Frasier

I love Frasier...I even own the whole series. It's probably my favourite American comedy series so far, but I never watched Seinfeld.

In a lot of British TV comedy sexual innuendo is practically de rigueur, as is seen here in the series 'Allo 'Allo, that ran for quite a while some years ago.

http://youtu.be/C2kgRmECMhs

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Originally Posted by Mutatis-Mutandi

I've watched Curb Your Enthusiasm, and I don't get the hype. The main character is just annoying. The only thing it seems to have in common is that absurd situations the main character gets in . . . but the same could be said of almost any American comedy show. Still, check out Seinfeld if you get the chance.

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Larry David co-created and wrote most of Seinfeld. I think the humour essentially the same, except David is allowed to be a bit more crude than he could be on network TV. It relies a lot on running jokes.

I like Big Bang Theory, it has grown on me despite not liking it too much at first.

Frasier was kind of meh for me.

I remember Seinfeld used to run in syndication here every day after school on so many channels you could watch it for 2 hours straight.

Modern Family.

Much as I like Seinfeld, Frasier, King of Queens, Taxi, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The (American) Office and (hip though it ain't) Friends, Modern Family is just brilliantly written, beautifully performed and thematically perfect. And no laughter-track either.

I still watch the re-runs of "Frasier" in the mornings here in the UK; love it!

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Originally Posted by Emil Miller

In a lot of British TV comedy sexual innuendo is practically de rigueur, as is seen here in the series 'Allo 'Allo, that ran for quite a while some years ago.

http://youtu.be/C2kgRmECMhs

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I am not familiar with many British comedy shows, I have to admit, but I loved "Coupling", which stopped running after couple of seasons for some reason.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkU8P...eature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAUHV...eature=related

Apart from the sexual angle, WW11 looms large in the British psyche and there have been a number of series in which it features. One of the funniest was 'It Ain't Half Hot Mum' which featured the shenanigans of a forces concert party in Burma.

http://youtu.be/5taNjmGKIdU

I think my favorite British comedy show is Faulty Towers. A close second is, of course, Monty Python, but for all the hilarious skits they did, just as many made me scratch my head. Monty Python and the Holy Grail has to be one of the funniest movies ever made.

And I've yet to watch Modern Family. It's just one of those shows I haven't gotten around to.

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Originally Posted by Emil Miller

Apart from the sexual angle, WW11 looms large in the British psyche and there have been a number of series in which it features. One of the funniest was 'It Ain't Half Hot Mum' which featured the shenanigans of a forces concert party in Burma.

http://youtu.be/5taNjmGKIdU

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I think it looms large in the writing of Perry and Croft, whose experience was there, and they were writing at a time when the audience remembered the war. I'm not sure that's still true, in terms of popular entertainment. I can't think of a comedy based on the Second World War that has been commissioned within the last, say, twenty years.

There's a curve, I think, in popular culture, where a huge event is tragic, then comic, then nostalgic, then irrelevant, then historic. The First World War seems now to be historic - hence Downton Abbey. The Second World War is probably going through its irrelevant phase.

Joe Frazier, who died yesterday, was a great fighter. I'll grant that Ali beat him 2/3, and Foreman destroyed him twice, but nobody else beat him. If those two are the only two guys in the world who can beat you up, you're pretty darned tough.

Actually Frasier and Niles beat the hell out of Frazier. Eddie was barking like crazy.

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Originally Posted by MarkBastable

I think it looms large in the writing of Perry and Croft, whose experience was there, and they were writing at a time when the audience remembered the war. I'm not sure that's still true, in terms of popular entertainment. I can't think of a comedy based on the Second World War that has been commissioned within the last, say, twenty years.

There's a curve, I think, in popular culture, where a huge event is tragic, then comic, then nostalgic, then irrelevant, then historic. The First World War seems now to be historic - hence Downton Abbey. The Second World War is probably going through its irrelevant phase.

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I don't know. I think, here in America at least, WWI is in its irrelevant phase, as it has been as long as I can remember. Schools teach way more about WWII than WWI, there's almost always some sort of documentary on it on one of the history/education channels, Hitler and the holocaust are common references, etc. Whereas with WWI, I think it's be quite easy to find multiple 20-somethings who don't even know it was the Germans who caused the trouble.

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Originally Posted by Mutatis-Mutandi

I don't know. I think, here in America at least, WWI is in its irrelevant phase, as it has been as long as I can remember. Schools teach way more about WWII than WWI, there's almost always some sort of documentary on it on one of the history/education channels, Hitler and the holocaust are common references, etc. Whereas with WWI, I think it's be quite easy to find multiple 20-somethings who don't even know it was the Germans who caused the trouble.

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I think you're right about that. But it was a remote war for you.

Even WWII was not as central, metaphorically and actually, to the US - which was recognised even at the time. The handbook for GIs coming to Britain said, "Back home you were in a country at war. Here in Britain you are in a war zone."

My American wife was astonished when she went to the Imperial War Museum and saw pictures of London during the Blitz. As she said, "Jesus, it was 9/11 every night."

The first world war had a much bigger impact outside of the USA. For many countries it was like an entire generation of boys had been wiped out. In Canada, 1% of the population at large was killed in the war, with casualty levels comparable to the US's during the war, despite a much smaller population. The countries on the continent suffered even heavier losses.

Historically, I think WW1 has been the more influential war for the British Empire, it put the final nail in the coffin of British Imperialism in Canada, and it created the idea of a Canadian nationality separate from Britain. It created the conditions where Canadians questioned for the first time whether their interest were really perfectly in line with those of the UK, because so many died fighting for what seemed a European problem. Which eventually culminated in the Statute of Westminster in 1933 which severed the final executive ties between Australia, New Zealand, and Canada with the UK.

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Originally Posted by OrphanPip

I like Big Bang Theory, it has grown on me despite not liking it too much at first.

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I like that David from Roseanne is in it, the characters are endearing, and I think the tall one is cute, but I HATE the writing. The show basically has one joke, and it's not a good one:

"We're so geeky, isn't it funny? We can write completely witless jokes, because we're just so geeky that we look clever without actually being clever!"
*insert Star Trek reference*
"See? We're geeky, do you get it? Isn't it so smart to like Star Trek?"
*insert comic book reference*
"Do you get how geeky we are yet?"
*insert video games reference*
"In case you haven't noticed yet, we're geeks!"
*insert science reference*

It's like they're trying to make dumb people feel smart by association.

I think that's probably true for the first season, they have gotten better in later seasons. Lately, I think they have pulled back on those kinds of jokes and put more emphasis on the awkwardness of Sheldon and the sort of bizarre social relations between the characters.