Top Coppers

What can you say about this?

'Big, silly characters and hilarious stories' it says in the BCG guide and the trailer suggests the same - as well as immaculate pastiche character and set dressing.

Unfortunately it's shit.

And not just a little bit shit, but really shit. Under-scripted, unimaginative and not funny. The best thing about it is the title, which is catchy and doesn't suffer by being a totally pointless pun on the hair colour of the two male leads. Everything else is terrible and how could it have been any different?

You need to be sharp to do anything with pastiche and it helps if you have something to say - not just look how mesmerised I am by the gaudy clothing and the heavy hair of forty years ago. I would think practically everyone who ever sat down to write a sitcom blocked out a spoof police script and thought they were geniuses for picking apart TV production clichés from the 70s. Unfortunately when everyone can see how ludicrous something is there's no need to spend half a million quid putting it on TV.

Steen Raskopoulos looks good as one of the coppers but is undermined by John Kearns who looks strangely like a woman pretending to be a man in a big ginger beard.

There's only one good joke - right at the end, but it's undermined by its cruelty, which further suggests the writers have got a long way to go.

Oh.

I rather liked it.

I haven't seen it but I think that like me Godot probably compares things to other shows we've seen and loved years ago. Youngsters (!) nowadays haven't had the experience of us oldies and so to them things are new and original.

Well this is meant to be a pastiche of 70s cop dramas. It's neither modern nor original.

I have seen the first two episodes now and I thought both were great. I feel it's rather traditional but a great jumping block for some fresh talent.

It's a lame rip-off of "Police Squad"/"Naked Gun" minus the wit and invention, dressed up in 70s clobber, directed by someone with nil clue about timing.

You liked something about it, surely?

In fact, the Australians got there first 20 years ago with Funky Squad. It wasn't very good but better than this drivel.

I thought it had some funny moments but it can't help but get comparisons to the amazing Police Squad as it's spoofing the same thing. You can't say it might be for a younger audience as what would they know about 1970s cop shows? In fact, Police Squad is probably shown more than any repeated cop show anyway.

First thought when I watched it was "Brooklyn Nine-Nine", but set in the 70s and done really, really badly.

As I see it, the biggest problem with this show is that it can't decide whether it wants to be a regular wacky comedy or a deadpan affair in the vein of Police Squad! (or Charlie Brooker's A Touch of Cloth). It ends up somewhere in-between, and that just feels awkward.

Oh, and the jokes aren't all that funny either.

The final episode was the best of the lot, I thought.

I liked the whole series. This may be one of the first times that I'm in the minority.

I thought it was one of the Beeb's best new comedies in ages.
The best compliment I can give it is it's nothing like the recent crop of Beeb comedies.
I haven't laughed out loud at a Beeb comedy in ages.
(hamster through the window)

Oh dear!

I really liked Top Coppers. It relies heavily on "random gags" and that is right up my street; I love to laugh at the small things I don't see coming. I also love word play - and this is full of it.

There is a lot of visual comedy, because one of the writers is also a director, so he's thinking along those lines.

I haven't watched any of the shows it's being compared to - from what the writer has said, they didn't write it to be compared to them. My opinion is - there's only so many comedy cop shows you can make before they start running into each other.

What it lacks is strong story and character development. It's TOO fast-paced and filled full of gags (whether you consider them to be funny or not). It does feel like the set and costumes and title are all a smoke screen to tell running jokes, one after the other.

BUT

I still really love it. It makes me laugh out loud. This obviously means I am exceptionally moronic, or, I can see something in the writing that the majority isn't seeing. I think my writing might be similar - so I'm going to be paddling up stream then, if people don't like Top Coppers - ha!

If it was my sitcom, I would tone it down - think of developing a better story; but apart from that, it gets my vote.

Jo