My girlfriend and I watched The Office for the first time literally minutes before the new Office. We both thought that the NBC version was funny in parts, but not as good as the British one. The one major thing that I noticed that might have made a difference (besides not liking the new "Gareth") was that the BBC version was 30 minutes long without commercials. It seemed like there was more time for uncomfortable glances, nervous laughter, pregnant pauses and other stuff like that which really escalated the humor. We watched it last night and thought that it seemed rushed, which isn't the show's fault necessarily, just a constraint of our commercial television. I think it could be good - we'll be watching it next week. I just hope the next episdoes are original rather than just copying word for word - If it just tries to replicate the British version, there's no way it'll be as good. (and as much as I love Steve Carrell, if he just tries to imitate Ricky Gervais's character I don't think it'll work - I mean, Carrell was OK, but Gervais created that character, I don't think anybody could do it better)
because the sadistic robots at the networks wouldn't get to dumb it down to the appropriate mediocrity that the masochistic american television audience wants.
Well that's true, if they did a good job, I'd take it over According to Jim. Thank god there are enough good shows on cable that I'm seldom forced to pick between mediocre crap on the networks.
I just read that NBC is gonna try for more single camera no audience comedies. Jason Lee is gonna have a show where he plays a former small time crook who wins the lottery and tries to make up for the wrongs he committed. Morris Chestnutt has a show called Dante coming out where he plays an out of touch football star with a huge sense of entitlement. It's co-created by the guy who came up with Leon for the Budweiser ads. Am I the only person who likes According to Jim and George Lopez?
According to an article on CNN (?), Carrell has never seen the British version of The Office for exactly this reason. He's playing the character as he sees him and didn't want to become biased by watching the original.
So we get....All in the Family, Sanford and Son (this was British???) and Three's Company....and they get....Who's the Boss??? I like that trade!
That's good news. I hope this is a trend that all the networks follow. The best comedies on television are single camera shows (Arrested Development, Scrubs, Curb Your Enthusiasm).
Why is that hard to believe? The original show was called Steptoe and Son: http://www.tvtome.com/tvtome/servlet/ShowMainServlet/showid-4467/
You can't have an odd number denominator when talking about your racial heritage, right? If he had said 1/16, that would have been fine, right?
Not as it relates to how much of someone's blood you have in you. You are generally 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, etc....
Definitely liking the show thus far... but of course, I still think Arrested Development is light-years ahead of any other tv show out there right now. On sunday's episode, they bashed fox 3 times (all with very subtle jokes), and fox is the network that carries the show (it was payback for how fox has been idiots in handling the show, and caring about nothing but ratings). But, back to the topic at hand... I highly reccomend this show (and all future sitcoms to adopt the AD and Office model of witty, reality-based humor). And, most importantly, please kill the laugh track (for all future sitcoms from now on). Honestly, america, do we still need to be told when a joke is funny by the reassurance of others who already laughed at it? I understand if its SNL or an awards show, where the show is live, but in this age of internet this, and reality that, why are we still succumbing to the illusion of the "studio audience."
