Quote: martin williams @ June 12 2011, 12:51 AM BSTDear "Shaggy",
I understand that there are certain rules to a sitcom but after watching The Office and Peep Show and even The Young Ones, there is something lacking in this show. It lacks atmosphere and relies heavily on quick fire gags.
My biggest criticism is that the main character should emit some sympathy with the audience. For example Basil Fawlty, Harold Steptoe, David Brent. Lee Mack's character is too smart, cocky, clever and doesn't have any flaws. Yet if he is so wonderful and quick and clever why is he in this position? That's why I thought that the plot was unbelievable. Yes I know it's a sitcom but it has to be credible to a certain extent for characters to be believable.
You are quite right here, imo, and you are not at all the first person to say this, or something similar. NGO frustrates me as a sitcom fan and even irritates me. There is absolutely no doubt it is funny. BUT a sitcom is NOT merely an empty vehicle to stuff full of gags, it should involve people in the lives of the characters.
It should primarily be focused on the characters, and there should be at least one in a sitcom that that really fascinates or annoys the audience; he or she should be a caricature of some type in society we recognise. It is how sitcoms work, or how they used to work. We are getting a lot of new sitcoms made which are not following this old rule. Maybe the BBC is trying to change the very formula of what a sitcom is, by foisting this new lot of fairly characterless sitcoms on us? Hmm, but then why would they be continually showing us Dad's Army: the model of a true sitcom with strong memorable characters?
