TERRIBLE TV sitcoms of the 80s and 90s

[GetOrfMo1Land]

I can't find the remote control - have just watched Keeping Up Appearances and now Allo Allo is on.

What a crock of shit.

Terribly contrived situations with 'hilarious' consequences.

Patricia Routledge is a great actress but the canned laughter, slobby family and just everything in it is so dire.

And Allo Allo - I don't get it. Who thought it would be funny to have a comedy about german occupation and the French resistance? Made by the BBC? With canned laughter? And Madonna with a big boobies? Were people complete divs back then?

We once watched an episode of Allo Allo with two french guests, one of whom was originally from Vietnam, and it took some explaining!
I still think that one of the funniest lines of all time was "There iss no piss for the wocked" by Officer Crabtree

I always loathed Bread - all my chums seemed to love it and quoted from it endlessly.

My parents brought me up on a diet of That Was The Week That Was and Monty Python - one Christmas they bought my brother and me the Monty Python Instant Record Collection; we ran gleefully to the radiogram and slapped it on the turntable.

Assembled aunties, uncles and grannies were almost instantly regaled with, at top volume, The Introduction:

"The audio content has been quality graded to give you the finest in listening pleasure.

There is little or no offensive material, apart from four cunts, one clitoris and a foreskin - and, as they only occur in this opening introduction, you are past them now"

The view of the assembled family entourage looked something like this:

That's My Boy was indeed awful, our local paper always had it in the TV Guide as That's My Body.

We just had OHSOM American sitcoms, like Different Strokes, The Naked Truth, Blossom, none of this weirdy unfunny chinless weirdoes stuff the UK was producing.

Like the British soaps - almost exclusively casting hideously ugly peeps.

I mean LOOK at the pop stars in the 70s as well. Slade? Chicory Tip? Bay City Rollers? What a bunch of soap dodgers.

And The Likely Lads? Likey? Not fucking likely with all that brylcreem and dandruff, you dirty buggers.

And Hughie Green was on the telly. Who let him out?

Sharon and Elsie
Laura and Disorder
You Must Be The Husband
Robin's Nest
Brighton Belles (may have this wrong, think it was the UK remake of Golden Girls)
You Rang M'Lord

I spent most of my childhood watching crappy sitcoms. Happy days.

I would still watch 'Allo 'Allo if it was on...

"There is little or no offensive material, apart from four cunts, one clitoris and a foreskin - and, as they only occur in this opening introduction, you are past them now"

Hahaha

Haha Talc

Fawlty Towers still makes me laugh even though I know it scene by scene.

"Colin's Sandwich was a late 1980s/early 1990s BBC2 sitcom starring Mel Smith as Colin Watkins, a British Rail clerk who aspired to be a horror writer." from Wikipedia

Don't Wait Up

Sorry with Ronnie Corbett

No one has mentioned Men Behaving Fucking Atrociously.

Mind you, I watched an episode of Dallas the other day, that was a steaming pile o' shite an' all. BUT at least the actors looked as if they had washed their hair and visitied the dentist once in their life.

Fawlty Towers is still brilliantly funny - I must have watched all the episodes dozens of times, and I still love them.

Same as Blackadder the Second.

Talc, rather like my placing my new Christmas record on the turntable as my family and old Uncle Ray sat down to our turkey dinner, only to hear Ian Dury and the Blockheads intoning 'bastard pricks and cunts' ...

'It Ain't Half Hot Mum' anyone? Or is that the 70's? Bet that's not funny now!

ExACTly

Yes, Sunset Beach, Dallas, Loving, Days of our lives - all rubbish with terrible storylines, but at least there's eye candy, or at a minimum, fabulous outfits

Pombear there was definitely Colin's Sandwich. there was one where he was trying to impress with a recipe, gets to step 4 and reads, "marinade overnight" - then promptly dumps it in bin. I'm sure there were funnier bits, but whenever I read that in a recipe I think of it.

No one mentioned George and Mildred yet? More 70s I think. I know couples like that (anyone remember the MN supermarket thread with "no bananas for you, Bernard"? A definite G & M couple!)

Mind Your Language was cringeworthy in the extreme - every racial stereotype going, sexy Frenchwoman, inadequate nervouse Englishman, groping Italian, Sikh man wobbling his head and being very subservient. Shudder.

There was a comedy, I am sure it was set in a leisure centre? It was shit.

What was that one with Leonard Rossiter renting out rooms in his house, and there was a skinny student, Leonard Rossiter was just in a bad mood in ugly clothes, and incredible racism against the black resident? AWFUL

The Brittas Empire, sweep. No, it was utterly unfunny.

AbsofCroissant ..We were one of the lucky few households who were able to tune into Bop TV, so we managed a few series ...

but the American sitcoms were baaaaddd! 'Webster' comes to mind --

Rising Damp. Gives me the creeps to this day

No one had better diss Steptoe though...

Rising Damp. Oooh Mr Rigsby...

Rising Damp, abs. I can't bear it either. More dirty bastards from the decade that soap forgot.

Steptoe was tragic. Really really good in an awful, awful way.

Itsjust - I was JUST saying to my colleague that Bop TV was the best.

And she made this face

Yes, Webster. With the small child person.

For an apartheid government, the SABC showed a surprising number of TV shows with positive black families in them, and races happily mingling (different strokes, Cosby show, Benson)