IT Crowd Series 4

[Jonsmad]

Friday June 25th

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTQeDh70qVY

[Jonsmad]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/may/26/it-crowd-fifth-series

[ChrisM]

“I came here to drink milk and kick ass* and I’ve finished my milk.”

Heh. Is it sad or cool that I get that reference?

*Or was it the other way around?

[pfm]

At this stage it does feel like it could run and run, that tons of potential is still there ready to be mined, so it’s brilliant news that it’s already got a fifth series. Bringing in different writers should keep things fresh and hopefully increase the episode count. 6 episodes is never enough for 22 minute shows. That’s why I’m hoping the new Dwarf is in a 40 minute slot on Dave for around 30 min running time.

It’s interesting how Moss-centric the new series appears to be (yeah I know this is only going off 30 second clips…). I seem to remember Graham saying on the last series commentary (I think) that he realised he’d slipped up in not writing enough for Moss to do. Personally I didn’t mind because, as brilliant as Richard is as Moss, it would be so easy to mess up the character by trying to create too many forced ‘classic’ Moss moments. I think the show really does work with Moss as more of the side character, unless it’s like the theatre episode where Roy, Jen and Moss all have their seperate threads.

[Ridley]

So has anyone watched episode one yet?

I’m waiting on the broadcast but how is IT?

[Pete Part Three]

Yes, I liked it. If anything it hit home about how good the cast is. It’s not a fantastic opener, but it’s enough to remind you how different this is to every other sitcom on TV.

Chris O’Dowd really is a fantastic actor and plays the dramatic stuff in this episode so well.

[hummingbird]

I agree: very good, but not one of the best.

[Tanya Jones]

I attended the recordings and can say that there’s quite a few interesting ideas in this series!

[Andrew]

> I attended the recordings and can say that there’s quite a few interesting ideas in this series!

I script edited this series and I can entirely agree.

[pfm]

Loads of stuff in episode 1 that was almost there but just didn’t make it for me (e.g. the other businessmen acting like Douglas was IMO a bad idea). Graham being a bit lazy as well, I reckon. Roy crying was funny before, let’s do it again. Moss falling over was funny before, let’s do it again… OK that’s a negative way of looking at things but, hey.

I DID love everything to do with D&D and the ‘it’s not for you, Jen…’ repeated gag, so Seinfeld that. ‘Goodbye…’ was a funny moment, though the applause from the audience grated on me a bit. Does a callback to something from 5 minutes ago really deserve a round of applause? Is that how terrible 90% of writing and performing for shows has become, that a decently-delivered callback gag sends the crowd wild?? Whatever, it’s great to hear so much enthusiasm from the audience.

[Ben Paddon]

Wow, performingmonkey. That’s a new level of bipolar criticism from you. “THE AUDIENCE REACTION GRATES! I FOUND IT ANNOYING! GREAT TO HEAR SO MUCH ENTHUSIASM FROM THEM!”

What?

[Plastic Percy]

Really enjoyed the episode, favourite line has got to be Moss’s “it’s like somebody split up with Stalin”.

[pfm]

> What?

I meant it’s great to hear the fans having a good time and actually liking the show. The atmosphere is great, even if applauding that moment is cheesy. It reminds me of any applause from VIII…

[genericnerdyusername]

Just watched it on the telly tonight and absolutely loved it. Pretty much agree with everyone who says it’s not the best but is still bloody marvelous.

[hummingbird]

Don’t you think that playing D&D is a little OOC for Moss? …. I mean, it involves a degree of social interaction with a group of people, and social interaction is hardly Moss’s forte. D&D seems much more Roy’s kind of game.

Of course, I’m talking bollocks as it doesn’t matter in the slightest. Still a great ep

[Plastic Percy]

I don’t think it’s out of character, Dungeons and Dragons is hardly the epitome of social networking. A group of shy nerds, sitting in a dark room pretending to be over people.

[ChrisM]

I saw it yesterday. I considered watching it on-line but I prefer to see it on the box if I can.

Great episode! As for the other business men being like Douglas, I was a bit in two minds over that. At first I wasn’t sure it was a good idea but I think it worked in the end. They’re cheesy and stink of caricature but this writer has a history of taking such characters and running with them… and it works. For me anyway.

And the scene between Roy and Moss in ‘Elf Queen’ mode. It kind of made me want to wince and laugh at the same time, which isn’t a bad mix of emotions. Not wincing because I thought it bad, just… it was kind of embarrassing. But worked partly ]because of that. I know that probably comes across contradictory, or I’ve explained it poorly…. but it worked. Especially Moss getting really into character with the Doe eyes. (Capital ‘D’ intentional, if technically incorrect.)

[pfm]

I think the funniest moment of the episode is Roy’s ‘thanks to a certain Elfen queen…’ or more specifically Moss’s reaction to it. Classic!

Liked it loads more watching it on broadcast. I was probably in too miserable a stupid mood to enjoy it enough first time, I don’t know… Love the applause as well tbh. Hey maybe I really am bipolar…

[Ridley]

I wonder why Jen not knowing her job gets no reaction whatsoever. Same thing happened in Red Dwarf with a gag that completely escapes me at the moment.

The atmosphere is great, even if applauding that moment is cheesy. It reminds me of any applause from VIII…

Better than that damn whooping every Seinfeld episode when Kramer first turns up.

[Ben Paddon]

wonder why Jen not knowing her job gets no reaction whatsoever. Same thing happened in Red Dwarf with a gag that completely escapes me at the moment.

“It’s well naughty. Trouble is you’ve got to eat it before the bread dissolves.”

I’d like to know the same thing, too. It got a little chuckle out of me but the audience do nothing. Katherine Parkinson didn’t leave much of a gap between that joke and the next sentence either, which leaves me to wonder if they’d expected a laugh in earlier takes, didn’t get one, and so they just told her not to leave a pause.

I’m just speculating, obviously.

[genericnerdyusername]

I just read a few comments on this series by the people over at cookd and bombd.

What a bunch of miserable fucking tossers nearly, if not all of them are.

[Plastic Percy]

Am I the only one who thinks Moss looks like Phil Lynott after a shave and wearing a pair of glasses?

[genericnerdyusername]

That joke at the end about windows… made everyone here groan, but in a fantastic way.

I enjoyed tonight’s episode alot, and not just for Douglas’ outfit.

[pfm]

> That joke at the end about windows

You just know that Graham will apologise for it on the commentary. He’ll be like ‘so sorry for this last joke, I know Roy should probably say PC not Windows but…I don’t care!’

[Pete Part Three]

Bit underwhelmed by that one. The bits in the club were good, but the Fight Club-style Street Countdown reminded me a little too much of Spaced’s Robot Wars pisstake.

The Jen storyline was a bit of a non-event with Matt Berry underused. I think I’d prefer it if they kept it to two main plotlines at the most.

[Ridley]

BenedictWongBenedictWongBenedictWongBenedictWongBenedictWong

Hope Prime resurfaces again one day but Negative One was just annoying, personally.

[James]

Wasn’t that Andrew out of focus in the background in the Street Countdown scene? The one without glasses, where everyone else did? I still like the style of the watching audience can guess the joke before it’s coming, you know it’s coming and when it does you feel more interactive with the show. It doesn’t make it any less enjoyable. Moss seemed more relaxed in his own geeky environment, but I’m not sure he would have undertaken the one on negative one challenge!

[Jonsmad]

Yeah it is a bit late to be doing Fight Club Parody now in 2010 but at least the variation of the joke was different to all the other ones ive seen, and it does fit well with countdown, and a nice homage to Richard Whitley.

Best of all I enjoyed the homage to The Young Ones Bambi in the opening set up of Moss not Neil getting onto a TV quiz.

[hummingbird]

> Wasn’t that Andrew out of focus in the background in the Street Countdown scene?

Yeah. Doesn’t he know how distracting that can be? ;-)

[ChrisM]

I actually fell asleep during this latest episode. Not due to boredom. Due to lack of sleep.

What I saw seemed pretty good though. Loved (what I saw of) the silliness of Street Countdown complete with a bunch of people doing the sound transitions themselves. Heh.
(And yeah, I wasn’t keen on the Fight Club joke either, although I probably would have liked it better if I hadn’t seen Spaced’s version.)

I’ll catch it again later now I’ve had my weekend lie in.

(Edit- I realise that looks like I’ve just got up. Not true. Honest.)

[genericnerdyusername]

My favourite line was the response to Moss asking what are the rules of street countdown; “The same as normal countdown but on the street.@

[Andrew]

> Yeah. Doesn’t he know how distracting that can be? ;-)

Steady ladies.

> The one without glasses, where everyone else did?

Had my glasses on the entire time. I guess they’re harder to see when out of focus, since they’re rimless…

[pfm]

> Best of all I enjoyed the homage to The Young Ones Bambi in the opening set up of Moss not Neil getting onto a TV quiz.

Yeah, smiled at that. I still reckon ‘Bambi’ is one of the greatest episodes of television ever made. ‘Cash’ too. Utter class.

[Danny Stephenson]

For me it’s ‘Sick’ and ‘Summer Holiday’ For the simple reason that they were my first episodes I saw as a child, and just hold sentimental value. I did see the scene on IT Crowd and thought it was a parallel, he should have tripped over a bin to verify it. Maybe Graham will mention it on the commentaries…

I liked the episode, I do think the Jen/Douglas thing did seem like filler, but the banter between her and Roy not caring about the other’s problem was funny.

Street Countdown is a brilliant idea, though. I’d do that!

[pfm]

Did anyone else think of the Ted ep ‘Song For Europe’ with the window cleaner who you can’t understand? Yeah it’s not really the same gag but it’s close…

Btw does anyone know if there were any real Countdown winners in it? And also, we mustn’t let the little factoid of the hottest woman on television appearing in this episode slip through the net! She will bear my children one day while others weep…

[Nick R]

The bits in the club were good, but the Fight Club-style Street Countdown reminded me a little too much of Spaced’s Robot Wars pisstake.

The idea of a spelling competition being taken outside reminded me of the ending of the spelling bee episode of Frasier:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7yucudEjrqE

I didn’t think it was as good as that Frasier episode, or as good as the first episode of this series. It had its moments though, such as the reveal of what was really going on in those meetings (but did the camera really need to linger that long on Douglas’ lycra-clad body?)

[genericnerdyusername]

Yes. Yes it did. I assume so, anyway; why else would it?

[pfm]

Graham has tweeted about the latest (dire) episode. Apparently he abandoned a lot of the story at the studio stage because they felt it didn’t work (Roy was gonna go mad on pain killers for his back after the ass-kissing incident, also Moss became the band’s manager). They shot the location stuff for those scenes but then scrapped it. You can so tell it was dragged out with little material.

Definitely the worst episode of all 4 series’. A shame really…

[genericnerdyusername]

Hmmmm. I enjoyed it, though I do have to agree.

[Nick R]

I loved the subplot about Moss and Douglas’ rivalry to acquire a robot hand. And Moss’ insistence that no-one except Jen could possibly find being kissed on the bottom funny (and then being proved right). And “Jen’s going out with a geek!” And the technical term “cleftal horizon”. And the keyboardist’s static poses in the romantic spinning-round-in-the-playground shots. And the quoting of “Did you see that ludicrous display last night?”

And even though Scientology parodies have been a dime a dozen online since South Park’s Trapped in the Closet/Return of Chef and the Project Chanology protests, Douglas’ infomercial the start of this episode was a pretty fun one. (It was only after the episode aired that I was told that it was more of a spoof of “cosmic ordering” than Scientology – something that, luckily, I’d never heard of before.)

So for me individual gags like those made up for any problems with the plot. Not the best episode, but far from performingmonkey’s description of it as “dire”!

[Ridley]

I do wonder if seeing Douglas’ robot hand in action is a Brittas Empire alien plant moment.

Though the declaration he was actually getting one was great.

That gig Moss couldn’t find was at the same place as Gay! right?

[ChrisM]

>That gig Moss couldn’t find was at the same place as Gay! right?

It certainly looked the same to me.

[Pete Part Three]

TBH, that episode was so mediocre I can’t remember much about it, 24 hours after watching it.

[Ben Paddon]

Aye. There were some good ingredients in there, but t’weren’t no cake.

[MANI506]

I thought the robot hand was going to be revealed during the hand clap in court. I laughed a lot (as I have the last two) and I still have a lot of goodwill for the show. Nothing to rival last series ‘Are We Not Men’ so far. Nice to have it referenced here!

[Muzzy]

The series so far certainly isn’t as strong as previous material but to class it as ‘dire’ is unbelievably harsh.

[pfm]

I loved the Countdown episode but I was watching this one and hardly laughing at all. Maybe two or three laughs, Moss getting the popcorn out, starting the slow handclap (and even that wasn’t played as funny as it should have been) and then the only real good bit of the ep which was Douglas with his hand at the end. I absolutely love stuff getting smashed in sitcoms. Complete with big smash sound effects too!

I know I’m a miserable fucker but watching it I just couldn’t help feeling this is a bad episode of television. Is all. How I can think that when the main stories in it were pretty much just plays on Seinfeld ideas (one of my favourite shows ever) I don’t know. Maybe because Elaine…I mean Jen and the ‘geeky’ boyfriend was really really unfunny and out of character for her, reminding me too much of the worse episodes of Seinfeld when they gave Jen…er, Elaine ‘wacky’ boyfriends that she would never look twice at just to get one gag out of it. I’m babbling…I promise it will stop lol I just hate it when I don’t like an ep.

[genericnerdyusername]

I know I may be contradicting what I said before, but I didn’t hate this episode at all. If it had been the first or last episode I would’ve probably hated it, but in the middle of a series it passed by me quite fine. I found plenty of bits to laugh at, especially Roy’s storyline (his face when the guy kisses him on the bum in particular).

[genericnerdyusername]

Wow the pace of that episode was SO fast!

[Kris Carter]

Best ep of the series so far!

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