Tag: Humor

Stuff that makes me laugh

Top Telly

Entertainment

Britishland’s Radio Times has published a Top 100 list of TV shows (from the beginning, i.e. early 1950s, until yesterday).

I read through the whole thing (so you don’t have to), and apart from the inexplicable inclusion of American shows (e.g. Hill Street Blues and M*A*S*H*) on the list, it’s not bad.  Of course, I haven’t seen all of them — give me a break, we didn’t even have TV in South Africa till I turned 21 — but I thought I’d share my thoughts on the ones I have.

What the hell, it’s the weekend, right?

The Comedies

  • Monty Python, Fawlty Towers, I’m Sorry, I’ll Read That Again — actually, the John Cleese Collection — all classics, all brilliant.
  • Not The Nine O’Clock News :  what SNL’s Weekly Update  tried to be, and failed (unless Norm McDonald was the host) — and speaking of Rowan Atkinson:
  • Blackadder :  historical satire at its very finest, helped by an unbelievable supporting cast (Hugh Laurie, Stephen Fry, Rik Mayall, Miriam Margolies, etc.).
  • The Royle Family :  most Brits of my acquaintance absolutely hated this show about working-class losers;  I loved it.

Drama

  • The Duchess of Duke Street :  excellent fin-de-siècle  series set in the late 1880s until post-WWI, with the wonderful Gemma Jones as the “Duchess”.  One of my prized DVD collections.
  • The Singing Detective :  unbearable to watch, but so good you can’t stop.  Forget everything you ever knew about Michael Gambon:  this is his finest performance.  Ignore the silly U.S. remake.  Also in my collection.
  • After Life :  funny, dark, poignant and sensitive;  Ricky Gervais’s best work.  I think I’ve watched this series half a dozen times, and counting.

Cops ‘n Robbers

  • The Sweeney :  long before NYPD Blue‘s Andy Sipowicz, there was the gritty Jack Regan.
  • Inspector Morse :  wherein the gritty working-class Jack Regan turns into the calm, analytic and cultured Morse, both having been played by the same actor.
  • Cracker :  tortured and flawed genius solving crimes;  Robbie Coltrane in a non-comic tour de force.  I have the set, but there’s a warning attached:  do not watch the postscript episode (set in Hong Kong), because not only is it terrible, it was an afterthought, cobbled together at the last minute, and none of the loose ends from the final series were tied up.

Sci-Fi

Never watched any of them.  I did try to watch one episode of Doctor Who.  It was awful and I never made it through to the end.

Documentaries

  • The World At War (I have this series on DVD):  probably the greatest WWII documentary ever — it’s hard to argue about Hitler’s behavior, for example, when you have Traudl Junge (his actual secretary) describing it.
  • Civilisation :  when I grow up, I want to be as educated as Sir Kenneth Clark.  I also have this series on DVD.

Missing from this Top 100 compilation (inexplicably, and shamefully):

  • Foyle’s War :  period drama with the brilliant Michael Kitchen (in Kim’s DVD collection)
  • The Young Ones :  anarchic comedy with Rik Mayall
  • The Goon Show (radio):  the groundbreaking show that defined anarchic comedy thereafter, all from the fevered imagination of Spike Milligan
  • Life On Mars :  detective show in the 70s, from the perspective of a 1990s transplant.  Maybe the good old days weren’t so good.
  • Waiting For God :  shenanigans at a retirement home with dark, biting comedy (in Kim’s DVD collection)
  • Absolutely Fabulous :  Jennifer Saunders’s hysterical over-the-top empty-headedness vs. Joanne Lumley’s feline degeneracy.
  • The Darling Buds Of May :  gentle bucolic comedy, with a fine cast (in Kim’s DVD collection).
  • The Avengers :  Patrick McNee’s bowler hat and Diana Rigg in skin-tight pants suits, ’nuff said.
  • The Persuaders :  Roger Moore and Tony Curtis;  who’d have thought they’d be a great pairing?
  • Doc Martin :  they left Martin Clunes’s show off the list?  Seriously?

All the above omissions should have been slotted in ahead of the American transplants;  not that the Yank shows are bad — they aren’t —  but they were essentially rebroadcasts.

If you haven’t seen any of the above shows, try to do so.  You won’t be sorry.

News Roundup

Bad News

Let’s get on with it:


...combining mythology, fantasy, superstition and bad grammar all in one headline. (And no, there’s no link… are you kidding?)

Speaking of superstition, here’s the latest from the Global Cooling Climate Warming Change© Dept.:


…


…okay:  I’m no fan of this foul broad but even I’m on her side here.  Considering that she was only blowing/shagging her hubby, I don’t see how this qualifies as “prostitution”. [#KillAllGovtLawyers]


...FFS, when she’s not incoherent, she’s moronic.


...and hundreds of DMV employees flock to volunteer for the jobs.


...soon to be followed by a massive increase in the murder rate as the scumbags no longer face the chop.  You heard it here first.


...keyword:  France.


...and to everyone’s amazement, her album shoots to #2 in the charts the week afterward.

From Captain Obvious, Inc:


...in another report, actual sex is apparently more enjoyable than phone sex.


...and the media are still bemused by the fact that most Americans hate, fear and distrust the Fibbies.

And in some truly magnificent INSIGNIFICA:

 

Finally, some Good News.


...the only way this show could get any better would be if Lisa Hogan (51) were to be filmed in the nude in each episode:

 

I mean, she is Irish, but that doesn’t seem to be a problem for Clarkson.

…But True

Funny Stuff, Veggies & Vegans, Wokism

Note the censorious tone in this one:

A BIZARRE joke which aired on Australia’s Today show has left viewers in fits of laughter.  Hosts Karl Stefanovic and Sarah Abo were left flabbergasted when a young boy told an unscripted joke about vegans jumping from cliffs.

The clip is causing a stir in the US as some Tiktokers remarked it would have never been broadcast on straight-laced American telly. 

And this eeeevil joke?

“A vegan and a vegetarian are jumping off a cliff to see who will hit the bottom first. Who wins?”
“I don’t know, who wins?”
“Society!”

I sniggered.

Flaunting It

Beauty, Clothing, Manners

It’s a well-known fact that I am somewhat conservative in my outlook [chorus of “No, Kim… not you!], but not really when it comes to women’s clothing.  Having come of age during the late 1960s and 1970s, I kinda like it when women show off their bodies (allowing for the Lizzo Exception, of course).

However, this one made me stop in my tracks:

Granted, she’s another one of those Brit Celeb/Actresses/Houris [some overlap]  but at least she’s apparently married to the father, so there’s that.  But I still feel a little… uncomfortable? looking at that display.

Now I’m not one of those “cover up everything because pregnancy is somehow shameful” people — sheesh, that went out with the Victorians — and I recall seeing some awfully-sexy pregnant women in Chile who were not at all shy about wearing tight little mini-dresses and high heels as they strutted their stuff around downtown Santiago.  I love the whole thing about pregnant women, too;  I think it’s glorious.

Still, I can’t help feeling that the above is a little too ostentatious or even vulgar.  Can we not say that women need to be a little more ladylike about the whole thing?

I know, I know:

“Kim, women show off their tummies in bikinis and midriff tops all the time — and you’re a serial offender when it comes to posting those pics, you dirty old bastard.  So why should it be any different when they’re pregnant?”

Because it IS different.

I welcome comments on the topic.