While that episode (along with most of Coupling) is great, “The Man With Two Legs” is even better.
-Joe
Really? I found them to be at extremes to each other. Peep Show is just fantastic and while it really just seems like it couldn’t get better, each season outdoes the last. On the other hand, I laughed at the “Do you think we’re the bad guys” Nazi joke, which was IIRC the first joke on The Mitchell and Web Look, then the rest of the series went straight downhill.
Apart from that, a great list so far, I’d especially second QI and most notably amongst the BBC’s documentaries, anything by Sir David Attenborough.
Since someone has already mentioned a show or two that Chris Morris had a hand in, I’ll nominate his series Jam. Quite surreal, for something equally so, but perhaps a bit less vulgar, try Monkey Dust.
I never got into Ashes to Ashes or Life on Mars. And I did watch the IT Crowd a few times but I considered it lame, and I don’t think I laughed once.
Top Gear is the best show on earth (And the new series begins in seven days - YAY!)
Extras and Fawlty Towers [and the british version of The Office] have both [all] done that which few shows do - end on a high. The saddest thing in TV is when a show is dragged out, spread too thin. Only Fools and Horses made this mistake. Best sit-com ever, and then they began to drag it out. There’ve been a few good moments (the moment they became millionaires) but this doesn’t save the fact it was alive longer than it should have been.
Oh and Spaced. I don’t think Spaced was dragged out too much. One of my favourite people on TV is Simon Pegg.
edit: PS: Did anyone see the advert for the new series of Top Gear? Is the kid playing the hamster [Richard Hammond] his actual son? Because the resemblance and voice are uncannily similar.
I did know this, but didn’t want to confuse the issue. Geordie accents seem to me to be the kind that mystify Americans the most, though. Though scouser accents like Moxey’s seem to confound them, too.
It wasn’t his accent, just his mumbling beardy enunciation, I think. Though maybe that’s the same thing.
Hyperdrive
Spaced
Black Books
Doctor Who
Torchwood
Primeval- It has gotten better or I wouldn’t add it.
Not having a TV, I had no idea. I’ll have to ask the parents to tape it for me.
I didnt think we were due another series of Top Gear until the autumn. Yay.
As for the Angus Deaton stuff. There was always the hint that Paul and Angus hated each other. Even though the show was there to mock people involved in scandals like that I think it got a bit nasty. Paul took way too much pleasure in sticking the knife in. It left a bit of a bad taste. I didn’t know that Fry had decided to never go on the show because of it though.
Never Mind the Buzzcocks is one of my favourites too. Its been on for years but the later seasons with Simon Amstell hosting have been my favourite.
Speaking of Angus Deaton, has anyone mentioned Nighty Night yet?
The first series is excellent, though it’s very dark with few likeable characters.
I didn’t see enough of it to think to mention it. Somehow that 's reminded me of another series I didn’t get a chance to catch, Catterick, was it as good as the little of it I saw seemed to be?
Hey, you’ve done a good list of what I wouldn’t watch in brit tv…
Ok, its one of those loaded questions…
Old british television, its pretty much comedy?
Well, Monty Python, Young Ones, Comic Strip Presents, Red Dwarf, Men Behaving Badly, Coupling, Spaced, The Day Today, Alan Partridge, Father Ted, Brass Eye, Absolutely or Nightingales.
Recent british stuff? Well, theres not a lot I’d put in there. IT Crowd perhaps. I’ve loved Inbetweeners recently on Channel 4… Its a struggle to name them…
I was trying to make a list that matched up with the stuff he already listed. I actually agree that some of those aren’t particularly good quality television, but they’re fine enough as entertainment.
Though having said that, I doubt your and my tastes would align very often.
3 abolute classics are…and I suggest everyone at some stage of their life should watch the following:
I’m alan Partridge
The Royle Family
shameless