The Unpopular Opinion Thread

Ah here!

Yeah, I can't remember when I stopped watching it, but the stories were becoming more and more ridiculous. 

I actually think that is the biggest problem with US sitcoms in that they are made solely for commercial success, so even the really good ones go on too long and turn into soap operas. That was certainly the case with ' Frasier' and 'The Simpsons' has no had more bad seasons than good, presumably. 

IT Crowd

Black Books

The Thick of It

Still Game

Early Doors

Fleabag

The Detectorists

Nathan Barley

Uncle

Back to Life 

Jerk

Home

Don't Forget the Driver

Friday Night Dinner(divisive, but I love it)

Outnumbered (same)

Mongrels

Ideal

Extras

There has been some brilliantly written sitcoms over the past 20 years. 

It's just a different way of looking at making a sitcom. I think the fact that so many of the successful comedies in the states, certainly those I enjoy the least, are often made my the same few production companies make it predictable. Three dimensional characters and formulaic situations generally leads to fairly bland comedy, but much easier to sell as primetime family viewing to major networks. 

I'm sure that there has been plenty of more talented and funny writers and producers in the States, but they don't make it on to the major networks and therefore never seen over here. That might be slowly changing given how we watch television now.

The best comedy characters are definitely two dimensional. I always reckon that if Basil Fawlty was American and ran a motel in Tampa we would have had a full breakdown of his mental illness and we would be feeling sorry for him.

Yer wan Stefanie Preissner was on Off The Ball of all shows lately claiming that the US Office was better than the real version because the US version had characters "you could identify with and that it gave you a sense of hope". She could barely have misunderstood the point of The Office more. 

I didn't watch The Office because I wanted character development or to empathise with the characters or to get a sense of "hope" or "aspiration". I wanted jokes, I wanted laughs, I wanted toe curlingly cringe inducing and embarrassing moments, I wanted a devastating skewering of Brexit Britain, before Brexit Britain existed (well it existed in 2002, it just didn't know it yet and we didn't knoww what to call it).