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Comment by workmandan | Hacker News Reader

Stephen Fry made the same remarks in a Q&A session some years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8k2AbqTBxao

As a Brit I can't agree more with both, I find American humour so hard to relate to but I guess it's just a culture thing

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His point of high church vs. Protestantism is a good one. We in the US practice a kind of competitive Protestantism designed--at least partly, if not mostly--to make the adherents feel good about themselves. There is a distinct difference between submission and proselytizing.

There is also something to the state of empire as well. The British empire had been in steady decline for a very long time before Adams or Fry started making people laugh, whereas the American empire has been ascending quickly since WWII. This sort of gestalt is hard to ignore and will certainly influence things. For example, would a 'Blackadder' sell as well in 1890? This is around the same time 'King Solomon's Mines' was selling briskly, and Haggard's story is instantly recognizable by any modern Hollywood writer.

On some level Americans are British people time-displaced by a couple of generations.

"On some level Americans are British people time-displaced by a couple of generations."

At a certain level I don't think the UK ever recovered from WW1.

I think there is a lot of truth in that. It led to the death of patriotism (which is now considered embarrassing outside of sport), national purpose, institutions, empire, and coincided with the decline of heavy industry (which only happened much more recently in the US).

EDIT: Saying that, there is still a strong positive national identity. We're just too embarrassed to express it strongly (see patriotism), because of our fall from grace.

Going by the variety of flags i see people flying I'd say there is quite a lot of patriotism about - just not for the UK.

To be clear - I'm in Scotland and the flags I see are the Scottish flag and the EU flag (often combined). I know there has been a spate of flag flying for other reasons but I haven't actually seen that myself.

When I visit the UK, it strikes me, the number of British flags and symbols. Perhaps most so on supermarket products. We have none of that here.

I also think there is a breaking point, and we're seeing the resurgence of right wing parties in the UK and across Europe as a backlash to anti-patriotism and praise for everyone except those with a long history in their own nation.

"Anti-patriotism" doesn't really sum up the sense that many among Europe's owning and intellectual classes would prefer to "dissolve the people and elect another" via immigration. The example that shocked me, as an American, was when a story came out that certain schools in the UK had stopped teaching about World War II and the Holocaust because (second-generation, in many cases) immigrant parents objected to their kids being preached-at about the history of someone else's country. This was presented by, IIRC, the Guardian or the BBC, as a fairly reasonable objection.

To my American mind, for everything wrong with our country, come on, if you're an immigrant to the USA, it's your country. Taking on American history as your history is what it means to be part of the common civic project, and insisting that "the Allies beat Hitler and built the liberal international order and then we saw off Stalinism too" is somehow insulting to your family because those Allied soldiers weren't your blood ancestors sounds outright treasonous.

The history curriculum is (like nearly everything else) nationally set. The content of the leaving exams is also not set by the school (but by the national boards). It's possible that one school has decided to do something daft, but honestly not likely.

The story reads like ragebait, TBH. Brits are absolutely as keen on extolling WW2 heroism as anyone else.

"In England, by law children are to be taught about the Holocaust as part of the Key Stage 3 History curriculum; in fact, the Holocaust is the only historical event whose study is compulsory on the National Curriculum. This usually occurs in Year 9 (age 13-14)."

https://www.het.org.uk/about/holocaust-education-uk

So not Province of Northern Ireland, Scotland or Wales. Note that WW2 is not a statutory requirement in any of the key stages although it does feature in the examples (which are non-statutory). And a reminder that history is a required subject only to Key Stage 3, so many students won't take it after they are 14 and won't study for an exam.

Reporting on education in the UK does tend to be rage-baity and most situations are more complex when you look at them a bit closer.

(I have never taught history and never taught in the school sector)

>"dissolve the people and elect another" via immigration

This is happening almost everywhere in the West, just at different rates.

Americans lying about Europe is common disease. That being said, right wing people lying about everything is basically a pandemic now.

I would really like to see the source of that because as mentioned elsewhere in the replies the Holocaust is a compulsory part of the National Curriculum and has been at least since I was in high school in the 1990s.

To the extent that the Holocaust is part of British and American history it is that we knew very well what was going on in 1930s Germany and strictly limited the number of Jewish refugees because of domestic concerns over the level of immigration.

WWI "coincided with the decline of heavy industry" ? I can't think of any UK-based heavy industry that didn't dramatically expand between the end of WWI and say, 1958.

The UK dominated the world in coal production, shipbuilding, factory machinery and textile mills before WW1, and went into steady decline post-war.

E.g. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mikael-Hoeoek/publicati...

A large portion of the UK hasn't really accepted or internalized the fact that the British Empire is no longer a thing, and they're not the most powerful nation in the world, nor anywhere close to it.

(...And yes, that does sound like what it looks like is coming for the US, though it's not quite there yet.)

I do know the type of person you are talking about and I don't think it's the Empire as such (which is long gone) but the lingering on of the kind of exceptionalism that was used to justify the Empire. Wonderful sayings like:

"Remember that you are an Englishman, and have consequently won first prize in the lottery of life." Cecil Rhodes

Mind you - perhaps I'm just bitter because I'm a Scot ;-)

That's quite true. On a recent trip I got talking to a girl from somewhere in Europe. She spoke perfect English, of course. At some point she remarked, rather bluntly, "It must be strange for you guys because you used to rule the world." I made a joke but internally I was reeling: used to? I'm almost 40 and still hadn't realised this.

Later I was talking to another 20-something, British this time, who didn't know Dr Martens were British. I asked where he thought they were from, "I guess I assumed they were American". Sigh...

I visited London several years ago, and in the house we were staying was a relatively short book describing, for lack of a better term, "British exceptionalism", and it resonated with me as an American. I don't recall that much, but I do remember the idea, for example, that the European Union was seen to be a good thing in the eyes of the archetypal Brit "for the continent", and not for the British isles. Always exempting themselves from international cooperation/norms/laws, etc. I think America inherited a lot from the British (certainly not an original idea of mine).

Yes Minister explains it nicely:

"Minister, Britain has had the same foreign policy objective for at least the last 500 years: to create a disunited Europe. In that cause we have fought with the Dutch against the Spanish, with the Germans against the French, with the French and Italians against the Germans, and with the French against the Germans and Italians. Divide and rule, you see. Why should we change now, when it's worked so well?"

> the European Union was seen to be a good thing in the eyes of the archetypal Brit

It wasn't, hence Brexit. We were dragged in via a Customs Union against the will of the British electorate at every turn.

Read the rest of the sentence.

For a small island nation, Britain has had an outsized influence. Culturally, politically, technologically, etc. There are many reasons for it, some accidental (like geography) and some purposeful, but it remains that Britain has punched above its weight for a very long time.

America has followed a similar tack, and for many of the same reasons. High-minded ideas like "international cooperation" sound especially good to those nations who are not sitting at the top, but for those that are it does seem less than ideal. I.e., I'm sure that Montenegro is big on international cooperation, but China will justifiably ask "cui bono" (but in Chinese).

And yet... TFA

Totally agree, WW1 is really the root cause of all of Britains problems.

Victory wasn't worth the cost. It would've been better to give the entire empire to the Germans to maintain peace. It'd be lost anyway in a short amount of time. Even forcing King George and Kaiser Wilhelm to marry would've been better for them than German Republicanism and the British Royals becoming Kardashians with crowns.

and that's a very good thing. I only recognise our nation from 1945 onwards, establishment of the welfare state, the idea the government cares for its people. The idea that victims matter. While it wasn't just overnight and was many years in the making, there was this element of cruelty, a survival of the fittest, seen in the victim blaming of street urchins with rickets in the early 20th century.

In 1966 there was an industrial disaster where a school was submerged in coal waste and 116 children died. The coal company offered £50 per child as compensation. There was a national outcry that marks the change in attitude and the compensation was increased tenfold to £500 (quite a lot back then). Did we see this in Flint with the polluted water, or in Ohio when that train derailed with all the chemicals?

There's something about having absolutely everything in the world and then pissing it all away in an enormous own goal of world wars that is extremely humbling and I'd like to think that plays a key part in the British psyche and I think its for the better.

My grandparents were the war generation I knew, having lived through the blitz, and all they wanted was to sit in the garden and have a nice cup of tea. They didn't want to be the best or were looking externally for validation. Just a nice sit down and a chin wag and I think that's a positive way to be, as opposed to what I imagine was the driving force of the Imperial era in always wanting more and trying to prove how "great" our nation should be. We proved how great we are in two of the most destructive wars in the world's history where the entirity of Europe lost. We suck.

> pissing it all away in an enormous own goal of world wars

in what sense were WWI and WWII British "own goals" ?

Britain won, but it cost them pretty much everything. And while a lot of pride is connected to winning them, neither were wars Britain really had to fight.

WWI was caused by every European power thinking they could benefit from a war, leading to powder keg that blew up from a completely inconsequential event. For the British one of the motivations was getting Germany's African colonies that were in the way of building the Cape to Cairo Railway, which ended up never being completed anyways.

WWII at least had a clear villain. But it was a villain that made every indication that he didn't actually want to fight Britain. Maybe that was a ruse and Hitler would have attacked Britain after securing the continent, maybe it wasn't and a British and German empire could have coexisted. We will never know. What we do know is that fighting WWII required Britain to bleed its colonies dry, followed by losing most of them in the years after the war

I'm not going so far as saying Britain shouldn't have fought the world wars. At least WWII had justification beyond what can be seen on map. However without participation in those two wars Britain would have had a shot at continuing to be a wealthy empire

I don't mind the rationale for WW2 so much, I think the idea that Britain "didn't have to", doesn't scan. What the Third Reich was doing meant it would always be an existential threat that would ultimately result in conflict. So it was better for Britain to fight the Nazis than stay neutral.

I would however suggest that the two wars are basically the same war with just a big ceasefire in the middle, that's why I would treat them as the same mistake.

Britain mostly bankrolled WW1 and was broke by 1916. If you consider the British position prior to the war and after the wars, its an extroadinary failure. Especially considering how all the monarchs of Europe were directly related and had ample opportunities to prevent the wars. They were conflicts of hubris, over-confidence based on mostly fighting the developing world and never having to appreciate the horrors of modern artilery against their own ranks. If you look at the opening battles of the first world war the quantities of casualties are absolutely staggering. They were not prepared and under-estimated what it would take to fight these wars.

All that wealth and power wasted on turning Europe into a wasteland and sacrificing generations of young men.

In Japanese culture the failed hero is also revered, but in a solemn rather than comedic way.

Minamoto no Yoshitsune, Kusunoki Masashige, The Standing Death of Benkei, Saigo Takamori (the last samurai), the Kamikaze pilots, even Yukio Mishima...

What's interesting is that unlike the British fatalism, Japanese failed heroes are driven by duty and honor and tradition above all (even at the cost of themselves). To an outsider they are foolishly stubborn and unwilling to accept an imperfect or changing world. But in Japan that is something to be admired.

Many of those are not failed heroes. They are heroes who found success by dying honorably. "Death before dishonor" is something now known only to the criminal classes in the West, but was the norm for any feudal society (ie, Japan before being conquered by the US).

I find more modern American humour much easier to relate to, probably because it has veered more in this direction. A show like Always Sunny seems incredibly British-compatible because it's about terrible people getting their comeuppance, yet still being sympathetic despite their failings.

To go full British, you need characters like David Brent, who aren't sympathetic. They have no redeeming heartfelt goodbye. No-one is sad when they're gone, life moves on.

I would also say that the Always Sunny gang really aren't sympathetic either, but it's a para-social trick of having spent so much time "together" with them over so many episodes.

I suspect a new viewer coming to watch the latest series of IASIP would not see them as sympathetic. That's quite different to The Office (US), where a new viewer skipping to later seasons would not have the same opinions as a new viewer watching season 1, where Scott was much closer to a Brent type character, before he was redeemed and made more pitiable than awful over the seasons.

I'm not sure it's generally true that funny English characters aren't sympathetic.

You're right, there are plenty of sympathetic ones too, but it's the unsympathetic ones that really don't do so well to a US audience. There's a reason that The Office (US) hard pivoted Michael Scott after season 1.

Mr. Bean (Rowan Atkinson) is both hilarious and sympathetic so there's that.

A more recent show to compare would be the UK vs the USA version of Ghosts. I like both shows but it is interesting how in the USA version all the main Ghosts are basically good people while the UK Ghosts have more serious flaws. And in the UK version, money is a constant problem while in the USA version it isn't nearly as big of a problem.

> I would also say that the Always Sunny gang really aren't sympathetic either, but it's a para-social trick of having spent so much time "together" with them over so many episodes.

I'd say they're charismatic and funny, but irredeemably bad people. It was refreshing that the show didn't shy away from that; in lots of comedies, the characters are basically psychopathic if taken literally, yet we're still supposed to like them and to see them as having hearts of gold if they make the occasional nice gesture. Always Sunny just leaned hard into portraying them as terrible people who were only 'likable' in the shallow sense needed to make the show fun to watch rather than an ordeal.

But I think the creators eventually lost sight of that -- I remember the big serious episode they did with Mac's dance, and I just find it baffling because in order to buy into the emotion we were evidently supposed to feel, we needed to take the characters seriously. And as soon as we take the characters seriously we are (or should be) overwhelmingly aware that we're watching people who have proven over the previous umpteen years to be irredeemable sociopaths, which kind of takes the edge off the heartwarming pride story.

I only watched the first few seasons of IASIP, but I don’t remember them being sympathetic characters at all. The whole concept, and what made it funny, I thought, is that they really are all terrible people who just drag each other down.

It would be disturbing to find out people sympathize with the IASIP characters.

They were more human and relatable in the very early seasons. It was just a bunch of people dicking around trying to run a bar (for the most part).

As time went on, they become more and more awful.

I'd say it has a pretty decent parallel with Breaking Bad. In season 1 almost anyone can relate to and cheers for Walter. By the last season, you hate him and are happy he dies.

I don’t believe most Americans would hate Walter, even at the very end. Americans hate Skylar.

No way. Everyone hates Walter at the end. If he had plausibly maintained the "I was doing it for my family" pose, then maybe, yeah. But the whole point of the last season was putting that idea to bed, demonstrating that it was always destructive selfishness.

Yes rationally he should be hated, it just doesn’t appear he is from a lot of discussions and forums online.

It's just not gonna generate a lot of discussion to say "the intended interpretation of the character is correct". The reason Skylar gets a lot of discussion is that there's a lot of disagreement on the interpretation of that character.

It’s less silence and more open, carefully qualified adulation.

On that topic, I think the perspective you're replying to is cope. It would have been better for everyone (else) involved if he took the money from his smarmy friend, took the abuse from his dick boss at his second job, took the abuse from his asshole rich student, took the subtle jabs from his family. Generally, if he swallowed his pride.

Of course, the whole reason the show had a plot is that he was too proud, too toxically masculine, to go that route. And I think the show's implicit thesis is that self-immolating as Walter did was preferable to enduring the indignity of his life. Certainly, it was more fun for the audience.

This is contrary to you and GP, making the (what I observe to be) common assertion that the show is a parable about the danger of toxic masculinity, and anyone who doesn't believe this is too stupid, sexist, or both to "get it" (parenthetically, where you differ I agree with you - people who think Walter is cool and Skylar annoying are legion). The reason I'm calling this "cope" is that reading the show as a morality play condemning toxic masculinity allows one to enjoy it without guilt. This is moral art! If only all that human filth on the internet were smart enough to realize it!

I just don't buy it, though. I think the show is about how being a monster is cooler than being responsible, in large part because all the people who depend on you to be responsible are so damn annoying.

It's not about masculinity at all, it's just "pride comes before the fall". That is not gendered. Both men and women are entirely capable of being destructively prideful. The reason Walter is a villain is that his prideful destruction isn't merely a self-destruction. He also tears apart a bunch of other lives, including those of his wife and children. Again, I'm sorry, but gender isn't the issue with this, if it were a woman who carved a path of destruction through her family and community, she would also be a villain. (And of course these stories exist too.)

The binary options you've proposed to somewhat vindicate Walter's choices were not the only options available to him. The whole point is that he's so brilliant that he can take over a whole regional drug trade in like a year. Well I'm sorry, but if he could do that, he could also have put his brilliance toward some other wildly successful business venture that would not have required blowing people up and putting his family in danger from like three different gangs of violent criminals. There were other options besides eating shit from his rich friend and boss.

He did what he did because he liked it, and he's responsible for the damage that did to the people around him.

Hmm. Well.

I'll admit I gendered it because that's the discourse I always see.

But anyway - you're speaking to whether Walter's actions were moral. I'm more interested in what is the show's attitude towards his actions. Is the show condemning, or glorifying. I think it's closer to the latter, regardless of how poorly things went for Walter in the end.

> The whole point is that he's so brilliant that he can take over a whole regional drug trade in like a year. Well I'm sorry, but if he could do that, he could also have put his brilliance toward some other wildly successful business venture that would not have required blowing people up and putting his family in danger from like three different gangs of violent criminals.

Sure. But, again, I think this is just another implicit thesis of the show. It's easier and more fun to be an amoral asshole without regard for any of your obligations to anyone else.

Right, the show's position is that he took the "easier and more fun" way, because of his selfish pride, and ended up hurting everyone he cared about, which is why he's the villain. It's very clear about this!

I'm pretty sure this is one of those noisy minority things. But who knows, I'm not gonna do a scientific survey to figure it out :)

> Everyone hates Walter at the end.

Hate? Nah. He's tragic.

Does he do evil, despicable things? Absolutely. Are most of those things done because of jealousy, rage, or a failure to bother to understand the context in which he's operating? Definitely. But, like, unless you've never been jealous, blindingly angry, foolish, or far too hasty, you can see where (assuming turning yourself in to the cops isn't an option [0]) you might end up making similar choices. [1]

Is he prideful, wrathful, did he do many evil things? Yes, yes, and yes. It's not unreasonable to call his (in)actions -on balance- monstrous. But he's also relatable/understandable in a -er- "Greek tragedy" sort of way. He's a blunderer and a wrecker who probably deserved far worse than he got, but I find it dreadfully difficult to hate him when I consider the entire story.

[0] Which it pretty much immediately absolutely was not. Even at the start, all the money he made would have been forfeit and (because the USian "Drug War" is batshit crazy) prosecutors probably would have found a way to take the house and cars, leaving his family way worse off than if he'd done nothing at all.

[1] Having said that, there are so many points of decision that the odds that you'd walk his path exactly are approximately zero.

Hate at the end, yes. Tragic, also yes. There's no contradiction here!

They were committing various felonies in the first season, if I recall. It couldn’t have been more clear that these characters are bad people who will do almost anything to get what they want. The humor lies in the arbitrary and inconsistent boundaries they set for themselves and each other.

Contrast with the initial good intentions of Walt in Breaking Bad. The IASIP characters never had good intentions.

Walt never really had a good intentions. That is what first season done - he had an out and legal access to money. But he was likable and all of the consequences were not yet known.

Yeah, the conceit of Seinfeld was that the characters were crappy, but you liked them because they were funny. But they didn't actually lean into that as hard as, say, the finale would suggest. All of the characters have something sympathetic that you can like about them, even if you can buy the thesis that they are unsympathetic broadly.

The genius of IASIP is to just lean all the way into this trope. The characters are never sympathetic and never redeem themselves. It's almost an experiment in whether you can make people feel sympathetic toward awful (but entertaining) characters just through long familiarity with them. (Yes.)

Yeah this does seem right. Maybe as our own empire has been collapsing, our culture has been edging toward the brits'.

No, nationalism and patriotism started to be embarrassing to the educated classes in the US after the USSR collapsed. We had "won", and slavish obedience and loyalty are really not consistent with the values of liberalism and democracy, and empire is quite uncomfortable if you believe in human rights and self-determination, etc. Our society has been changing because it's running into the contradictions of a culture designed to foster the unity necessary to win wars and dominate the world and an idealism that says all humanity is equal and freedom and self-determination are inherently good.

I don't think "patriotism" and "slavish obedience and loyalty" are the same thing.

Can you articulate a meaningful distinction?

Another great example of this is British SF, especially 20th century Doctor Who and Blake's 7, vs American SF such as Star Wars/Trek. The British version can be much bleaker. And of course Red Dwarf, which doesn't translate at all into American. (There was a single pilot episode)

Edit: someone downthread mentioned Limmy's Show and Absolutely, to which I would add Burnistoun. Scottish humor is even more grimly fatalist than English.

Does the Office have heroes? It turned out to translate very well into American.

That Red Dwarf pilot was actually fine except for the bizarre choice of making Lister a hunk. Rimmer was fine, Holly was great.

I think there is a divide, but it isn't the Atlantic ocean.

Robert California and Dwight were the clear heroes of the American version of the office.

As I just commented above, I do think The Office fundamentally maintained this foundation of comedic failure, but I also think it wouldn't have worked as well for American audiences (and indeed, wasn't working as well in the first season because of this) if not for the much larger emphasis on the likable-character love story with Jim and Pam. Maybe the upshot is that you can have a British edge in American comedy, as long as you sand it down a bit with some other element.

I see a similar kind of dynamic in Parks and Recreation, which is maybe a more culturally native take on the same kind of show, where Leslie is also ultimately a comedic failure, but with the edge sanded down by a certain amount of (mostly fruitless) competence and especially a seemingly inexhaustible well of enthusiasm and optimism that can't help but infect most of the people around her.

man it has nothing to do with American watchers.

the UK Office had fourteen (14) episodes. The US one had 201 episodes.

if you don't lean on things like inter-office romance there is nothing to put on screen.

the jim-pam thing was a direct riff on the tim-lucy interactions in the UK version, they just didn't, you know, have 100+ more episodes to build on it.

hell, you can even see when that ran out of steam in later seasons of the US version and they just start jamming celebrity guest stars in there

Fair!

But I also think it's correct that the US version is much softer-edged and that it would not have been so wildly popular were that not so.

I mean, there are harder edged comedies in the US, but they certainly aren't as popular. Would they be more so in England? I dunno, maybe. I suppose the US version of The Office was probably more popular across the pond than the homespun version as well?

I have only seen very little of both, but I did get the distinct feeling that the US office was just plain better executed in many ways. I do remember that reading online forums, fans of UK Office scoffed at the US version at first, but that turned around.

True, after the first season. But I kind of question whether there is really a difference between "better executed" and the cultural difference we're discussing here. It's rare to have a show change tone from one season to the next, so it gives us a pretty unique way to look at what changed. I'm not sure what the "execution" issues were in the first season, except that it seemed (to me, as an American) more cold and self deprecating, where later it was warmer and more lovable. It had the same actors and sets and everything, but just different writing and changes to the personalities and storylines of the characters. But I think this might just be restating the differences between American and British humor that kicked this thread off?

Jim is the hero of the US version of the Office

He doesn't succeed so much at work but he does in his personal life

> That Red Dwarf pilot was actually fine except for the bizarre choice of making Lister a hunk

I doubt the character of Ace Rimmer [what a guy!] would have translated at all.

Star Wars is not scifi. Star Trek has nothing to do with SW.

> Scottish humor is even more grimly fatalist than English.

Typified by Rab C Nesbitt. "An alcoholic Glaswegian who seeks unemployment as a lifestyle choice".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rab_C._Nesbitt

Tbf, Star Trek TOS was also a sci fi show with an FX budget of two shoelaces and a pack of gum, and had to be carrier by great actors and writing, which it absolutely was. It's still my favourite Star Trek to this day.

I think the problem with how the US makes shows is that once something get successful, it gets a budget, which means the writing needs to appeal to a broader audience, which makes the whole thing blander.

I might be ignorant of US television pop culture, but I think, at least before the 90s, the UK produced much more memorable scifi shows (and even in the 90s, a lot of those US shows were secretly Canadian)

> The British version can be much bleaker.

I think this one is a miss. TOS is inspired by _british_ naval history. Loss, fear, and failure are central to the show. In this era of TV, leading characters still had large flaws. Kirk is frozen by choice, Spock believes himself superior, Bones is a bigoted luddite. We as viewers get to see the pain this causes and their efforts to improve. It's wholly different than modern US television including all other ST media. Meanwhile, 70s Dr. Who is packed with automatic weapons fire and explosions and the formula has always been the Doctor knows best. (I am a huge fan of all the mentioned shows.)

For a good, modern example we can look at Ghosts (suddenly renamed "Ghosts UK" on my streaming services) and Ghosts US. The adaptation is agonizing. They stripped the important aspects of the story but kept a boy scout, toy soldier, and an interracial marriage. I found that telling.

I'd argue that DS9 was pretty stand-outish as well.

Worf continues to grapple with honor and restoring his family name, but he's too stubborn and proud to "debase" himself to defeat his political opponents.

Sisko refuses to accept that his fate is preordained, leading to one disaster after another every time he tries to go his own way. His loyalties are also split because of his status as Emissary, straining his relationship with both sides - not to mention the cultural issues.

Odo's pride is his constant downfall, and despite arguing that he's an island unto himself, he's miserably lonely and constantly pining.

Kira can't get over the trauma of her past, and although she does mellow out as the series goes on, when she gets triggered she goes on a rampage.

Dax's past hosts leave her in constant conflict, and she's usually trying desperately to appear in control, even when it's obvious she is not. In Jadzia it's particularly bad due to her issues with Curzon and Joran.

Nog is desperate for adult approval, and is in constant search of ways to gain respect, sometimes to disastrous results.

Also mustn't forget Derry Girls. Uncle Colm is a classic.

“So I says to the taller fella, I says… although there weren’t more than an inch between ‘em…”

"Greetings"

The ending to Blake's 7 doesn't get any bleaker.

Red Dwarf was hilarious. Highly recommend the books, as they contain a lot of jokes that wouldn't translate to screen easily and would resonate with anyone who enjoys humour in the vein of Adams.

> And of course Red Dwarf, which doesn't translate at all into American.

The American version is Futurama (agreeing with your point and with the cultural differences discussed throughout this thread.)

The American version of Shameless is in some ways bleaker than the original British version though.

As an older American, I’ve always found British humor of the Monty Python type hilarious.

Unfortunately, I haven’t found a lot of newer material of this type. I may have to look harder.

As a fellow older American who loves Monty Python, the more modern British shows I've enjoyed the most were Green Wing, League of Gentlemen, Peep Show, and Doc Martin. Of those, League of Gentlemen and Green Wing have the most Python-like absurdity, while Doc Martin has the most subtle humor. Peep Show is hilarious, but the most crass humor of those listed, although League of Gentlemen doesn't shy away from crassness either.

What do you mean by "this type"?

The sketch show format has been pretty much entirely killed off by TikTok & Instagram.

It's very hard to do a sketch that hasn't already been done on TikTok with a tiny fraction of the budget.

Absurdist humour still exists everywhere, it's less popular than either Python in the 70's / 80's, or the flash era in the 2000s, but it's still everywhere, but I'd also wager it is not to your taste.

At the risk of offending just about everyone, I would suggest that something like "Skibidi Toilet" is just this generation's badger-badger-mushroom, which in turn was that generations' "Bring me a shrubbery!".

Sketch shows in particular don't work well for TV in this era. Mitchell and Webb tried hard to return with one this year and it just fell flat, the jokes feel telegraphed from a mile-away, taking a minute to get to a punchline in a era when the same jokes are told in a 10 second short.

The downside of the tiktok/insta model, is that the more successful people on Insta end up just re-telling their one good joke over and over. ( Or indeed, re-recording someone else's one good joke. ).

Not that sketch shows didn't also repeat jokes sometimes, but they could at least play around with a punchline in unexpected ways, or have callbacks and nods to earlier sketches in a series. That kind of non-continuity doesn't work when you don't know which tiktoks will go viral, or which order your audience will see them in, as the algorithm dictates all.

If you are saying sketch shows like "Thank God You're Here" "Fast & Loose" and "Who's Line is it Anyway" are being killed off by short/low budget replacements on TikTok, we must be living in different worlds.

I haven't seen anything like them on TikTok and I'm on there enough to have noticed. Maybe you're talking about the dumb alien short videos of them telling a joke to each other and snickering, that doesn't compare.

"TikTok doesn't live up to the best of TV" is true, but that's not the argument I'm making.

OP asked for "newer", and yet you've not named anything created in the last 10 years. ( And named a 30+ year old improv show, which is definitely not the format I'm talking about. )

You're not alone, one second-cousin comment even went with the phrase "more modern", then named a range of shows that are at least over 20 years old. Green Wing was the 90's, that's closer to the time of Python's Life of Brian than today.

Clearly things aren't fine if there isn't fresh blood coming through.

Sketch shows never were the best of TV, they are a format where you throw a lot out there and then the very best bits of each episode might be particularly funny, with a bunch of filler in-between.

That can't compete with a medium where people just swipe the second they're not finding a particular piece funny or to their taste.

I agree the shows I named have aged, but I think my point stands. There really isn't anything _like_ those shows on TikTok that I am aware of, and maybe you've made a bigger point that there isn't anything like these shows at all anymore. (To be fair I don't watch much traditional TV anymore -- maybe that was your point all along and I just missed it)

>"Thank God You're Here" "Fast & Loose"

I've never heard of these shows, where are they out of?

>we must be living in different worlds.

While I'm not on social media like that, I do think so.

Australia and the UK respectively. Many of the best bits are available on YouTube.

I think there's something to this. But I'd also say the reason it feels so dead is because consumed media has shattered into a million pieces. With the death of broadcast TV and somewhat the death of movies, it's actually getting increasingly harder to find shows with common consumption.

The reason "Bring me a shrubbery" is funny and why people endlessly quoted Holy Grail is because almost everyone in the US watched Monte python at one point or another. Part of what made people do those quotes is the fact that regardless audience, you know you'll get a laugh because they too know the context for the phrase.

I don't think there's a single piece of media like that. Not at least in the last 10 years. I mean, funnily, I think you've nailed Skibidi as a rare exception, at least for the younger generations.

> I would suggest that something like "Skibidi Toilet" is just this generation's badger-badger-mushroom

Beyond the first minute or two, I'd not class Skibidi Toilet as any kind of humor. It's a serialized silent (late-era-style silent with synced foley but no dialog) sci-fi action war epic told without intertitles.

As in surreal British sketch comedy? You'd like

- The Goon Show (it's this 1950s radio serial that inspired the Pythons... it's surprising how many tropes the Pythons borrowed from it)

- The Goodies

- The Kenny Everett Television Show

- Absolutely!

- The Mighty Boosh / Unnatural Acts / Noel Fielding's Luxury Comedy

- Vic Reeves' Big Night Out / The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer / Bang Bang, It's Reeves and Mortimer

- Big Train

- The League of Gentlemen

- On the Hour / The Day Today / Brass Eye

- Jam / Blue Jam

- The Armando Iannucci Shows

- Limmy's Show

Also, to throw in a US programme, I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson was pretty good

> The Goon Show

I had the opportunity to meet and talk to Harry Secombe just a couple years before he died. He was quite surprised to run into an American who knew who he was. Most American's only know Peter Sellers.

- A Bit of Fry and Laurie

with Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry

I feel like Jam/Blue Jam was about the zenith of British surreal and nihilistic comedy.

Can we fit in 'Not the nine O'clock news'?

And what about 'Spitting Image'?

They're both fine shows, but I'd say Spitting Image is satire, spoofing current affairs of the time, rather than surreal.

Although, that said, Monty Python also threw in a number of current affairs references, e.g. references to Reginald Maudling, and spoofing other TV programmes and BBC continuity.

I was looking for I Think You Should Leave, which I think is great. But it might be the exception that proves the rule, at least for newish shows in the US.

Key and Peele and Chappelle's Show were also this kind of show, but are pretty old now.

Thank you!

Also:

- Monkey Dust

- The Fast Show

If you're a gamer, pick up Thank Goodness You're Here!

Yes, definitely a culture thing. I had a very difficult time finding most British humor funny when I was younger, but my personality combination of loving humor and comedy and also being incredibly interested in people, drove me to want to understand why British humor was funny when most of the time it just seemed so absurd.

It was a multi-decade path so it's very difficult to identify progression points, but slowly through exposure I began to "get it" and now I adore British comedy and humor. I still adore American comedy and humor as well, but the more exposure to the culture I got, the more I understood it.

Obviously that's just anecdotal, but I personally find it strong evidence that the humor divide is indeed cultural. The more similar cultures are to begin with, the easier the leap is.

To me the most exciting part of this is that it means there are thousands of other cultures on this planet that have humor that I have not unlocked yet. Someday I hope to!

Edit: for a very fascinating example of differences, I love comparing the UK version of the office to the US version of the office. To many Americans, David Brent mostly just came off mean and an asshole, even a poisonous one, whereas Michael Scott comes off as eccentric and clueless and unable to read the room, but overall a mostly good guy. That perception makes David Brent kind of hateable whereas Michael Scott kind of lovable.

Another fascinating point of comparison is the UK version of ghosts, versus the US version of ghosts. I'll leave comparisons and contrasts on those to others as I haven't watched all of the UK version of ghosts yet. I'd be fascinated to hear what others think of that, and the office for that matter.

David Brent is poisonous, and indeed hatable. The point of the British version of the show is not that he's more tolerable or likeable to the British. If anything it's more pointed how awful he is this side of the water, given the preponderance of bosses exactly like this. What makes the show work in the UK (and Ireland), is a greater cultural willingness to see the worst aspects of reality reflected in entertainment. Versus the focus on escapism in even the most grim US television - i.e.: Tony Soprano is a monster, but he also has charisma and glamour. Walter White is dying and becoming more and more amoral, but he also goes from being a dork to a badass. Both characters are utter glamorisations of what their real life counterparts would be like. Along with the surrealism there's a genuine existentialism to the darkest of UK comedy - from early Alan Partridge to Nighty Night. An actual interest in examining the nature of cruelty and suffering.

> Versus the focus on escapism in even the most grim US television

Interesting observation, thank you! Lot to noodle on there :-)

> i.e.: Tony Soprano is a monster, but he also has charisma and glamour. Walter White is dying and becoming more and more amoral, but he also goes from being a dork to a badass. Both characters are utter glamorisations of what their real life counterparts would be like.

I'm not actually disagreeing with you, but I wonder how you think you know this to be true?

Well for one, no real life mob overlord has a killer sound track and the best DOPs in the business making him look 'cool'. Real life violence doesn't cut away. Real life doesn't have moments of humours for the families of the murdered left behind etc etc.

I'm a filmmaker myself, and the nature of narrative television is to glamorise.

It's the opposite for me - the 'you can't change anything, the world sucks, the best you can do is endure and be snarky about it' attitude appealed a lot more to me when I was younger.

I watched both versions of Ghosts, and found them to be quite similar honestly. The US version can be a little more slapstick and a little more goofy, but that's about it.

Very interesting! Except I noted that he referred to David Brent from The Office, and we have a direct corollary to that character, of course, in Michael Scott from The Office. They really didn't change the formula for American audiences, he's absolutely still a comedic failure. Starting in the second season, he becomes a bit more of a lovable comedic failure, but the basic point of the character stands. And he is beloved by American audiences!

So the exact opposite of David Brent. As the show goes on you don't discover a single thing to make you like him.

This is true of the Michael Scott character in the first season (which follows the same plot points as the British version).

And even in the next few seasons, the core run of the show, he's only a bit more lovable. He's still pretty bad!

But certainly as they went further and further along he became more and more of a lovable doofus, very unlike David Brent.

I also really enjoyed After Life (with Ricky Gervais). I wouldn't call him a hero, but then again maybe I would. So honest, so pissed off, so intelligent.

Sick Note with Rupert Grint, same thing. Brilliant.

I'm currently reading the Bobbiverse series. Sure the guy is sort of a hero. But he is also an antihero forced to do heroic things, while he just wants to geek out and enjoy his coffee while making star trek references.

I'm not British btw.

don't worry lots of americans can't stand the american humor either

a lot of stuff here keeps existing because of the weird ouroboros of it being popular so people make more of it so it stays popular. but if other things were made and thrust on the mainstream instead they could easily be popular also.

As a Brit, I generally prefer American Humour when it comes to comedy. My favourite films are Happy Gilmore and Tropic Thunder. A lot of British Humour is around that everything is crap, it gets tiresome after a while.

> I find American humour so hard to relate to but I guess it's just a culture thing

These kind of comments always puzzle me. Hollywood makes stuff for the entire world, not just for a domestic audience.

Shows like Friends, Seinfeld, The Simpsons, pretty much any big sitcom you can name is in syndication in most countries around the world, because of how relatable it is.

It's often not sophisticated, and can be quite shallow (See Two and a half men or Big Bang theory), but it being hard to relate to is unlikely to be an issue.

Don't underestimate the power of big media corporations to push a world view. When I was a kid in NZ, British culture was impressed on us via the media. These days, there's more American influence. I don't think that's to do with the inherent quality of those cultures.

Of course not. But I think the US is unique in having it's shows be syndicated to such an extent globally, that isn't true for most other countries even English speaking ones. I assume that feeds back to them having that in mind and trying to please the lowest common denominator.

As an American I'm a huge fan of HHGG and Rowan Atkinson (not just his Bean character). I'm also a huge fan of Conan O'Brien and his Harvard generation's work for The Simpsons. Would be far ahead of Adams' time. Though while I find them _okay_ I never laughed so hard that my face and stomach hurt from laughter when watching Monty Python anything, not even Black Adder. For other American comedy what made me really, really laugh so hard was Kenan & Kel and The Lonely Island's work for SNL.

I've tried to find something as funny as HHGG for so long that I've read P.G. Wodehouse as Adam's main inspiration. Also watched Fry & Laurey. I guess Sacha Cohen as British humour? Since he's Cambridge Highlights alum after all. Found his works extremely hilarious though the parody of racism was disgusting.

Here is Conan's best (natural) performance roasting the Google CEO and gOogLers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7TwqpWiY5s

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