Episode 20: The IT Crowd and bacon
IN WHICH a British television show is dissed summarily, and cured pork products are celebrated, especially in their relationship to a certain starchy/sugary confection.
Briana’s (sort-of) pick: “The IT Crowd”
Truth be told, I had a rough week. I flubbed up a couple things at my real job, stepped in cat vomit (twice), spilled red wine on my white sweater, and accidentally set my hair on fire (note to self—do not lean over gas stoves). So I guess I wasn’t surprised to discover this week that hit BBC comedy series “The IT Crowd” is a bust. You know you’re having a bad week when even British comedy disappoints…
“The IT Crowd” focuses on the antics of the three person information technology (I.T.) support team at fictitious British company, Reynholm Industries. The three main characters: Roy (the laid back, slightly desperate, computer tech), Moss (the highly intelligent, socially inept uber nerd computer tech) and Jen (the cute, shoe crazy, tech-illiterate manager). While I appreciate the truths in stereotypes, the characteristics of each person are blown so out of proportion that it’s not even interesting. For example, Moss (the socially inept nerd!) actually wears high-water slacks, white sneakers & an ill fitting button up plus lame tie. He also (surprise!) lives with his mom and is deathly afraid of spiders.
The show is written by Graham Linehan who also writes for another BBC series called “Black Books;” a series I do enjoy. Oh well, we can’t all like everything all the time. It’s just been one of those weeks, I guess…Maybe I’m missing some charming, hilarious element of “The IT Crowd,” but safe to say that the nerdy stereotypes on “The Big Bang Theory” are more entertaining and less insulting.
So you got that going for ya, CBS, which is nice.
James’ pick: Bacon
Are you aware of the online cult of bacon? It’s pretty extensively documented at my all-time favorite web site MetaFilter – in a nutshell, if you can think of anything debaucherous or gluttonous to do with bacon, somebody out there is doing it any blogging about it.
There’s the bacon bra, which makes my primitive man-brain ASPLODE (possibly NSFW). There’s Bacon Man. Bacon Salt asks the timeless question, “Why would you have French fries when you could have bacon French fries?” There is the unholy Bacon Explosion, which combines 2 pounds of bacon with 2 pounds of sausage into a cylinder of delight that I want to eat with every fiber of my being.
But today, fellow babies, we partake in a local confection that takes it to a new level – Nord’s Bakery’s bacon donut. Please enjoy this photo of Briana partaking.
Oh, also, this is really fun: You can put bacon on top of any web site. Just put it at the end of http://bacolicio.us/ For instance, click here.
Listen to this episode:
I totally disagree with you guys about the IT crowd. First, you have to watch the entire season to truly appreciate the show. Sure they play the stereotypes, but its almost a compliment. Especially if you’ve ever dabbled in the profession. Second, you think the Office is the best british humor since the Monty Python….
Well after listening to a bunch of episodes of your podcast, I honestly don’t think you guys are nerds. More like internet posers. I am now removing you guys from my podcast subscription.
(my real name is hidden in the one I provided, 83% of the letters are mine)
I was really enjoying your podcasts up until the moment when you said that British comedy had not moved on since Monty Python except maybe for The Office. Well you’ve mention Black Books already, what about Father Ted, Spaced, Spitting Image, The League Of Gentlemen, The Royle Family, Phoenix Nights. It’s understandable that you may not have seen these programmes but to say that we haven’t had anything to match Python just isn’t true. And The IT Crowd and Black Books aren’t BBC, they’re Channel 4. I think that in America, that the BBC just puts them out
Gemma