Thursday Night Comedy … and sh*t …
I did say at the start of this year that I wanted to write more reviews of TV things but I’ve failed miserably so far but I can at least come up with something to say about tonight’s torrrent of fresh comedy on BBC2.
Fear, Stress and Anger is one of those sitcoms that with a few minor tweaks could easily have screened with a laughtrack on BBC1, but thank god it didn’t go that way. Had it not been for a few short clips I saw on Richard & Judy this week, that nearly had me on the floor laughing, I probably wouldn’t have even given it a 5 minute trial. It’s the simplest of set-ups, baby-boomer parents with 20-something children who won’t leave home and all that that implies, in fact now that I think about it, it’s almost too close to Jack Dee’s Lead Balloon for comfort. But, honestly, at times it’s unspeakably funny, and it only got better as it went on for me. I didn’t think there would be anything funnier in this first episode than the grandma-in-the-lift scene I’d already seen, but the stuff with the dog and the final dinner party argument scene had me in stitches, then, finally, the absence of a laugh track allows for it to stray into slightly more emotional matter which I hope they keep tapping into, moreso if possible, in future episodes. It’s too soon to say whether this is brilliant or anything, but it certainly has more potential than I would’ve given it credit for. It’s simple, even asinine, clichéd sitcom stuff, lol, but it’s executed so perfectly and differently, it’s far from as bad as I expected.
Dead Ringers – hard to say anything new, this one has won me over many times in the past. But The Queen doing Helen Mirren’s part in “Prime Suspect” was probably the stand-out skit, and Judi Dench phoning the Academy saying ‘there’s a rumour about H’ to win another Oscar (“We’ve all done Queens, love, I spent 8 minutes in ruffles once …”) a close second.
The Graham Norton Show – truly didn’t know what to expect from this, and I expected the worst, ‘cos he has kind of phoned himself in a lot in the past. But the first two minutes of this worked about as well as the first two minutes of last year’s Torchwood in that it completely made sure ‘the wrong audience’ weren’t watching. Like, you can imagine a lot of kiddy fans of Doctor Who tuning into Torchwood and their parents happily letting them, right up until that first f-bomb was dropped. Here, you can totally imagine, as the many ads for the show actually did, cheery old church-going types tuning in thinking, “Oh, it’s that Graham Norton, he was so good on that Maria thing, and with the Dancing, that’ll be a nice show!” but ohhhhhhhhhhh no. It’s almost as if he started out being rude on Channel 4, turned all conservative with the BBC, and now has almost been catapulted back beyond the depravity of his 4 days, lol. When Kim Cattrall says, “I didn’t know you could say that,” Graham responds, “I don’t know, maybe we can’t,” and you find yourself thinking, “Can you?”, you know you’re not wasting your time, lol.
So anyway, that’s a must-see 90 minutes for the next 5 or so Thursdays 
Oh and of course later on is Man Stroke Woman – always painfully sidesplitting
While I’m here, I guess this might turn out to be the way I do my TV things, like a few things at a time, ‘cos looking at my log for the year so far, I do seem to be watching more than I could possibly keep track of on an individual basis, lol. So I may as well play catch up. I just caught up on the first couple of episodes of Primeval – dubbed ITV’s answer to Doctor Who – pah. I already felt this was a slightly enthusiastic claim and had already decided before even watching that it was probably closer to Torchwood if anything. Now that I’ve seen some of it, I have to admit, it’s annoyingly watchable and it’s nothing to do with Hannah Spearitt (who was to be my last possible reason for watching the show) – but really, so far, it’s closer to The Sarah Jane Smith Adventures than anything, with elements more of Mimic than Jurassic Park, and hints at an annoyingly “We promise we’ll tell you what’s going on next week! Promise! PINKY PROMISE! PLEASE DON’T TURN OFF! They beat us when you do!” mystery to rival that of Lost. But anyway, for now, I’ll keep watching. At least it’s only 6 eps, lol.
Queued up I have Heroes (on Richard and Judy today, again, I think I’ll regret watching this because I’m bound to get into it, and it looks like yet another slick, technically perfect show with nothing to say except “PLEASE DON’T TURN US OFF!!!”), Skins (actually looks interesting), Five Days and still last year’s The State Within as well as any number of things I’ve got lying around from decades past lol. Meanwhile, I feel compelled to watch Hayley Mills in Wild at Heart because she’s too much fun even though she hasn’t really made the show much better.
Anyway, same time next month, right? 
Addendum: OOooooh and Lily Allen on This Week nice treat lol, except I wish she’d stop itching her head, lol, is this like part of her street image, she has nits??? But no, she’s cool despite the itching lol. I forgot to mention the other side of Thursday night which is the two great political programs, This Week and Question Time.
Addendum 2: First two episodes of Five Days weren’t too bad. Sarah Smart wasn’t in it nearly enough for me, but maybe that’ll change in further episodes … the ending of the first certainly took me by surprise. But anyway, how good is Penelope Wilton???? Between her fleeting moments in this and her role in Shaun of the Dead I could easily have a new fave actress. Give her a BAFTA TV award right now! Oh and there’s also a girl in this, I don’t know her name for sure but deducing from the IMdb credits and boards I think it’s Lucinda Dryzek, who I wouldn’t mind them replacing Emma Watson with in future Harry Potter movies – she’s a great actress, looks a lot like Emma, and it doesn’t hurt that she’s practically dressed here as Hermione is in Azkaban, lol.