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[Great Order]

Latest episode of TLOU was fantastic. Quite self-contained in all as well.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Bill and Frank are heavily expanded on and altered. Shows how Bill survived the outbreak (ie by being a paranoid schizophrenic), turned the town into his own place and kept the amenities on (Although the issue with the petrol's still a thing, since it'll spoil in about a year even if it's sealed), met Frank, met Tess and Joel, and ultimately how they both die in a major divergence from the plot.

Not afraid to say I welled up a bit towards the end of it.

[delphonso]

I'm gonna dig into Rings of Power in solidarity to another nerd.

My wife is watching the Three Body Problem (currently coming out daily in China, I have to assume subtitles are available and that you can watch it...ahem..."completely legally" somewhere). From what I've watched over her shoulder and the discussions we've had, it's real accurate to the book, which is good.

I'm not a fan of where the series goes, but the first book is undeniably a solid work of science fiction. If you can get your greasy mitts on either the book or this series, go for it. (Wenjie's actress's performance is genuinely perfect.)

[McTraveller]

Just finished The OA.

Enjoyable show but:

My brain hurts.

[Frumple]

I can't decide how I'm supposed to feel about a series called Oa written by someone named Batman not having anything to do with the green lanterns. It feels like it should be some kind of copyright violation or... something.

[McTraveller]

Hah yeah I noticed that in the credits too.

Mostly I'm just like... there are so many dangling plot threads! Apparently yet another victim of Netflix not finishing a series because of metrics or something stupid.

Just finish at least one of these series/stories, dammit!  (Although, of course, when a show is discontinued before it (potentially) goes bad, it will always live in folks' memories as "what could have been!")

[Il Palazzo]

Arguably, Lost would have been the best series ever created, had it been cancelled after the first season.

[McTraveller]

Are there any publicly available outtakes for Cunk On Earth?

I want to know how many takes it took to make each 30-minute episode. I don't know how anyone involved was able to keep a straight face long enough to get even one scene made, all done with complete documentary deadpan.

Spoiler: It's hilarious even though many may take offense (click to show/hide)

Gems like this. I literally laughed for a minute.

The need for bigger vessels led to the invention of the Titan 1C, the worlds first single-use submarine.

[Il Palazzo]

What is this whole Cunk thing? I keep seeing clips recommended by the 'tube, that I've been steadfastly ignoring. Is this some Mitchell & Webb-style comedy show?

[Frumple]

Google said it was some kind of mockumentary when I looked it up. I... don't remember what mitchell & webb was like, but comedy show of some sort, yeah.

[Ziusudra]

Morgan is perhaps best known for her portrayal of Philomena Cunk, an extremely dim-witted and ill-informed interviewer and commentator on current affairs. The character first appeared in a regular segment on Charlie Brooker's Weekly Wipe (2013–2015). Cunk has since appeared in other mockumentary contexts.

[Starver]

Philomena Cunk (aka Diane Morgan) is a deadpan 'reporter' character that I think (probably says in that link, I really should check it!) was made popular in a Charlie Brooker comedy/satire show for the BBC(or was it The Mash Report? ... no, I think that's Rachel Parris), and I've seen that "Cunk on ..." things have been around, created as stand-alones, since then, but I've not seen them myself.
...and Ninjaed.

Its the kind of humour I like (well, one of the kinds), so I really must have a look for them.

[Starver]

Talking of humour that I like... I've just seen news of a planned return of Fawlty Towers. Fills me with trepidation/interest in equal measure (and probably unlikely to appear on a broadcast/streaming platform I'll see, anyway, like Spitting Image) because they could do justice to the original two short series (US: seasons), but in trying to be contemporary and possibly even trying to say something it could be car-crash rather than a car-thrash (with a sapling!)...

They (not the same 'they', of course) have indeed done it well with the Open All Hours revival into Still Open All Hours, but I don't think Ronnie Barker, were he still around, would have wanted to do it. They were lucky enough to have David Jason (and a number of the other original cast) being able to create the core skeleton of continuity, having had a significantly gravitas-building career path between.

Compare that to riding upon Cleese's character alone, as the only obvious linking element. It currently seems it won't even be the same establishment being run. So it'll be much more a spin-off than a faithful continuity[1], and the choices made to 'update' it could kill it or chill it so very easily.



...and also confirmation in that news article that Spinal Tap is looking to pop up again as 'a thing'. I think I am happier with that. Though it would be nice to get something more in the lines of The Ruttles.

(Next up "The Old Ones"? A rather troubled remake of "The Young Ones" that essentially transplants what characters they still can over into a University Of The Third Age-type setting with more than a few elements of One Foot In The Grave, Waiting For God and Last Of The Summer Wine?  )


[1] Ok, it worked with Frasier from Cheers, and possibly also Mork And Mindy from Happy Days, I think it could be argued... Can't bring to mind anything British that did it as well. I enjoyed First Of The Summer Wine, but that was during the tenure of "Last...", a prequel and didn't last so long compared to its ultra-long-running parent series. While the "<something> and Chips", I think, that did the same for Only Fools And Horses (and featured one notably 'original' cast-member in a non-nod-wink-wink ancestral cameo) didn't do so well.

[hector13]

It’s a little surprising given Cleese’ distaste at certain episodes and characters not being regarded as having aged well (“don’t mention the war!”) but I did enjoy some of it, despite it being cringe comedy to some extent.

[Starver]

Cleese was upset that The Germans was removed from listings/censored because of some of the dialogue[1]. He wasn't distasteful of the his old programme (as in "I wouldn't have written it that way today"[2]), but of the way it caused the blocking of the programme without considering the context[3] and how it contextualised it as 'abnormal'.

Compare with Little Britain with its shock-comedy. The WI lady who projectile vomits (to ridiculous extents) on encountering any sight or sound of 'diversity' that threatens her world-view might be considered a "laugh at the prejudice, not at that prejudiced against", and The 'Only' Gay In The Village who seems to be as prejudiced and willingly blind to the truly enlightened nature of his home town as any homophobe in denial would be. 'Emily' ("I'm A Lady"), and occasionally a disciple to the cause (with the gruff "...a'right!"), is a difficult one. Making fun of Trans, or just making fun of some people's reductionist ideas of transvestitism?

But then there's the fatsuit (and, if it even needs to be mentioned, the blackface fatsuit) for the rather 'out there' fading-but-overly-effusive female once-glamorous but now just cringeworthy characters who had plenty of vanity but no inhibitions. Perhaps they (at the time) tried to balance that with the steroided-up musclemen ("musclesuits", with micropenises that also were a regular reveal), but it was probably at the 'wrong end' of a largely two-handed multicharacter act (both men, with or without their own alternate sexualities and natural body-shapes) who weren't averse to portraying a wide range of subjects in their work... Undoubtedly very good at varying their output across a wide range (Lou and Andy, with their own problematic issues[4], were both far more toned-down 'impressions'), but just because you can create a certain character doesn't always mean you should.

I think Lucas and Walliams have said that they wouldn't do some of that these days (though Walliams has had more recent trouble, in Britain's Got Talent I think it was), and even if I probably wasn't critical at the time (beyond it being a set of rapid firing cringe-sketches, off a little beyond my comfort zone if I wasn't intrigued enough to be sat watching the not-so-cringy moments of possible brilliance, or at least imagination) then I'm probably unlikely to seek out a streaming service holding their shows for a spot of nostalgia.

But nothing like that reticance with Fawlty Towers. A dozen(?) episodes in total, dealing with a variety of 'comedies of error' situations, and I don't think I'd say even The Germans is in bad taste. Even/especially in hindsight. You're not going to get much inadvertant audience 'sympathy' with the less nice viewpoints portrayed (a problem that Till Death Do Us Part had, Alf Garnett intended as a parody and figure of derision but attractedva "Yeah, I think that too" following by those who just didn't get the right joke), and the ridicule lands firmly and fairly upon those who perpetually rudiculous.

(That being Cleese's point, I believe, and I would clearly agree.)


But I'm worried that now!Cleese could be different and no longer aligned to what now!me thinks could and should be done. Apparently he has some stint on GB News. Which is a warning flag in my mind, given what I think about other guest stinters and full-blown presenters on GB News are like in political/political commentary circles. A British clone of Fox ('News'), it seems. I don't think they've sought for a wide range of possible iconoclasts to allow a wide and nicely representative spread of iconoclasms. So it makes me wary, even though I think Cleese fronted LibDem (or was it even pre-LibDem, the original Liberals?) Party Election Broadcasts, three or four decades ago.


[1] It featured an 'of his time' (i.e. purposely old fashioned even at that time) character using language increasingly deemed 'no longer appropriate'.

[2] Maybe he actually wouldn't, but I don't think he would shy away from a more contemporary 'edgy' character saying something else that is currently 'allowed' but controversial/thought-provoking as a character-establishing moment.

[3] The characters saying things that shouldn't be said were saying them because they had no inhibitions. Either an old person who had clearly never learnt to have them, or a concussioned one not being able to properly reason (even to his usual low level of self-control).

[4] Andy is faking disability, when it suits him. And Lou certainly ends up helping him, and empowering him to do so, however oblivious it seems he must be to the well-timed trickery.

[King Zultan]

I'm gonna withhold my judgment of the reboot of Fawlty Towers until I get to watch it, part of me is afraid that it isn't gonna be as good as the original, but the rest of me is hoping for good things even if most of the OG cast is gone, hopefully Cleese can pull it off.