Can they even do that?

Continuing my trip down The Guardian's Top 50 TV Shows of 2021.  

#10 : I Think You Should Leave With Tim Robinson

In its second outing, Tim Robinson’s absurd comedy sketch show scaled new heights of surreal, laugh-out-loud greatness. Its meme-friendly skits somehow managed to cram subplots into scenes shorter than most ad breaks, often managing to draw belly-laughs through cleverly wrong-footing the viewer. At its best, it felt like it was reinventing what a sketch show should be in the internet era – and it was often at its best.




The first series of this was highly recommended by The Guardian and so I checked it out - and really didn't understand what the fuss was about.  So what are the chances of the second series being vastly different?  Yeah - that's what I was thinking...

And no, I still don't understand the fuss - although I completely agree that "absurd" and "surreal" are most definitely applicable words.  And yeah, the sketches often "wrong-foot the viewer" but "laugh-out-loud" and "belly-laughs" are not words I experienced, I'm afraid.  I did chuckle a few times and there were some interesting ideas for sketches, but it was more the case that I laughed at the beginning of the sketch and then I was wrong-footed into confusion and left scratching my head as to, well, just why any of us were sticking with it so long.  

It was all well put together and you didn't doubt for a minute that they weren't making exactly what they wanted to be making, so I guess I have to give them some plaudits for that but I just didn't quite get who would find it funny - I gave it a couple of episodes and then we just agreed we've go our separate ways.  I'd also say that having come off a run of two comedies with well-drawn characters that you grew to like or at least understand, you just don't have that luxury in a sketch show - some of the characters were well put together and introduced very slickly, but in the rare case that I liked them, they were gone in a couple of minutes.

It did make me wonder what happened to sketch shows - the internet tells me they still make them in the US, but I'm not aware of any made over here recently (I guess there might be some later in the list).  Maybe they just went out of fashion, maybe the internet killed them or (a theory from the internet) maybe panel shows are just easier and cheaper to make - whatever it is, it feels like people don't bother any more.  However, if they were all like this, I'd have to say I'm not missing them - sorry!

#9 - Utterly charming television
#11 - Unfortunately a bit of a let-down

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