearsed. The Last Leg however is utter dross, partly because it lacks this space for refinement, but mainly because it's too busy spouting its own political agenda as opposed to actually being funny.

I really really tried with that because disabled people don't get enough representation on TV as it is. But I just find it irritating, especially Alex Brooker, who is about a tenth as funny as he obviously thinks he is. And its political agenda, such as it is, is all over the place. Their first fawning interview with the vile Anna Soubry (she's been on more than once apparently) was the final straw for me. Have only watched about ten minutes since then.

Here's a controversial opinion while we're at it. Josh Widdicombe's sitcom was actually okay. Not particularly funny, but passable.

Clownbaby

Quote from: Blue Jam on May 21, 2020, 12:57:21 PM
Nighty-Night. Sounded right up my street, hated it so much it actually made me a bit angry.

This is one of the few shows that I absolutely enjoyed the first time I watched it and then watched it again all excited and hated it, completely at a loss about what I found so funny in the first place. I still liked the vibe but the actual stuff I laughed at, nothing second time round. I've only ever got that before with Robot Chicken and Idiocracy.

keir

I liked The Big Bang Theory for more than half of its run but I really wish they'd ended it before I was thinking THANK FUCK.

I liked Green Wing, but I never saw it until a few years ago.

I like some Inside No. 9 episodes well enough but if they show any weakness they're battling against my prejudice - because of all the people I see jizzing over it I'm primed to think "it ain't all that", same as Black Mirror. I preferred Black Mirror, from what I saw, which is the Channel 4 ones, but I'm not in any rush to see the later ones until they come on proper telly. (We've got cable and a Tivo and until we start running out of stuff we've recorded to watch we don't see any point paying for an extra streaming service).

dr beat

Yeah I wasn't a huge fan but whenever I stumbled across early episodes of Big Bang Theory I found it amiable enough as a typical US ensemble sitcom, but like a lot of these things it went on too long.

And I'm afraid I have to agree with Lisa JMC about Community, and I've tried multiple times to get into it.

I do however hold what may be the most DEFCON1 Nuclear-option controversial comedy opinion, and no its not 'I don't like Chris Morris'.  Its much, much worse than that.

pancreas

We have this thread every now and then and it's a good thing.

I'm just ridiculously difficult to please. I want my comedy to be a hair's breadth away from drama. Needs to be dark, and a reasonably mild distention away from something believable. So, too much absurdity is unpleasant for me. Hence I agree with CB on Monty Python. Don't like the films, don't like the tv programme. Everyone is always shouting. It's far too *WE ARE DOING COMEDY* to be funny. Mark Heap is a more modern practitioner of this sort of thing. I hate him in everything he is in.

I do dislike Always Sunny. I suspect the writers and actors of quite base forms of chauvinism, which they use the programme to pick at and scratch. It's like HAHA RAPE but with RAPE replaced with racism, homophobia, domestic violence ...

And just for Twit 2: Tried Norm MacDonald now three or four times, including Death/Heart Attack and Alcoholism and while it's okay, there's not enough there for me. Some ideas sure, but mainly too slowly developed and too smugly delivered.

notjosh

Quote from: Jumblegraws on May 21, 2020, 12:49:15 PM
Bloody hell, thought this must be some joke I wasn't getting but no, Chuck Lorre really did have a hand in making the Heathcliff cartoon. I'll update my previous statement to "Everything else Chuck Lorre has made and attached his vanity plate to is as bad as everyone says, though"

Chuck Lorre co-wrote the theme tune for the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon, so he gets a free pass on everything as far as I'm concerned.

jobotic

Quote from: Jockice on May 21, 2020, 01:19:39 PM
I really really tried with that because disabled people don't get enough representation on TV as it is. But I just find it irritating, especially Alex Brooker, who is about a tenth as funny as he obviously thinks he is. And its political agenda, such as it is, is all over the place. Their first fawning interview with the vile Anna Soubry (she's been on more than once apparently) was the final straw for me. Have only watched about ten minutes since then.

Here's a controversial opinion while we're at it. Josh Widdicombe's sitcom was actually okay. Not particularly funny, but passable.

Yeah the Last Leg is total FBPE Centrist desolation. Litrally. I feel desolate when I watch it. So I don't.

Fr.Bigley

Quote from: notjosh on May 21, 2020, 01:32:43 PM
Chuck Lorre co-wrote the theme tune for the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon, so he gets a free pass on everything as far as I'm concerned.

It's three lines of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"
"Heroes in a half shell" followed by "Turtle power" - it's hardly Keats is it.

rue the polywhirl

Parks and Recreation is a pile of uber smug, barely amusing claptrap. Really cold and calculated. Everyone in it is squeaky voiced or seems far too pleased with themselves or both. Chris Pratt, Aziz Ansari, Amy Pohler worst culprits. Ron Swanson seems like the only character with any worthwhile comedy value.

Clownbaby

Quote from: rue the polywhirl on May 21, 2020, 01:41:26 PM
Parks and Recreation is a pile of uber smug, barely amusing claptrap. Really cold and calculated. Everyone in it is squeaky voiced or seems far too pleased with themselves or both. Chris Pratt, Aziz Ansari, Amy Pohler worst culprits. Ron Swanson seems like the only character with any worthwhile comedy value.

Yep. I usually like Amy Poehler but I don't really like her character in Parks. Ron Swanson is the sort of outlier who doesn't seem to operate on the cutesy wavelength of the other characters. I find the same thing with 30 Rock. I like it a fair bit more than Parks but I don't like Liz Lemon. I think Tina Fey is a good writer but there's something about her vibe in front of the screen that I don't like. And the cutesy sort of self-deprecating running joke that she's such a minging socially awkward slob doesn't make any sense with her being Liz, as Tina Fey is neither convincing awkward OR convincingly pathetic and slobby.


Pancake

LOVE the inbetweeners. I get why you wouldn't and I'm normally too cool for anything that low-brow but it just strikes a chord in it's unabashed childishness and it looks like the kind of school/house/close of my youth

notjosh

Quote from: Fr.Bigley on May 21, 2020, 01:38:46 PM
It's three lines of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"
"Heroes in a half shell" followed by "Turtle power" - it's hardly Keats is it.

Hey, get a grip!

jobotic

Love the Mighty Boosh first and some of the second series. Fucking awful after that. Such a drop in quality.

Fr.Bigley

Quote from: jobotic on May 21, 2020, 01:56:08 PM
Love the Mighty Boosh first and some of the second series. Fucking awful after that. Such a drop in quality.

My favourite bit is when that green gentleman comes from the water and says "my name is old Gregory". Ripping good fun.

Pancake

Actually my submissions slightly miss the point of the thread as they're popular series, just not necessarily in these waters.

OK so... I also don't really get Vic and Bob outside of Shooting Stars

Blue Jam

Quote from: keir on May 21, 2020, 01:22:28 PM
I preferred Black Mirror, from what I saw, which is the Channel 4 ones, but I'm not in any rush to see the later ones until they come on proper telly.

The Channel 4 ones are good, but the show took a serious nosedive in quality when it moved to Netflix. In my opinion. Probably not a controversial opinion on here, but if you ask me you're not missing much.

'White Christmas' remains one of the best bits of television I have ever seen.

Clownbaby

Quote from: Pancake on May 21, 2020, 02:00:59 PM
Actually my submissions slightly miss the point of the thread as they're popular series, just not necessarily in these waters.

Nah you're good, popular outside of here is still popular.  I wasn't really limiting it to the CaB vaccuum myself

Really don't understand the fuss around Derry Girls. Watched the first series and found it really uninspired.

dissolute ocelot

The League of Gentlemen isn't funny. It's clever, and dark, and well made, but doesn't make me laugh at all.

I never really got into The Fast Show, despite liking other similar-vintage sketch stuff like Big Train and Spank the Pony. Fast Show is just kind of meh, silly characters say silly stuff with no real purpose to it. Not that I'm expecting Spank the Pony's brilliant social critique (lol) just something that doesn't feel like a long-forgotten early-60s comedy film.

I kind of join in with appreciation of The Goldbergs which in my opinion is well-observed and warm-hearted and full of memorable well-drawn characters. It's not really aiming for rapid joke-telling, but it can be very funny in the occasional moment.

I vary on Big Bang Theory which I can sometimes watch as easy, brain-dead entertainment, but equally a lot of it is annoyingly stupid. Young Sheldon again isn't bad.

I think enjoying House of Fools probably counts as a minority opinion.

Parks and Rec was good for about 2 1/2 seasons, between the arrival of Rob Lowe and Adam Scott and Leslie Knope deciding to run for office. This excludes the time with Louis CK, but he's not the reason.

Unfabulous, a teen sitcom starring a young Emma Roberts, was as good as most US adult sitcoms. Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide was also underrated.

Peter Sellers is overrated. Dr Strangelove's greatness has nothing to do with him and would be just as good if not better with 3 other actors. Most of his other films are mediocre, notably the Clouseau ones which are all messes to various degrees. Being There is crap for entirely different reasons (and Harold and Maude is rubbish too masquerading as offence).

Frank Skinner is really good, even now, even the stuff you think is shit (not Watercolour Challenge though, got to draw a line somewhere).

Buckaroo Banzai is shit.

Rick And Morty is also not funny.


Pancake

Never really loved The Young Ones

Totally happy it exists as a piece of anarchic post-punk snot, plus without it there might not be a Bottom, which I love (fnarr)

Blue Jam

Loved The League of Gentlemen when it was first broadcast. Re-watched the first episode a few years ago and didn't laugh once. And the sketch with Mr Chinnery and the border collie just really upset me.

The Young Offenders. Just found the two main characters a pair of unsympathetic little shits.

lankyguy95

Quote from: dissolute ocelot on May 21, 2020, 02:09:30 PM
Frank Skinner is really good, even now, even the stuff you think is shit (not Watercolour Challenge though, got to draw a line somewhere).
Is that controversial? I think most comedy fans acknowledge how naturally quick and funny Skinner is.

mr. logic

Norm Macdonald and Frank Skinner are two of the funniest people ever, but only if you don't include their stand up, where the delivery spoils it a lot of the time. Much better bouncing off others.

The worst series of Seinfeld is series six.

A lot of very good American comedy is not funny. 30 Rock is an example of a show that is brilliantly clever and enjoyable yet never makes me actually, you know, laugh.

Chris Rock and Eddie Murphy are both dreadful. In fact, most stand up comedy is shit, now that I think on. And most comedy films.

Woody Allen's mid period (and his 90s period, and even some of his much more recent stuff) is way better than his 'early, funny' period.

madhair60



madhair60

I will try to join in instead of being a fat shithead.

I don't find Airplane! funny, and I think most people who claim to do so are simply pretending it's funny to save some sort of weird comedy face. It's regarded as this comedy classic and it has almost no laughs, no consistency in its tone (it goes from played straight to broad comic reactions between lines, let alone scenes) and nothing to recommend it whatsoever. You don't like Airplane!, it's not funny, you are fucking lying and I don't understand why.

Jockice

Quote from: dr beat on May 21, 2020, 01:26:50 PM

I do however hold what may be the most DEFCON1 Nuclear-option controversial comedy opinion, and no its not 'I don't like Chris Morris'.  Its much, much worse than that.

It's thinking Morecambe And Wise are shit isn't it? And you are Jerry Sadowitz.

Jerzy Bondov