Steve Coogan, Chris Morris, British comedy of the moment...

[Andy Harwoos]

It's NME's fault. They made it cool to be angry at stuff for no reason. I'm way more aware of American media these days because I can't stand the tone of British pop culture coverage.

[Dan in Chicago]

It's NME's fault. They made it cool to be angry at stuff for no reason. I'm way more aware of American media these days because I can't stand the tone of British pop culture coverage.

I feel the American culture media can be just as blamed for making strong or unreasonably harsh reviews of things just to make it more of a bold read. Very few critics anywhere are completely blameless of sensationalism but that's getting away from the topic so I'll shut up.

[actwithoutwords]

Yep, the hype/backlash cycle is really vicious and fast-moving in the U.K... That whole process is so predictable that it's difficult to take it very seriously. And if http://chilled.cream.org/ is anything to go by, well, those people just seem to hate everything. Thankfully U.K. media is under-the-radar enough here that we aren't really subjected to the pump'n'dump media cycle.

Heh. In fairness, the Boosh dislike to which I referred was clear from the very beginning. There's certainly no popular backlash against them either. Their (somewhat cynical) targeting of the 'trendy' audience has been very successful.
Whereas there are plenty of very popular and almost universally liked comedies, One Foot in the Grave, Only Fools and Horses, Fawlty Towers, Blackadder, Father Ted, KMKYWAP etc.

Dismissing criticism as part of the hype/backlash cycle is often disingenuous I think. It's very easy for someone like Ricky Gervais to moan about how people are only critical of him because he's so successful. Which ignores the fact that nothing he's made since The Office has been of remotely the same standard.

I don't think there's many people who 'hate' the Office. I've heard some criticism of the second series. But I think the main problem is that the Office is often hailed as groundbreaking in a way that brushes the influence of a lot of (equally good) shows under the carpet. Including Partridge, and utter classics like People Like Us*.
Plus Gervais is a complete tool, with his Gorch-like incessant self-promotion. Yo buy my book!



*Actually, there's a recommendation. People Like Us by Chris Langham. Unrelated to the FMU show. One of the most well observed, brilliantly acted, original and densely joke-packed shows of the 90's.

[fletcher munson]

It's NME's fault. They made it cool to be angry at stuff for no reason. I'm way more aware of American media these days because I can't stand the tone of British pop culture coverage.

Do people really care about NME?  Aren't they just a bunch of old boobs?  I mean how relevant are the opinions of rock journalists today anyway.  I could see how they might have held a certain power back in the 80's when people found themselves walking into a record store with $20 in their hand and no idea which direction to turn in, but nowadays with the abundance of niche music blogs / message boards / myspace where you can hear samples of anything you want and chat with true music lovers, what's the point?  I mean I'd be surprised if people still looked to NME for advice on anything, and I'm pretty sure cool people in England hate that rag anyway.

With regard to Gervais, I'm a huge Alan Partridge, Boosh fan, but also love Gervais.  Have you seen the Extras where he goes on a man date with another extra and becomes so exasperated at how pathetic the guy is that he drops his face into a bowl of soup?  So funny and weird. 

[Bryan]

Heh. In fairness, the Boosh dislike to which I referred was clear from the very beginning. There's certainly no popular backlash against them either. Their (somewhat cynical) targeting of the 'trendy' audience has been very successful.
Whereas there are plenty of very popular and almost universally liked comedies, One Foot in the Grave, Only Fools and Horses, Fawlty Towers, Blackadder, Father Ted, KMKYWAP etc.

Dismissing criticism as part of the hype/backlash cycle is often disingenuous I think.

Fair enough. It may be that Boosh is exotic enough for us over here that we don't really clue in to their target-marketing. Be that as it may, I think they're funny, original, and anything but lazy. As Tom would say, that's why there's horse races...

[crumbum]

Plus Gervais is a complete tool, with his Gorch-like incessant self-promotion. Yo buy my book!

I agree his public persona can be a bit irritating but I think most things he's created have been top-notch (though I haven't seen The Invention of Lying). What's really interesting to me is that if you look at his obsession with the relationship between ego and fame in both Extras and The Office, and compare that to the self-promoting look-at-me thing he does constantly in the press, it begins to seem he's deeply ashamed of his overriding desire to be famous and loved by everybody.

[Trembling Eagle]

Heh. In fairness, the Boosh dislike to which I referred was clear from the very beginning. There's certainly no popular backlash against them either. Their (somewhat cynical) targeting of the 'trendy' audience has been very successful.
Whereas there are plenty of very popular and almost universally liked comedies, One Foot in the Grave, Only Fools and Horses, Fawlty Towers, Blackadder, Father Ted, KMKYWAP etc.

Dismissing criticism as part of the hype/backlash cycle is often disingenuous I think.

Fair enough. It may be that Boosh is exotic enough for us over here that we don't really clue in to their target-marketing. Be that as it may, I think they're funny, original, and anything but lazy. As Tom would say, that's why there's horse races...

I thought right off the bat GM Darkplace > Mighty Boosh
Boosh seems a little too precious to me.

That's with zero hipster influence from either side of the pond.

[buffcoat]

I really liked the Gervais-Merchant-Pilkington podcast.

Ricky Gervais seems to be better when he has people who knew him before he was a genius around.  Like everyone else.

[Andy Harwoos]

I don't think there's anything cynical about the Mighty Boosh. I think it's just a bunch of trendy guys who grew up loving Vic and Bob and Monty Python.

And noone pays attention to the NME anymore (I don't think anyone pays attention to any print magazine anymore) but it was a huge influence on the people from the generation before mine who are now pop culture critics

[Bryan]

I thought right off the bat GM Darkplace > Mighty Boosh
Boosh seems a little too precious to me.

For me, Darkplace was much funnier in conception than in execution. Great cast, but it seemed like a 7 minute SCTV sketch stretched out to 6(?) episodes.


I don't mind precious. Or fey. Or even a certain amount of twee. And I simply love whimsy!

[Andy Harwoos]

I thought Man to Man with Dean Learner was better than Darkplace

[buffcoat]

Peter noone?

[Dan in Chicago]

I don't think there's many people who 'hate' the Office. I've heard some criticism of the second series. But I think the main problem is that the Office is often hailed as groundbreaking in a way that brushes the influence of a lot of (equally good) shows under the carpet. Including Partridge, and utter classics like People Like Us*.
Plus Gervais is a complete tool, with his Gorch-like incessant self-promotion. Yo buy my book!

I think there is influences clearly between the characters of David Brent and Alan Partridge, but the comparisons between the two shows for me ends there. I'm Alan Partridge is really a vehicle for Coogan's ridiculous character, where as The Office is much more fleshed out and there are many great personalities. I also overall think that Brent is a much more forgivable character than Partridge, and he does have a much higher sense of shame, like he knows what he is doing is wrong but he still feels the need to do it. That said I'm probably a bigger I'm Alan Partridge fan, I just think that calling Gervais a tool for this character he has built, which is similar to most of the characters he plays and even his public persona, is just a little too harsh.

[Andy Harwoos]

The Office is like Nirvana - it brought cool stuff into the mainstream (and was 7000 times funnier than people like us)

[masterofsparks]

What's really interesting to me is that if you look at his obsession with the relationship between ego and fame in both Extras and The Office, and compare that to the self-promoting look-at-me thing he does constantly in the press, it begins to seem he's deeply ashamed of his overriding desire to be famous and loved by everybody.

This seems to be addressed very directly in the Extras Christmas Special. He lets the character off the hook a bit at the end, but up until that closing it was a pretty self-lacerating criticism of just this sort of behavior. I really didn't see that shift in the character coming, but I thought they pulled it off really well.

I don't think there's many people who 'hate' the Office.

Have you ever read the AST forum?