British Comedy Guide

Mrs. Brown's Boys - Series 1 Page 7

Not sure what you erm... is for Griff? But anyway to clarify the quote you used here's what I meant.

I was relating to earlier suggestions in the thread that perhaps silly Irish accents are not in themselves worthy of a comedy and that overall the show was stereotypically "Irish"

The Good Life was in a fairly good natured way sending-up Home Counties Middle Class worthies all right. But not because they were that in themselves, it was purely their situation really. That's who they happened to be so they naturally spoke in received pronunciation and sounded a bit "posh". Nobody thought that was the joke in itself.

Similarly the characters in Mrs Brown's Boys are Irish and therefore they sound Irish and they speak with Irish accents etc. But this is purely incidental to what the show's about. There is a certain degree of light sending-up perhaps with the words "Feck" & "Mammy", but these words are used extensively in real life in Ireland; despite them also having been hijacked by people who would seek to stereotype "de Oirish" in cheap, xenophobic and inaccurate portrayals.

My point was that a show set in Ireland cannot but help "sound" Irish in just the same way as Still Game "sounded" Scottish and used a lot of Scottish colloquialisms in the script.

;) Look stop 'navel-gazing' if a programme is crap and poor, just say it, those concerned will know it is.

After a great start and a reasonable second, No.3 was struggling quite badly and was, by a long way, the weakest so far.

Could be the novelty of the manic performances is wearing off and that they are unable to keep afloat, what is in all honesty, a fairly rickety old tub.

Hope it picks up down the home stretch but am beginning to doubt that it can.

Quote: Blenkinsop @ March 8 2011, 10:24 PM GMT

After a great start and a reasonable second, No.3 was struggling quite badly and was, by a long way, the weakest so far.

Goodness, if the first was by far the best I'm glad I haven't watched again! :S

This third episode was awful, the series has run out of steam already, it reminds me of an adult pantomime that was written in a lunch hour with an old joke book as reference. I will watch the whole series as painful as that will be.

Quote: Nil Putters @ February 25 2011, 7:30 AM GMT

I don't mind swearing, far from it, but there seemed a lot in this, and for no apparent reason. And it all felt a bit forced to me. Also telling us "I'm a man in a dress" during one scene annoyed me too, yes we know, they didn't have to bring more attention to it!

I hated the trailers but some interesting comments on here made me go and watch episode 1 on iPlayer. It wasn't the complete disaster I'd imagined but Nils has summed up the big problem for me - it relies a lot on a man in a dress swearing a lot for no reason. And he does swear an awful lot. It comes across as a bit desperate.

What Badge said. Mostly.

The main difference is that I hated the trailers but watched episode 3, not ep1.

Apart from that I agree - not as dreadful as I imagined but not great and that best-friend-is-a-jinx joke was probably old when Dave Allen did it nearly 40 years ago.

I've definitely seen worse though. It was a bit poor but not dire.

Quote: Matthew Stott @ February 21 2011, 11:03 PM GMT

I'll probably watch again.

I haven't.

Quote: Matthew Stott @ March 10 2011, 9:21 AM GMT

I haven't.

Only bothering with one episode, Stott? Glad to see you proving my point from the Friday Night Dinner thread. Pleased

Quote: Afinkawan @ March 10 2011, 9:18 AM GMT

What Badge said. Mostly.

The main difference is that I hated the trailers but watched episode 3, not ep1.

Apart from that I agree - not as dreadful as I imagined but not great and that best-friend-is-a-jinx joke was probably old when Dave Allen did it nearly 40 years ago.

I've definitely seen worse though. It was a bit poor but not dire.

The thing about old jokes is that they are only old to oldies who have heard them all before. :P

All this stuff is fresh for me, and that joke stuck out as one of my favourites.

It's shit, a good use of the word fecking but the jokes are old. It will be successful though as it's risqué for BBC One, a cross between Father Ted and Bread, I don't like it though.

You can't polish a turd.

My nan loves it.

Very funny tonight. The blowjob joke, inflatible penis and the bloke wearing the stockings to go to the toilet were laugh out loud moments.

So, what do you think of this?

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