Should the BBC play God and use A.I. to make the last episode of Bloomers that sadly never got made due to Richard Beckinsale's sudden early death? It would be fascinating and macabre at the same time to see it, knowing it was completed decades later.
No, but it would be nice if they aired the other five on BBC Four.
I think obviously there's a give and take of it all. Recently I've been spending my commutes watching a lot of British comedy and put a few rules into place whilst doing so.
I can get what you mean with narrow demographics etc but then again it's also to do with having to commission a number of shows by writers from different backgrounds and of course female written shows.
Whilst not everything will suit everything this is certainly the same as it was in the glory days too.
Take BBC for example. Likely an overreaction to not commissioning enough comedy their on demand service seems to be full of new and recent comedies all with one series, some have been commissioned second series' and beyond and others have fallen silent, many different backgrounds and of course it's not always hitting every demographic and some people may say are just god awful.
However there are some sleeper hits and bigger shows out there.
But how could this change to suit everyone?
I genuinely think with the age we are in with on demand services and the way we watch TV now it would be a great time for the BBC to look into bringing back the Comedy Playhouse brand for an on demand audience, a collection of pilot episodes from all backgrounds together and BBC being able to collect information from this. Amazon did this many years ago where they dropped pilot seasons of shows and the best watched ones got commissioned for more.
Why not allow many of let's be honest great and aspiring writers to have their stories told in a single episode and if it does well we get more?
Well when the comedy or as I increasingly say dramedy (which I believe is a bigger problem but another offshoot of the comedy malaise) doesn't do well besides the rave reviews in the usual places.
Why do they keep making more of the same?
It's pretty easy to see
Ideology has trumped most commissioning goals.
It's obvious that female and BAME centred stories are being overly focused on
But it has lead to extremely low viewing figures.
I get it the perceived mission that they think they can make up for the past by ODing us all in the present with the non-stop virtue signalling.
But it's just led to awful decisions in programming that frankly no one watches.
The numbers don't lie
You can bet your bottom dollar that repeats of Little Britain and Never The Twain amongst other things get higher viewings figures than BBC Two's Spent got recently. Matt King was the only reason to watch it. So far BBC Three's comeback has been pretty weak compared to what it used to put out. Anyone here remember or is a fan of Siblings? Now that was funnier than recent fodder.
Matt Lucas and his grovelling apologies for Little Britain were so sad to witness.
I lost all respect for him after that.
Better to join the cast aside comedians and comedy actors in vapid panel shows or reality tv
"Traditional TV viewing in the UK has seen its sharpest ever decline over the past year, according to Ofcom.
The broadcasting watchdog's annual report into viewing and listening habits showed the proportion of people who tune in each week was down from 83% in 2021 to 79% in 2022.
Media Nations 2023, released on Thursday, suggested older audiences are also switching off at the fastest rate."
Quote: tenbeersbold @ 16th September 2024, 6:56 PMMatt Lucas and his grovelling apologies for Little Britain were so sad to witness.
I lost all respect for him after that.
Yes - such a shame because it was - and still is - very funny.
Didn't know about that but it doesn't really surprise me cos, as I wrote in another thread, I always got the impression they were trying too hard.
The third series of Little Britain struck me as lazy and poor, and I remember at the time wishing they'd stopped at two series.
The pissing woman was when I bailed.
Yup got my wife outta the room!
Quote: tenbeersbold @ 18th September 2024, 9:07 AMYup got my wife outta the room!
Always a good test.
There was actually an Italian rip-off of Little Britain, I Soliti Idioti. They got away with it cos they said it was a 'homage to a great British series', which is Italian for 'total theft'. And yes, it sucked like a toothless budgie, but at least it made me appreciate the UK version more. But give me League of Gentlemen over this desperate attempt to be, like, totally kinda rad, man.