Quote: stupid boy @ February 9 2011, 3:59 PM GMTNot in my opinion, there was poor characterisation and the central character was too pathetic to identify with at all. And why are you using me name, swerytd?
Unless you are called Dan too, haha. Well it didn't take long to uncover my secret identity, which is funny considering what it says underneath.
Yes, he is called Dan!
After four years, it's like the unveiling of Spiderman...
Dan
Teenage Kicks is an unusual brew for a contemporary sitcom. As one reviewer pointed out, it mixes sentimental family comedy with the kind of antics that Adrian Edmonson - the show's star and co-writer - got up to in Bottom. The critics have been unkind and I can see their point, but still enjoy this sitcom and see potential.
The story centres on a middle-aged punk forced to live with his young adult children and their university room-mate after a divorce. Like Absolutely Fabulous - written by and starring Edmonson's wife Jennifer Saunders - the show features an immature adult who is parented by his children. The format here, however, is different. In Absolutely Fabulous the daughter, Saffron, is the one sane man on the island, the only 'real' and 'mature' character surrounded by a cast of immature grotesques who she has to parent. These include her wealthy, spoilt and outlandish mother (Saunders), her mother's spiteful best friend, her senile Grandmother and her mother's incompetent Personal Assistant. By having a cast of grotesques with one sympathetic character - no individual character seems too 'over the top' or unbearable to the audience. This is just the world of the show.
In Teenage Kicks, however, the reverse is true. Edmonson's character, Vernon, seems substantially more ridiculous than the mildy funny cast around him. This means that he risks seeming out of place - as if his Eddie Hitler character from Bottom had just stumbled onto the set of My Family. The folk from Bottom and Absolutely Fabulous did not ask for sympathy like Vernon (although they do get it). Vernon also risks irritating the audience as much as the other characters (a similar situation to what happened in the first series of Blackadder). Putting an experienced comedian like Edmonson with such a gift for anarchic pysicality next to a group of newcomers also causes the show to be a little uneven. What a mentor, however, for these new comics to learn at the knee of.
I suppose a lot of people expect the kind of revolutionary anarchy of The Young Ones and Bottom from Edmonson. Others who were expecting a family sitcom of the My Family variety would be similarly disappointed. Edmonson can't be expected to do the same things forever. Perhaps this could be a clever subversion of the family sitcom - the genre is certainly ripe for it.
People say that the comedy is old fashioned, predating the style of Edmonson's other work. Curiously enough, these critics would probably prefer some of the seventies sitcoms that the Comic Strip generation moved away from. I certainly think that if I watched Teenage Kicks next to some of that old stuff I would find as many, if not more laughs from Teenage Kicks - and edgier humour too.
Criticism has been levelled at the inclusion of the Chinese character and the making fun of his accent. In the scene where he is impersonated, Vernon's accent is also impersonated by someone quoting both characters. The intention is not to make fun of him or to offend - a young man is just portraying two sides of a conversation to (slightly) comical effect. to me, his role is similar to the character of Fez in the American sitcom That '70s Show. It is the comedy of errors created by cultural misunderstanding - which hardly constitutes political incorrectness.
This is a gentler comedy with a different impact to Edmonson's other work. Granted it is not the best of Edmonson, but everything he does can't be Bottom. This show had a reasonable amount of funny moments and needed time to develop, which, sadly, it didn't get.
Quote: ToddB @ February 17 2011, 9:26 AM GMTBy having a cast of grotesques with one sympathetic character - no individual character seems too 'over the top' or unbearable to the audience.
Yeah, really not sure about that one...
Quote: ToddB @ February 17 2011, 9:26 AM GMTThis show had a reasonable amount of funny moments and needed time to develop, which, sadly, it didn't get.
Nor that. Admittedly the two genres are different beasts with different demands, but Teenage Kicks had a radio series (although of just 6 episodes) before it came to TV. I don't think people were necessarily expecting something 100% perfect from the show, but given that history, it had had some development time and should have been better.
(And I didn't think it was all that bad.)
I agree to some extent that it wasn't bad. But there was just some unidentifyable ingrediant that I couldn't accept - and I loved Vyvyan in The Young Ones.
I agree with you guys, not as good as Edmonson's other stuff, but I liked it better than the critics did.
I thought it had its moments, would be amazed to see it come back though. Have ITV1 showed a sitcom since?
They currently have Benidorm.
Can't say I've ever seen an episode of that, but from reviews I've always thought of it as a comedy-drama?
No, not at all. Not in the slightest. The last series or two have taken a comedy-drama-like hour-long episode format, but it is definitely a sitcom, through-and-through.
TK had a few little moments of sitcom worthiness that I saw, like Edmondson trying to get into his old drainpipes, but there was nowhere near enough of it, and I just wanted him to break out into his old persona all the time. Knowing this wasn't going to happen nearly ruined the old Edmondson image for me, so really I wish he hadn't done the series, or that I'd not seen it. It also confirmed how important his old partner Rik Mayall was to his act, as he didn't look too great without him, IMO, whereas Mayall copes very well on his own.
I dunno, because it was a good idea for a sitcom, I'm thinking maybe the constraints of a primetime family type sitcom and possibly the limitations of an ITV production (not as confident about breaking new ground and using adult humour as BBC or C4 are) meant that this promising concept was strangled at birth. If the kids had been younger, and not uni students then okay, it may have looked right. But being their age it should have taken a more adult approach with its humour, who knows it could have been ITV's Inbetweeners or even 2 Pints!
But that would have changed the whole show from the ground up; if they were any younger, they wouldn't have their own home for him to move into.
Very true, but I meant their behviour didn't look realistic for their age. This was a good sitcom premise that was probably put in the wrong slot, imo, or maybe it was just a good idea that's difficult to get right on screen. Maybe it worked better on Radio as others have said.
Agree about their behaviour, yes.
