British Comedy Guide

Cliché sitcom jokes that really piss you off Page 5

This isn't so much sitcom as every genre and medium of British comedy: Daily Mail bashing.

That's only coz comedy commisioning types are Guardian readers. They don't mind their own brand of biased opinion being promulgated but other thinking is deemed fascist etc.

Although if you bashed the Daily Mail now in a comedy I think it would get a ? from the audience. What's a daily mail?

How about the cliche where a character who the other characters rely on, say for making the tea, leaves for a few days. The other characters assume the task is easy and say something like "How hard can it be". We then cut to them failing miserably at said task.

That one annoys me. It was even in Father Ted (albeit done better on there than in most other sitcoms that have done this joke).

Here's my personal list of irritants -

Car parked on a hill and the hand brake goes

Man dresses as unconvincing woman and gets hit on by randy suitor

Someone doesn't hang up phone properly and person listening on the other end gets insulted / wrong idea

Injured person wearing bandage / cast gets hit specifically in injured body part

Any dream sequence, especially when they do the double bluff, 'oh thank God that was only a dream' when it turns out they're dreaming that bit as well

Wearing a fancy dress costume to a normal party

Straight laced wife tells idiot husband to behave at party, but she gets mashed instead and makes fool of herself

Dead goldfish or any dead pet for that matter, most often happens when the child owner is away and they need to find a replacement

People going face first into an elaborate cake (The worst offender isn't even a sitcom, it's the Guns N Roses November Rain video. Everyone is having a good time at the rock and roll reception, it starts raining and the crowd goes ape shit like they've never seen water from the sky before, next thing you know, a mulleted acrobat throws himself into the wedding cake. 'Shit! It's raining! Better throw myself through a cake then, frosting will protect me from God's angry tears.')

Anything to do with surprise birthday parties

A religious person getting so angry they blaspheme 'God damn, etc.'

And though not necessarily a sitcom cliche, it happens in so many studio based programmes, that it's really starting to get on my nerves - someone being at the door every time it's opened. Used to happen on Neighbours all the time. 'I'm just gonna check on Bouncer.', opens door, someone is standing there ready to knock. 'Oh Charlene, what are you doing here?' Personally, if everytime I opened my front door and an Ozzie was standing there, I'd start leaving through the window or become a hermetic shut in that kept urine in jars. (Put Fosters joke here).

And relax.

:D

Quote: Renegade Carpark @ December 26 2008, 4:22 PM GMT

People going face first into an elaborate cake (The worst offender isn't even a sitcom, it's the Guns N Roses November Rain video. Everyone is having a good time at the rock and roll reception, it starts raining and the crowd goes ape shit like they've never seen water from the sky before, next thing you know, a mulleted acrobat throws himself into the wedding cake. 'Shit! It's raining! Better throw myself through a cake then, frosting will protect me from God's angry tears.')

That bit always annoyed me, there is no good reason for throwing himself into that cake.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sploshing

They're jsut catering to their kinkier fans.

Didn't do nothing for me, would rather have had 2 girls wrestling, naked, in a pool of oil.

Quote: Renegade Carpark @ December 26 2008, 4:22 PM GMT

People going face first into an elaborate cake (The worst offender isn't even a sitcom, it's the Guns N Roses November Rain video. Everyone is having a good time at the rock and roll reception, it starts raining and the crowd goes ape shit like they've never seen water from the sky before, next thing you know, a mulleted acrobat throws himself into the wedding cake. 'Shit! It's raining! Better throw myself through a cake then, frosting will protect me from God's angry tears.')

Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!!

Quote: Ned1984 @ December 27 2008, 10:20 PM GMT

Didn't do nothing for me, would rather have had 2 girls wrestling, naked, in a pool of oil.

Reply seems to be at odds with your signature?

:S

Quote: Oldrocker @ December 28 2008, 12:10 AM GMT

Reply seems to be at odds with your signature?

:S

Haha, I did think about changing it when I read that but I thought f**k it.

The worst one is, giving it much thought, is this.
'Turn Left'
'Right'
'No Left'

Heard it countless times and never laughed the first time.

Quote: Jack Massey @ December 29 2008, 3:24 PM GMT

The worst one is, giving it much thought, is this.
'Turn Left'
'Right'
'No Left'

Heard it countless times and never laughed the first time.

Or 'Left, left no your other left'

The Daily Mail deserves a good bashing though.

It is awful.

It's no worse than sensationalist nonsense in any other paper.

And no matter how much it may or may not deserve it, the whole anti-DM spiel is old, boring, unimaginative, and IMO the sign of a comedian (or writer) struggling for any idea at all.

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