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The League Of Gentlemen.

post #1 of 16
7/25/05 at 7:47pm
Thread Starter 
Have any of you American chewers seen this yet? With all the acclaim 'The Office' has been getting it seemed a little unfair to overlook this gem, which happens to be clever, hilarious, daring and even quite touching at times. It's basically 3 guys who play about 60 characters between them, both Men and Women alike who make up the fictional town of 'Royston Vasey', ranging from a Butcher who sells his 'special stuff' to priviliged customers to a fucked up Circus owner (And possibly the creepiest character on Television) called 'Papa Lazarou' who steals, literally, other peoples Wives.

The 3 cast members and writers (Plus a 4th co-writer who doesn't act) delivered 12 episodes of comic gold during Seasons 1+2 and then for Season 3 they did a U-Turn, dumped the BBC enforced laughter track and went with an all out ambitious experiment by making a 'dramedy' and not using any of the 'popular' characters.

I can't even think of a way to describe the humour...Imagine 'Twin Peaks' was a comedy and I guess your part of the way there. Throw in a healthy dose of Hammer Horror, a bit of gross out humour and a touch of Monty Python and you'll get the idea.

If anyone is interested you can always pick it up from here.
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post #2 of 16
7/26/05 at 12:50am
Here in America, we have a cable channel called Comedy Central. They picked up the series and played some episodes, but this was a few years ago, before anyone heard of "The Office". I don't think anyone really watched it. I'm not even sure BBC America or any public television stations showed any episodes.
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post #3 of 16
7/26/05 at 1:12pm
I rented the first three disks from Netflix and their Christmas special is on the way. It is funny when trying to tell people about the show. They think I am talking about that movie (i won't mention the title) with Sean Connery. The Christmas special is supposed to be very bloody. Not for everybodys taste but the Leauge are genius.
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post #4 of 16
7/26/05 at 5:32pm
Thread Starter 
I wouldn't say the Christmas special is bloody at all actually. It is tremendously dark for a 'Christmas Special' though. It's basically a horror anthology using fringe characters from the show. It is very funny though.

Oh and there's also a film 'The League of Gentlemens Apocalypse' which is one of the most surreal movies I've seen for a long time.
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post #5 of 16
12/10/10 at 8:09am
I just discovered this show recently, I'm almost done the first season now. I have to say it's really quite disturbing, even more so than Little Britain! But they somehow managed to find a balance between disturbing and charming which works quite well, and there's a lot of dark dark humour and wit on display. The intros in every episode with the townfolk of Royston Vasey are especially hilarious.

And the Local Shop is by far my favourite part, Tubs is weirdly fascinating. At times things get so creepy they cross the line into pure horror, and I love horror! I can't wait to watch more.
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post #6 of 16
12/10/10 at 1:05pm
Interesting you should mention little britain, as it and League season 1 both have the same crippling flaw- that of re-using the same joke/scenario over and over, though League rescues itself somewhat by having a progressing plot/being funnier.
Season 2, however, is fantastic, striking exactly the right humour/plot balance, and the show peaks with the Christmas Special.
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post #7 of 16
12/10/10 at 6:03pm
Thread Starter 
I found the repitition of jokes much less jarring in TLOG than I did in LB. Mainly because at least there's somewhat of a story taking place there as well. I agree that Season 2 starts firing on all cylinders though. But man Season 3 is great. I hated it the first time it came on, but now I think it's fantastic.
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post #8 of 16
12/10/10 at 7:47pm
Series 3 is my favourite and the last episode is quite possibly the most hilariously demented and disturbing 30 minutes of television I can recall. Seeing the way everything tied in together was absolutely beautiful while the terrifying secret of that nice Keith Drop chap was mindfuckingly incredible.
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post #9 of 16
12/10/10 at 7:51pm
Little Britain is a bit of a strange comparison because it's much more of a singular sketch/catchphrase show whereas LOG has season long arcs and developed characters etc.

Anyway, big big fan of the show, very funny, horrific and touching at times. The range of characters played by just three actors is amazing. One of my favourites is the three businessmen, the ones who go on the wilderness day out thing, I've known a lot of people just like Shearsmith's Geoff.

Did anyone see Psychoville? I haven't got round to it yet but it seems very similar to LOG just without Gatiss.
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post #10 of 16
12/10/10 at 11:49pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by James View Post
I found the repitition of jokes much less jarring in TLOG than I did in LB. Mainly because at least there's somewhat of a story taking place there as well. I agree that Season 2 starts firing on all cylinders though. But man Season 3 is great. I hated it the first time it came on, but now I think it's fantastic.
I'm just in the midst of Season 2 now and I agree it's fantastic, they really found their stride here.

I love the pathetic Creme Brule guy, I just watched the episode where he gave all his savings to the band and they screwed him over and abandoned him. The part where his ridiculous costume deflates when he realized what had happened was GOLD! So pitiful and yet you can't help but laugh.
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post #11 of 16
12/11/10 at 12:03am
Yeah this was a great. This thread reminded me that I still haven't seen the film, I need to fix that ASAP.

Psychoville is pretty good too, it's a bit more darker.
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post #12 of 16
12/11/10 at 8:53am
Thread Starter 
Yeah according to Shearsmith and Pembleton, Psychoville was their answer to shows they love like Dexter, Lost etc. They said the British don't tend to do long form shows like that and I agree.

The homage to 'Rope' they do in the middle of the Season was one of the best things I'd seen on TV, more so considering the BBC needed an extra episode from them so they didn't just want to make it filler material (It totally is, but not shitty filler like BSG used to do). The Xmas special was great, and now they're doing another series!

Few things in my life shake me up the way that Papa Lazarou does.
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post #13 of 16
12/11/10 at 3:53pm
Oh god, I just remembered about 'The Medusa Touch' in S3 - that was seriously great, especially when the poor guy comes home and finds *that scene* awaiting him in the living room. In fact, I think I need to watch the whole lot again, it's been ages since I last watched them.
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post #14 of 16
12/12/10 at 5:24pm
Fantastic Show - when we lived in the UK, my wife used to go on a pilgrimage to hadfield every year to buy some "special stuff".
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post #15 of 16
12/13/10 at 1:49pm
Love this very much. It's been too long, gonna make some time, fire up the old multi region and watch my LOG discs tonight.
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post #16 of 16
12/13/10 at 2:03pm
The season two opener, with Papa Lazarou visiting suburban housewives to recruit more concubines and sell pegs, is demented, disturbing perfection.
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