Worst British Sitcoms of all time!

[Babygirl66]

In your opinion what is the worst British sitcom of all time.

My definition of Sitcom, is a comedy that prime purpose is to be “funny”. For Example shows such as Being Human, Fleabag, my mad fat dairy, Brasic and Jonathan Creek don’t count as whilst they contain humour they are not what most would consider a sitcom as they contain to much of a serious undertone. (Not saying these are bad shows, I just see them refer to as sitcoms a lot when they technically are not)

Well, I wasn’t expecting this thread to be that popular. With over 400 comments and 163 shows mentioned I can announce the results:

The following sitcoms received one dishonourable mention:
A Small Problem 1
After you’ve Gone 1
Agony 1
All Night Long 1
Bad Move 1
Bless This House 1
Butterflies 1
Come Fly With Me 1
Coming of Age 1
Coupling 1
Cuckoo 1
Dark Ages 1
Dear John 1
Derry Girls 1
Desmonds 1
Detectorists 1
Don't Drink The Water 1
Don't Wait Up 1
Duck Patrol 1
Extras 1
Eyes Down 1
Get Back 1
Girls on Top 1
Heil Honey I'm Home 1
Horrible Histories 1
Hyperdrive 1
I Fought The Law 1
Inbetweeners 1
Jam & Jerusalem 1
Just a Gigolo 1
Just Good Friends 1
Keep It in The Family 1
Mad About Alice 1
Man About The House 1
Men of the World 1
Miss Jones and Sons 1
Mixed Blessings 1
Monty Python Flying Circus 1
My Wife Next Door 1
Nightingales 1
On The Up 1
Peep Show 1
Phoenix Nights 1
Pig in the Middle 1
Please Sir 1
Plebs 1
Porridge 1
Rings on their fingers 1
Robin's Nest 1
Sandylands 1
Shane 1
So Haunt Me 1
Sunnyside Farm
Take a letter Mr Jones 1
The Big One 1
The Catherine Tate Show 1
The Crouches 1
The Good Life 1
The Likely Lads 1
The Liver Birds 1
The Mistress 1
The Other ‘Arf 1
The Return of Shelley 1
The Upper Hand 1
Three Up Two Down 1
To The Manor Born
Two's Company 1
Up the elephant and round the castle 1
Valentine Park 1
Worzel Gummidge 1
You Rang M'Lord 1
You’re Only Young Twice 1

The following programs received two dishonourable mentions:
2.4 children 2
As Time Goes By 2
Big Top 2
Blackadder 2
Brighton Belles 2
Bottle Boys 2
Come Back mrs Noah 2
Father Ted 2
French and Saunders 2
George and Mildred 2
Goodnight Sweetheart 2
Hardware 2
Help! 2
Lame Ducks 2
League of Gentlemen 2
Little Britten 2
Only when I Laugh 2
Rising Damp 2
Rosie 2
Scarborough 2
Slingers Day 2
(Still)/Open all hours 2
The Gone Wrong Show 2
The Green Green Grass 2
The Grimleys 2
The Happy Apple 2
The IT Crowd 2
The River 2
Troubles and Strife 2
Vicious 2

With three dishonourable mentions we have:
All About Me 3
Benidorm 3
Bottom 3
Count Arthur Strong 3
Curry and Chips 3
Doctor's Daughters 3
Ever Decreasing Circles 3
Fresh Fields 3
Game On 3
Men Behaving Badly 3
Never The Twain 3
Sink or Swim 3
That’s My Boy 3
Terry and June 3
The Wright Way 3
The Young Ones 3

With 4 dishonourable mentions are the following Sitcoms:
Gimme gimme gimme 4
Kate and Koji 4
Love thy Neighbour 4
Outnumbered 4
The Victor of Dibley 4
Thin blue line 4
Till Death Do Us Part 4
Upstart Crow 4
Watching 4

Coming in with 5 dishonourable mentions we have:
2 Pints Of Larger And A Packet of Crisps 5
Allo Allo 5
Dads Army 5
Duty Free 5
Friday Night Diner 5
It Ain't Half Hot Mum 5
Keeping up appearances 5
May to December 5
My Hero 5
Red Dwarf 5

The following programs received 6 dishonourable mentions:
Are you being Served 6
Babes In the Wood 6
Fawlty Towers 6
Gavin and Stacey 6
Hold the Sunset 6
Mr Bean 6
Sorry 6
Steptoe and Son 6

Coming in on it’s own with 7 dishonourable mentions is:
The Brittas Empire 7

All receiving 8 dishonourable mentions are the following:
Bread 8
Birds of a feather 8
Citizen Khan 8
Hi De Hi 8
Mind your language 8
My Family 8
The Office 8

Both of these sitcoms received 9 dishonourable mentions:
Absolutely Fabulous 9
The Royle Family 9

And both of these sitcoms received 11 dishonourable mentions:
Not going out 11
Only fools and houses 11

Now onto the top 5!

In 5th place with 13 dishonourable mentions we have...
On the busses 13

In 4th place with with 14 dishonourable mentions we have...
Some Mothers Do Ave Em 14

Coming in at 3rd place we have with 16 dishonourable mentions...
Last of the Summer Wine 16

Our runner up for the worst uk sitcom of all time is, with 29 dishonourable mentions is...
Maranda 29

And in 1st place decided by the people of mumsnet as the worst sitcom of all time, with a massive 82 dishonourable mentions is...
Mrs Brown Boys 82

Therefore Mrs Brown Boys is, in mumsnet’s opinion, the worst uk sitcom of all time, and yes it technically is British as it is made by the BBC and is filmed in Scotland. I didn’t see anyone complaining about My Family being repeatedly mentioned, which was actually made by an American production company.

Thanks to all who gave dishonourable mentions, sorry if your favourite sitcom was mentioned, ditto if your most hated one only got one or no mentions. Thanks all. Keep safe.

I would just like to say that I am the op of this post, I did change my name for another post as I wanted it to be more anonymous, but changed it back afterwards. sorry if there is some confusion, as why that post isn’t green

@BabyGirl66
Youve clearly got too much time on your hands with lockdown!

Stirling work there OP 👏👏👏

Superb work, OP!

Tell me, is your job in real life making those 'Top 100' programmes that always come out at Christmas? If not, you'd be excellent at it!

Glad MBB came out as the worst sitcom - won't feel so guilty now when DH wants to watch it and I veto it!

For 30 years I've had an awful theme tune stuck in my head from a terrible sitcom. All I could remember was that it had the man from Gregory's girl in it.
I looked it up. He was a journalist called Nelson, so of course it was called Nelson's column......
Still got the bloody theme stuck. Extra extra READ ALL ABOUT IT

Phone Shop. What the hell even is that?

Thank you for the results!!

That was Watching and yes, it was terrible. Woman goes out with birdwatcher bloke with a motorbike & sidecar and has a sister (Liza Tarbuck: things definitely improved for her after that) married to a rich bloke. At least one disapproving mother stereotype as well.

I loved Watching! Was about 12 when it was on and had my own TV. I can still sing the theme tune

I also loved Duty Free as a child and my colleague told me about the DVD boxed set - thinking of treating myself to a bit of escapist nostalgia!

Good work, OP. I actually watched the first episode of That’s My Boy on YouTube on Monday, inspired by this thread (few social engagements at present haha). I wanted to see if it was as bad as I thought. I was not disappointed!

Mrs Brown's Boys
Miranda (sorry, I think she's lovely when interviewed but just not funny to me)
Vicar of Dibley (same as above)
Benidorm

it becomes clear I don't really like sitcoms. Don't get me started on soaps

My Family
Chalk (a dreadful thing from the mid-nineties that was meant to be a vehicle for David Bamber post-Pride and Prejudice)
The Vicar of Dibley
Little Britain
One Foot in the Grave

Keeping Up Appearances was dreadful but I have such admiration for Patricia Routledge's performance

Wow thankyou OP wasn't expecting results.. Possibly the most satisfying outcome to a thread I've ever participated in!

Nice work OP. So who does watch MBB?

My DH and MIL love MBB - even though MIL normally hates swearing.

Can anyone who loves MBB articulate what it is that they like about it?

I'm really struggling to understand. But then I suppose there are people who like liquorice allsorts and I loathe them...

I hate MBB but I’ve heard Brendan O’Carrolll talk about how many people with autism love the show and ‘get’ the humour. So much so he has sponsored a PhD in the area at Trinity College.

Can anyone who loves MBB articulate what it is that they like about it?

I certainly don't love it, but the early episodes have a few lines which make laugh. Whereas Miranda doesn't have any.

make me laugh

Mrs Brown originated from an absolutely lovely and funny novel by Brendan O’Carroll called The Mammy, set in the 1960’s. It was made into a film starting Angelica Huston called Agnes Brown. MBB is completely different to them!

His mother was a trailblazing politician in her day.

@clevererthanyou I loved all those you mention and also Two Doors Down. Benny Hill makes me feel ill and angry in equal measure

Wow OP you did the results! Now that's what I call dedication. I agree with the winner.

I've not seen a mention of 'Clarence' anywhere. It starred Ronnie Barker as a very short sighted removal man. it was quite funny though.

I remember Clarence - it wasn't too bad, but not a patch on the Barker classics. The Ronnie Barker sitcom that was really below par was 'The Magnificent Evans' - Evans was an egotistical Welsh photographer and not a character you'd warm to. The series never took off. Ronnie Barker said in his autobiography that, in hindsight, the idea for the sitcom was too whimsical.