For me if I had to pick a good contender it would be the UK version of The Office.
I know many tend to debate how Ricky Gervais really fell off and how he repugnantly acts like a whiny centrist edgelord but me personally IMO I actually don’t think he was ever funny not even a little.
His big break through television was just so painful to sit through it’s so charismatically boring the characters are completely generic at best (notably Tim) or straight up insufferably unlikable at worst (especially the protagonist David FUCKING Brent) and most importantly the humour is just embarrassing.
Always seemed like The Thick Of It but without the nuisance tongue in cheek and charming satire.
You’re right and you should say it. Ricky Gervais has always been weird and off-putting and the idea that he was ever good has always baffled me. I never enjoyed The Office. When my dad tried to get me into Extras I just found all of Ricky’s parts annoying. When my sister told me how great Derek was, I just found the whole thing simultaneously tasteless and bland, like it couldn’t commit to being offensive but didn’t put the work into being real. His standup is often clever, but always the kind of clever that is let down by a complete lack of emotional intelligence. The man just does not understand people, but thinks he really does.
The US Office is unironically a better show because it understood what path it wanted to take as it went on and stop trying to rely heavily on cringe comedy to focus more on absurdist but still relatable scenarios.
I nearly stopped after the first few episodes. They are really bad, I just cannot see the appeal of cringe comedy.
I would say the first season is the worst, and then after that it finds its footing and it doesn’t rely on cringe comedy but actually humorous situations.
There is still a little bit of cringe after that, but the majority of it is in the first season.
I can’t watch The Office.
My empathy makes me feel super uncomfortable watching people do socially mean or cringe things. I enjoyed most of Parks and Rec, but I didn’t like the way they treated Garry, and almost stopped watching because of that running gag.
Oddly enough, I devoured The Bear. It’s not high anxiety or intensity that turns me off, it’s the banal meanness that some express that I can’t stand. The Bear is intense, but the characters feel genuine and honest
but the payoff for Garry was SO good.
There’s a huge regional and cultural aspect to what you’re saying. You’re comparing slapstick in-your-face American comedy to subtle cringe British comedy. The Office is an excellent example since it is exactly the same script used in both initially. Watching S1E1 for British vs American version is an excellent comparison of styles. I don’t like British comedy particularly and don’t even like The Office, but watching both back to back, I would prefer the British version.
There are a number of amazing British comedies. They are very different to American. British comedies are understaffed, a bit miserable. Try “I’m Alan Partridge”…such an amazing comedy.
Equally I’ve tried watching Curb Your Enthusiasm with British friends and a large portion can’t stand that for how cringe it is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
There’s no superior choice in matters of art and taste. Just different flavours.
Part of the longevity of the US version was the decision to make characters likable, especially Michael Scott / the manager. The UK version leans hard into the cringe / social ineptitude and gives the manager essentially no redeeming qualities.
There’s a big cultural difference between Curb and Partridge - cringe isn’t universal!
Specifically, Larry in Curb has a distinctly American sense of individualism. He does what he wants and doesn’t care if someone doesn’t like him for it. The cringe comes from his attempts to enforce his own set of unwritten social values on others.
Alan Partridge is the exact opposite - fundamentally insecure and desperate for approval. His cringe comes from lack of self-awareness and trying to fake social status, which is painfully obvious to a British audience with our deeply ingrained sense of class.
Ultimately, taste is taste, but I think that goes some way towards explaining why some people like one or the other but not both.
For me it’s Friends. I don’t get all the hype about it until today. I tried watching a few episodes but it was nothing special. It was just a sitcom, nothimg special about it.
It was special because “everyone” watched it. The meh or bad parts were whatever, while the exciting or good parts were something you could talk with all your friends about at school. This made the good parts uniquely good.
So unless you happened to both be alive and watch it when it ran, it just won’t be amazing.
Alternately, you were “the kind of person who didn’t watch Friends”, which still made it a cultural touchstone.
Same here. Personally I thought the British comedy Coupling was so much better done.
I haven’t seen a full episode but Big Train seems like it had some legs, and was right around The Office timeframe.
My favorite scene with a VERY young Simon Pegg: https://youtu.be/VKH9ECC_Qa4?is=sntN4AxaEXgPHFsg
The US Coupling could have been the new Friends, but they bungled it just as bad as That 80s Show.
Except the last season. That was bad.
No Geoff. No show.
My aunt Gisela promised to bring me into touch with my father. In reality, she simply darkened the room and, with a lowered voice, gave a bad imitation of my deceased dad. That’s one medium I could do without.
Funny and original comment. Nicely done
I am trying to watch “The Wire” (on ep. 10) because it is one the highest rated show on imdb, but it doesn’t click in me. It is high quality product. Acting, music, camera work are all good. But is just boring for me, and I force myself to do it.
Same was with The Sopranos btw.
P. S. Ricky Gervais is funniest comedian for me. I watched his Life’s Too Short, After Life and I like it a lot. For me it’s very funny and bravely. Never watched British The office, may be shouldn’t, thanks.
Agree, I actually think he is a fantastic actor and that’s missed in the role, don’t confuse the role with the actor and the tone of UK black comedy. Yes he roasts but it’s in a highlight kind of way and tends to be pointed at mocking privilege and arrogance. I’d suggest trying his other stuff like afterlife.
The wire’s magic is that every character seems real, more like the show is a documentary rather than a TV show. And it carries all the way through, the quality never ends. You have to accept that you are watching a slow burn documentary, else you won’t get it.
I think it takes a different approach mentally to enjoy it. Especially compared to anything modern. I’m working through it slowly myself and just finished season 3. I watch it with friends tho which maybe makes it easier to watch.
All that said, if it’s not clicking after 10 hours, could be best to put it down. You can always try again later.
If the actual premise of the show isn’t interesting, then it may not matter how quality it is.
Hmm. I don’t know how I would feel if a person told me they found the premise of The Wire uninteresting… it’s a deep look at poverty, political corruption, black American life in inner city Baltimore, commentary on police and our justice system etc etc etc… there’s a lot to chew on, unless you came from the same background as the characters idk how a person could find the premise boring intellectually, and even then I’d still be surprised. The pacing however… yeah season one is slow
While I personally liked the show, it is heavy. Not everyone likes watching shows about serious topics.
You’re the first person I’ve ever seen that made it that far into The Wire and didn’t like it. Are you American? If not, I think that maybe makes more sense. For Americans, it’s just such a great representation of so many things that every city experiences. And the fact that you see the same story from so many different perspectives is just SO compelling. I think it should be watched/taught in high schools because of how many perspectives it gives on the plights of society in American cities.
Only When I got to season 3 did I understand why people rave about it. Each season is like an onion layer.
Star Wars, Marvel movies, basically film in general. Goes for TV shows too.
It wasn’t until my mid-twenties that I concluded that video is just not an entertainment medium that works for me. I tried really, really hard to like it, and I gave all of the really popular films or TV shows or even YouTube videos a fair shot.
A big part of why many of the things in this thread haven’t aged well, is because a lot of what made these shoes original and unique was copied to death following the fame of the original.
If you weren’t there for the original release of a piece of media, there’s a good chance you’re not necessarily seeing it in the context where the accolades make sense.
Seinfeld basically invented the 3 camera sitcom and a lot of the key tropes in the format. If you go back today having not watched it before, the vast majority of it just comes across as a boring sitcom, because every sitcom to follow took notes from the way they did Seinfeld.
It’s the same with the UK office, it basically invented the modern mockumentary format as well as the cringe comedy era that followed (and gave us things like peep show). If you look back now without that context, it just looks like a generic combination of both those things.
Just to mention it, this is literally named the Seinfeld is Unfunny effect on TVTropes
I think the bigger issue is that most of the show isn’t that good. Less than half the seasons are good, and the lows from the bad seasons are really low. Watching it on a streaming scenario exposes this a lot more than reruns of the good parts.
I actually still enjoyed it for the most part last time I went through. Jerry’s standup is terrible and I have no clue how he ever got an audience, but the actual show I enjoyed most of, even if nowadays pretty much all the plots would be solved because everyone would have a cell phone.
Seinfeld didn’t invent the three camera sitcom, but it was important in creating modern sitcoms that didn’t have a lesson to learn at the end of redeeming protagonists.
Ahh so THAT’S what they meant with the whole “It’s about nothing!” thing…
The Office (US) pretty much killed laugh tracks in US sitcoms.
I believe “I Love Lucy” is credited with inventing or popularizing the three camera sitcom. Not to dampen’s "Seinfeld"s contributions or the point of your comment, but I just wanted to add that small correction.
Macgruber. I’ve tried two different times to watch it once while sober and once while high, and it just, I fucking hate it. I don’t know what it is. Everything about it is terrible. I cannot complete the movie.
That and the Broadway edition of Cats. 15 or 20 seconds in and for some reason watching the actors dance around in cat costumes trigger some sort of primordial anger, rage, terror, something in me.
I was screaming at my family to stop it, I had to physically leave the room.
Cats.
primordial anger, rage, terror
This is a typical response.
So you say it brought forth deep emotions. It moved you.
(never seen it, idk…)
Oh yes, it stirred something deep inside. This show could be used as an ipecac substitute. I may be particularly sensitive as I was on crew for this production many moons ago.
Just stab yourself in the ear with a rusty knife, you’ll get the gist of it.
An additional beneficial side effect of watching the first, I don’t know, two minutes of cats if you can make it that far is it will confirm for you forever whether or not you are a furry.
I am solidly in the not a fucking furry crowd.
not a fucking furry crowd
I misread this as “not fucking a furry crowd” at first which changes the meaning a bit!
The James Cameron Avatar movies.
Great example of; just because it was a technical masterpiece, that doesn’t make a movie good. The special effects were outstanding for the time, and still hold up very well. That is something I will always praise it for, but it is the only thing worth praising about it. It really is a very polished turd, in that sense.
Yeah I saw it in IMAX 3D and it was certainly a spectacle. The visuals were phenomenal, but the film itself was otherwise completely forgettable.
I’ve never seen them, probably not going to either
They’re so bad.
…well the first one was. Didn’t bother with any after that…
I thought the wecond one was way better and more intereating than the first one. It even made me genuinely sad at one point. I watched like 15 or 20min of the third one and found unwatchable. I’m not saying you should watch the second one, because it’s a masterpiece or something, but i thought that if they keep that pace, maybe the third one will be good are something. It’s still a technical marvel, at least the first one at the time and the second one for the insane water scenes and water physics and time and effot that went into it. The third one looks a lot more like a greenscreen movie.
The first 2 are pretty much the same plot so you’re not missing much. Not sure about the 3rd one not interested in it.
It also has basically the same plot with the same enemies. Except they added a red lady villain that is weirdly sexualized and a kid gets magic powers - because nature.
Utter snoozefest I didn’t get the hype at all
I lost all respect for the movie and the entire franchise after hearing “unobtainium” as the name of the super rare space mineral. Nearly walked out of the theater.
I can’t remember if they ever refer to it as anything else in that movie but I actually appreciated this scene in the first movie for two reasons:
Info dumps irritate me in sci fi. He’s like the main guy in charge talking to one of his lead scientists. They both absolutely fucking know why they’re there. They know what it’s called and what it’s for. He’s spelling it out for our benefit without breaking in-world character. If, in-world, someone started pedantically outlining what the rocks were for to their lead scientists, it would be the equivalent of calling them an idiot. Calling it “unobtainium” is like saying “we’ve had this argument before, I remember everything you said last time, you know everything I’m about to tell you, and nothing you or I do will change what’s happening because you cant get it anywhere else and oh yeah it’s worth a fuck load of money”.
I can’t remember if they later retcon that into being the actual name, but in that moment, it didn’t sound like the actual name, it sounded like slang being used informally during a semi heated discussion.
Whether or not that was the original intent I LOVE this interpretation. I like to be entertained and err on the side of “Maybe this is a deliberate choice these very smart and passionate people made to smooth out a story.”
Sometimes I feel like people get mad that they aren’t just dropped into a completely fleshed out imaginary world.
It’s entertainment delivered to them as they relax in a chair, requiring zero effort on their part, and they make it a goal to nitpick whatever reminds them this slice of imagination was designed by humans, and isn’t actually a fully functional parallel universe they can literally isekai into to escape the mundanity of modern existence.
Critic culture is overrated, and I wish people would exercise their suspension of disbelief, basically. Hahaha
The plot sucks and the characters are forgettable, but that’s not the point. The point is the graphics, the locations, the crazy wildlife and eywa. The neural queues and the floating islands. Its a masterclass in world building, and has been an endless source of inspiration.
The first time I saw the first one in the theater I was blown away. Then I went and saw it again with someone else and paid more attention to the plot the second time and …yeah.
When did you watch it? When it came out, it was technically impressive for the computer-generated graphics, which included a lot of highly-detailed and expansive “organic” stuff like forests.
Here’s some quotes from the Roger Ebert review from the time:
https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/avatar-2009
Like “Star Wars” and “LOTR,” “Avatar” employs a new generation of special effects. Cameron said it would, and many doubted him. It does. Pandora is very largely CGI. The Na’vi are embodied through motion capture techniques, convincingly. They look like specific, persuasive individuals, yet sidestep the eerie Uncanny Valley effect. And Cameron and his artists succeed at the difficult challenge of making Neytiri a blue-skinned giantess with golden eyes and a long, supple tail, and yet–I’ll be damned. Sexy.
Cameron promised he’d unveil the next generation of 3-D in “Avatar.” I’m a notorious skeptic about this process, a needless distraction from the perfect realism of movies in 2-D. Cameron’s iteration is the best I’ve seen — and more importantly, one of the most carefully-employed. The film never uses 3-D simply because it has it, and doesn’t promiscuously violate the fourth wall.
I mean, I remember being underwhelmed after I went to watch Avatar with a friend who was deeply impressed, but it did show off a lot of render capability for the time. I’d call it more impressive as a tech demo.
It’s way beyond a tech demo. Each Avatar movie invented dozens of new techniques. They actually film using cameras. They do a CGI movie with cameras, filming real actors acting. And they become huge blue aliens, while being filmed on a camera. It’s truly insane. I don’t like the movies themselves, but the BTS for them is crazy.
And that sort of thing totally DOES permeate throughout the industry. Whenever Pixar or Weta(RIP?) or Cameron or DreamWorks or whoever invent something REALLY COOL. . .
. . .At some point we eventually get it in Blender, and I think that’s neat.
@MonkeMischief you’re into animation ?
I’m pretty sure that’s Cameron’s goal. He saw the direction movies were going and wanted to guarantee a niche for artists will keep existing within it 🤷♂️
I watched it in 3D too and was blown away
Didn’t expect this is how I found out Roger Ebert was a furry
We will never get along
Not quite what you’re asking for, because this one I can at least stand to watch, but Futurama was one of the biggest “I’m not impressed but know people who adore it” pieces of media for me.
I’ve liked past Matt Groening stuff. I liked Life is Hell. I liked (earlier) The Simpsons stuff.
I’ve sat next to people who crack up while watching Futurama.
But I don’t think I’ve ever chuckled at the humor in Futurama. It throws out a series of jokes that just don’t make me chuckle at all.
That being said, I haven’t watched it for some time, so I haven’t seen the newer stuff.
Same. I used to watch Futurama a lot and I usually found it amusing, but I never made any audible noises of enjoyment.
If you didnt laugh at futurama you didnt laugh at the simpsons. Even the early ones. You may have been a child that was giggling at the colors or that a catoon was on at night but you werent listenting to the punch lines at the time.
It’s very much a Gen-X nostalgia bucket.
I do agree that it’s full of cultural references and that lacking it would probably detract from it, but even so, I just don’t see how someone having that context makes the jokes funny.
One example I had in mind was when I brought up the fact that I just didn’t really find the jokes funny even through some people really did laugh. At the time, the show was showing some robots trying to pack boxes and they kept failing, because when they put them together, they’d eliminate them, in an allusion to Tetris. That is, indeed, a Gen-X reference. The guy I was watching it with was chortling. I remember asking him about it and him saying “it’s hilarious!”
I mean…I get the reference there. I’ve owned a couple versions of Tetris. I played it back when the game was young. But…even having the cultural context, it’s just…there’s none of the stuff that make something funny for me there. I just look at it and say “yeah, they’re alluding to Tetris.” Maybe it’s that there’s not enough buildup or something.
I remember some episode when a bunch of hippies are protesting outside Professor Farnsworth’s house. The Professor tells them to get off his property. A hippie says “You can’t own property, man!” The Professor says, “You can’t, because you’re a penniless hippie!” I mean…I’m not offended by it poking fun at communism, but…I see the political conflict there, but it just doesn’t make me laugh. Or the Dr. Zoidberg humor, which in significant part is him acting inappropriately…I dunno. It’s hard to figure out precisely what makes humor work for people — if we did, we could probably produce it a lot more mechanically — but whatever the writing team did just…consistently didn’t tickle it for me.
That’s funny, I’m the exact opposite. I grew up never getting why people liked the Simpsons, but Futurama is one of the funniest, most entertaining, and most moving shows I’ve seen.
The Game of Thrones TV series.
I really enjoyed the George R. R. Martin novels that they were based on, but the TV series just didn’t do it for me.
I did enjoy the Lord of the Rings movies, so I know that it’s possible to do film adaptations of fantasy novels that do click with me.
I feel like most people that read ASOIAF beforehand are disappointed with how it turned out. The first season is practically a perfect adaptation of the first book, except Tyrion now spends his time having sex with whores and getting drunk instead of spending his nights in the library reading as much as he can.
And that was the beginning of it going to shit
I thought all four seasons were pretty good, though they lean on discovering the plot and lose a lot of rewatchability for it.
Heh, too bad they never continued the series past there :P
Boobies equal ratings!
The Office
Napoleon Dynamite
Grease
Reservoir Dogs
Big Bang Theory (or any popular laugh-track sitcom post 2000)
(Nevermind, you said highly extolled, not just popular)
Chicago, Rent, and Cats
Harry Potter (even before JKR went full terf, probably just a generational thing, honestly)
Taylor Swift (again, nothing personal, just not my jam)
Sideways, Marriage Story, Whiplash (intense interpersonal drama, particularly dealing with infidelity or power disparity)Star Trek in general.
TNG was OK when it was on TV, and everything else on TV sucked more.
The fourth movie was actually funny and enjoyable.
But I don’t get the appeal that sparked such a huge fandom.My mother is a huge star trek fan from the era where it was biggest. The thing that really did it for her was that it’s one of the few good outcomes in the future. They’re out on space exploring for altruism and the novelty of it, not colonialism, not for the destruction of earth’s enemies, not to find a home became we destroyed ours, almost every other space media uses it as a for-warning of the outcome of the poor choice we currently make. Star trek is the future we want. No money because all needs are met. Alien contact because they believe we have potential to be equals, stuff like that.
The shows actually do a terrible job conveying this and a worse job using the tools at hand, but I honestly don’t know any other media with such a hopefully fiew.
So.
Star Trek was genuinely groundbreaking when it aired. First was that basically no other sci-fi story had a hopeful vision of the future, so it was instantly different. Star trek was a meritocracy, it was post-scarcity, characters where hailed for being competent moral people, instead of morally bankrupt nepo-babies.
Second was that the show treated people like adults, a lot of the storytelling involved significant moral conundrums, and included scenarios with no easy answer.
Finally, the shows sci-fi setting let it tackle ideas that otherwise would be untouchable. Racism was shown to be absurd not by having black people and white people, but you could see a whole planet where people half-white and half-black would oppress (and be horribly racist) towards exactly the same people, but who had the white part on the other side of the body.
Finally, the casting for the show, and the characterization was amazing. Kirk is (imo) a boring character, but the dynamic of Kirk Spock and Scotty made for genuinely interesting interpersonal dialog.
Granted, its been done again and again, and done better (Notably, TNG is better in almost every way IMO), and so the formula got stale, and you cant help but compare Star Trek to the copies, several of whom inevitably did certain parts better.
It’s really easy to rank the Star Trek TV series for me. The earlier it came out, the better.
I liked STNG at the time, but I tried watching them again recently and it didn’t age well. I’m not even talking about the special effects or anything, I don’t really care. I’ve gotten used to shorter serialized seasons rather than long episodic seasons.
For clarification: serialized = plot continues through episodes - vs- episodic = each episode is a self-contained plot
Blade Runner
2001: A Space Odyssey
Citizen KaneThese movies are so well regarded and spoken so highly of (ok - maybe not Blade Runner); their champions are so passionate and enthusiastic, every time I hear folks go off on how great they are I get, once again, excited to watch them. But every time I try, I just can’t get into them. 2001 is a particular slog with its ~30 minute intro of no dialogue. It almost inevitably puts me to sleep before even the first word is spoken.
I hate that they’re so well regarded and I really want to enjoy them but I just can’t get into them.
Citizen Kane is generally considered the origin of the “innovative media that’s considered boring because everyone copied it so now it seems cliche” trope. It was a masterpiece when it came out, but it pioneered so much stuff that became commonplace. When a modern audience looks back at it, you just see the cliches, without realizing that they’re only cliches because they were endlessly repeated afterward.
2001: A Space Odyssey
I like behind the scenes footage far more than the movie. I can appreciate how it’s made but I absolutely can’t stand to actually watch the resulting movie.
Citizen Kane
@9point6@lemmy.world has a comment below stating that some of these are examples where a piece of media did something new and innovative that was so compelling that many subsequent pieces of media copied it, and thus whatever it was that the piece of media did failed to impress later audiences. For them, it was just the new normal. So the work was very influential…but maybe no longer stands out.
I’ve often seen Citizen Kane cited as being the poster child for this.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizen_Kane
The film’s narrative structure, cinematography and themes have influenced countless filmmakers and films worldwide, asserting its place as a cornerstone in the history of cinema
Definitely true. I’ve heard the same and it’s another one of the reasons I want to appreciate it.
A other example of this that’s frequently cited and happened in my own life time which makes it easy to see first hand and understand is The Matrix/bullet-time.
For blade runner the original film is awful. I didn’t get the hype until I watched the directors cut which I personally thought was excellent.
2001 definitely overrated.
I enjoyed Citizen Kane though I completely understand why you wouldn’t like it.
They are worshipped because they were the first in their particular area (neon cyberpunk, Space FX, non-linear storytelling). Each has been improved on by so many other films that the originals pale in comparison.
They are classics, but not timeless.
2001: A Space Odyssey is so insanely boring and pretentious, I’m still glad I watched it though because it’s very influential, you even see it in the Project Hail Mary movie, and it’s satisfying to have context to art but unless you’re really into watching films I wouldn’t suggest it to anyone
Blade Runner is sooo boring. I’ve tried watching it a few times and it just doesn’t click for me.
This post made me angry because I’m one of the people that love this 3 movie and go passionate about them.
