This show bumped The Office from its 9:30 time slot tonight, so I feel compelled to comment about it somewhere. Has anyone else caught an episode? I watched it after Scrubs last week. IMHO, just another sitcom. It has all the standard devices: laugh track, slightly zany yet sympathetic main character, his love interest, etc. I don’t think I’ll be coming back for more. I’m perfectly fine with its existence so long as it doesn’t wind up supplanting a show I actually enjoy (read: Those imbeciles at NBC better not even f***ing THINK about replacing The Office next season).
The most disappointing part to me is that its premise has potential for an interesting show. When I was in high school, teachers’ personal lives were pretty much off-limits. I would have loved to know what they thought of their students or their fellow faculty members. Theoretically, this show could present those kinds of topics in a slightly dark, biting or, at the very least, original way. It’s sad to see that they chose the path of the tired, bland, boring sitcom formula.
Again, it looks like NBC is looking for their new Friends.
I was underwhelmed, but, then, I was expecting that from the commercials I saw.
So I guess I wasn’t really underwhelmed as it was as lame and average as I expected. I’ll not watch it again on purpose. (In fact, I’m trying to read more these days. And I’m making time for it!. Sorry, I’m just really enjoying it. )
I watched it, but only because it was on between Scrubs and Law & Order, I was firmly planted on the sofa and was too lazy to change channels.
It was just okay. What’s the word? Formulaic. I called every ‘plot-twist’ before it came. The new teacher working at the Hooters-like place to pay off her student loans was old hat and the English teacher getting drunk and cleaning was just kind of dumb. :rolleyes:
I liked the bit with the two guys who went ahead and took the kids to see “Romeo and Juliet” despite being told to go to the botanical gardens. Way too obvious that a nervous parent would object, they’d go anyway, get caught and then get off without punishment.
That said, I was enjoying the double Scrubses on Tuesdays, and am slightly peeved that it’s supplanting The Office tonight.
NBC’s show sucks! I gave it a go hoping it would be more like the UK show Teachers, but it isn’t. I’m not even sure if it’s based on the UK show even though there are some similarities.
As a teacher, I found the premiere to be very realistic. I could really relate to the two goofballs shooting a golf ball into another teacher’s classroom. Happens all the time. And the hot but slutty Latina sub who carries beer with her in school? Who hasn’t met someone like that? And finally, the chick with the British accent who gets her scarf caught in a door and spends 5 minutes tugging on the scarf instead of just opening the door? Had me rolling in the aisles! :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:
That was my exact reaction, too. Intrusive laugh tracks are a huge turn-off, now that I’ve been spoiled by Scrubs and Arrested Development and even Simpsons.
I just went to IMDB and checked out the forums for this movie, apparently everyone else hated it. But I read there that this is just another UK show that US have made their own version (other shows being The Office, Coupling, Trigger Happy Tv), which I don’t understand. (Of course some others say it is not a remake at all)
I love British comedy, I don’t know why anyone would want to remake British TV shows in their own country. I understand there are differences between the styles of comedy from the two different countries*, but remaking them just doesn’t make sense.
I saw a couple of episodes of the BBC Teachers, and it was mildly funny. I can’t believe you guys remade Trigger Happy TV. :eek:
Were those eps on Comedy Central remakes? The early ones I saw were set in Britain, and then the “American” ones still had Dom Jolly (sp?) attached.
Anyway, to slightly hijack my own thread, when are we going to actually see the next Friends? The highest rated shows nowadays are reality-based (Survivor, American Idol), action/dramas (Lost, 24) or crime-solving (CSI, Law & Order). We’re starting to see a trend of unconventional sitcoms getting attention with shows like The Office and My Name is Earl moving into important time slots. Are we ever going to have another show like Friends, Seinfeld* or Cheers?
Even more unrelated to the OP, I recently read an Electronic Gaming Monthly column (they were reviewing some Friends trivia video game) whose writer commented that although he had never actually sat down to watch an episode of Friends, he had somehow seen every single one. I feel this exact same way.
*Seinfeld even seems to be quite unconventional with its unrealistic and sometimes despicable characters.
Thanks to syndication, I have managed to see every single episode of Friends as well, despite only having seen the final episode when it was actually aired. Personally, I’d just as much rather not have another Friends - it kept it going long past the due by date.
Teachers, in my opinion, went past that date as soon as they hired the main teacher guy. You know, the one with the witty comebacks and the zingers. Minus the witty and the zing. Plus a heapload of suck.
Who the hell uses laugh tracks anymore? I found it very distracting, like a big old neon sign INSERT LAUGH HERE. There’s been enough good sitcoms filmed before studio audiences that laugh tracks aren’t needed.
Hint, folks, if you need a laugh track…maybe it ain’t funny.
The only thing that was remotely funny was when they were using “‘gay’ as a derogatory without any sense of irony or post-modern spin”.
And, it was clear they were doing that just to be “edgy”.
It was astounding to me that after scoring with shows like The Office, and Earl and Scrubs where jokes are derived from the interactions of well-written characters, that they seem to regress about 15 years in Sitcom-world, going to a set-up/punchline show with terrible jokes and cardboard characters.
I was actually hoping that it might be a funny/sarcastic/realistic look at teachers in the style of The Office (and if you know any teachers, or are one, there is plenty to mine). Instead, it was just a bunch of pretty looking 20 somethings and a cranky old man reading stock lines punctuated with laugh tracks.
I think that Frostillicus’s post sums it up nicely. It had nothing to do with teachers (lower case). It just happens to be a sticom set in a school. I don’t think ONE writer for this show knows a teacher, or has ever been one.
Is my disdain for this show coming through clearly enough?
Disgusting, rotten, generic show. Unbelievable they think they’re going to hook the “Earl” crowd with it. Maybe it’s part of a plot to demonstrate to viewers, “see how good you have it with The Office and Earl”.
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