The Inbetweeners

fair point but also a lot of american shows usually have the ideas to keep them interesting. british tv just doesn´t have the money or writers or profuction values to do this anymore.

i reckon the ´6 episodes a season, stop after 2-3 seasons thing´ isn´t really a valid excuse anymore

Fair point as well if you look at it from that view. I have no insight into British TV as we don't get that much here anyway. And I only download what is recommended in here.
So I base my impressions on that and then it's one hell of a high quality

But if the entire industry takes the 3 series limit as a regular excuse for not having enough quality then they need some kind of fresh kick in the behind to pick up speed.

You would think British TV would make fantastic shows with the Wire etc as inspiration. You have the real stories and moods for it.
Nothing like that on the horizon eh?

American shows are written by teams of writers who can add people to the team, but it's usually just 1 or 2 doing all the writing for British TV shows (The Thick Of It being one of the few exceptions I can think of). So generally everything has to come from one source in Britain with no-one to pick up the slack, meaning good UK shows are often short, but with tight characters and plots.

Plus in terms of commercial TV there's a LOT more money (and competition) in America so the ability (and necessity) to produce good quality there is greater. And as far as pay-tv goes, the US has HBO and Showtime, whereas we have Sky who don't have strong free-to-air channels to compete with like the other two, and so rely on sport, films, imports and quantity rather than quality.

Then there's the BBC, generally the only ones who can/do make quality television (though Channel 4 occasionally do something great) but, since they're publicly funded, have to make their money stretch a hell of a lot further than someone like HBO by catering for all audiences, making 'family' shows, representing all communities in it's output and run nationwide and local radio stations - all the while trying to avoid being 'offensive' and chase decent ratings in order to justify it's funding - pretty hard to squeeze out a Wire in those circumstances.

There have been good reviews for Luther and ITV's Father and Son recently and it seems like people here are taking notice of HBO, but there isn't the money (or demand tbh) to try to match America's top dramas, the best we can do are 2 to 6-parters like State Of Play which, while good, are never going to match up to 70-odd episodes of The Sopranos. Luckily money doesn't effect how funny something is so at least our 6-a-series comedies will always have the potential to be excellent.

great post

Can we have the BBC's budget on excel sheets with pie charts attached? thx

Quick guys, no one try to explain anything in over 4 lines or para will make fun of you

I'm starting to think Andy was right about you all along

FINALLY.

no i think tis because america has a ginormous society with myriad levels of ethnic and socioeconomiccultural tapestry; where's the brits gonna find the content richness that shows like the wire and the sopranos drive from

Are you actually being serious?

a little

So you're saying American life is inherently more dramatic than British life? Do you think it's just Britain or most other countries that, coincidentally also don't have the US's TV infrastructure? If HBO commissioned David Chase or David Simon with their usual budget and staff to come over to Britain, research, write and shoot a drama on racial tensions in Bradford, an alcoholic's centre in Glasgow, TCOTU gangs or inner city homeless, for examples, it wouldn't have a chance to standing up to their other work? That's insane, so yeah, American TV has the means to portray and explore it's 'myriad levels of ethnic and socioeconomiccultural tapestry', but because British TV's in the poor house this must means those things and others don't exist here? (Presumably because there aren't any great TV shows about them!)

Then there would be too many people wearing tracksuits on the show and that might bring the ratings down.
Britain is boring, they have funny accents and they smell.
Sorry I spouted the first thing that came to my mind to see if you'd write another essay. I don't care really about the subject. :ass:

Well I thought it was a pretty retarded thing to say, but then you said you were serious so what was I supposed to think? Sorry for, y'know, caring and stuff

ANDY WAS RIGHT.

Also part brut for soapbox member of the month tbh. (perhaps we start this?)

Shit post.

You know what Orch, you're probably right

Member of the Month is a terrible idea. Didn't Baz suggest it a few forums ago and the idea got laughed at for a while?

Yeah nothing worse than everybody kissing each others arse.

(I'll vote for you if you vote for me Andy)