Ricky Gervais on The Simpsons

DéiseGirl

Pretty dreadful episode.

beans

"Pre-Gervais was similar to most episodes - a bit of fun here and there. The minute he came along, it died on it's feet.

Pretty much sums it up

To throw my .02€ in, I am not a great fan of Gervais since his 'Politics' show in the Point. He didn't localise the show in any way, referring to the Falklands war and the British political parties in exactly the same manner as he did for shows in the UK, alienating the crowd (me anyway) and making it all seem like he couldnt give a toss. He was riding the wave that David Brent made, once that died down he wiped out.

This close to writing the man off as a lazy hack

meldrew

Thought it was a bit of a letdown alright and I normally like Ricky Gervais

corblimey

I taped the whole 'Ricky on the Simpsons' thing sky onc had yesterday where they showed a few of the most recent episodes along with the Ricky one. I've not watched the Simpsons in a while, and these few hours really showed me why. Dreadful nonsense. The song Ricky sang which he claimed as his best yet must have been edited rather harshly - it was no "Freelove Freeway".

I'm a huge fan of Gervais, love his standup, love The Office, Extras is good, but doesn't stand the test of time as much as The Office, but this was just really really really really ... bad.

lilmissprincess

Was absolutely useless....worst episode ever!!

_Kaiser_

lilmissprincess wrote:

Was absolutely useless....worst episode ever!!

until the next new episode rears its head

wayne040576

Really bad episode. Didn't work at all. There were a few bits were gervais tried to do his David Brent style rants but they just weren't funny.

Thomas_S_Hunterson

it was a load of bollocks

byte

Wow, that is quite unanimous! I think it's nearly safe to say it was indeed officially ****

Laguna

beans wrote:

To throw my .02€ in, I am not a great fan of Gervais since his 'Politics' show in the Point. He didn't localise the show in any way, referring to the Falklands war and the British political parties in exactly the same manner as he did for shows in the UK, alienating the crowd (me anyway) and making it all seem like he couldnt give a toss.

You know why he didn't localise the show?, it's because a huge amount of British people still think Ireland is a part of Britain, I kid you not. I was born in England to Irish parents and people I went to school with couldn't grasp the fact that Ireland has it's own Parliament, passports, currency and economy. It's arrogance really, why do you think he thought that jokes about the British Tories and Labour party would go down well?, it's because he didn't think, he's an arrogant little fat tosser; that's why.

flogen

Like Gervais, turned the episode off about 2 minutes into the second half.

As for him not localising his Politics show, what did you want? Taking British references out of it in favour of Irish ones would have meant a complete re-write... I guess he just assumed people in the audience had an idea of recent world politics given the show title, it would have been stupid of him to pretend he knew about Fianna Fail and Fine Gael anyway, let alone write a new set based on them

Rb

Was expecting it to be better, that said I'm not a fan of Gervais so don't know why I had any way high expectations of it.
Quite poor imo.

J.R.HARTLEY

fade2black wrote:

I'm a big fan of Stephen Merchant..to be honest, I think Gervais in real life is quite annoying but gives a great performance in Extras. The Patrick Stewart episode for instance was quality. At least I thought so anyway...

the simpsons episode was muck i turned it off.
extras was gas thoug, i nealry had totuen that off becuase of all the excellent cringe moments in it.
i love the Grant from eastenders one, especiallty the end when vinny jones puts him back in his box,
"d'you know what SAS stands for" "Super army soldiers":D

Sizzler

The office was genius and I never get tired of watching it again but I have to say that episode of the simpsons last night was instantly forgettable.Not in the slightest bit funny. They were trying waaaay too hard just cos RG was in it.

Tobias Greeshman

I love the office and Extra's but this episode of the Simpsons was just dire ****, he was only in it for ten minutes and it was so boring and tedious to watch. There was way too much hype to the episode.

DS

Yeh, crap. You could see a lot of Office inspired stuff in there, Gervais' character was clearly based on Brent in terms of humour. The interesting thing was how unfunny it was in an animated context. The documentary style and very "real" environment in the Office created a tension that Brent's kind of humour thrived on. But it was completely lost in a cartoon where awkward social situations and that kind of thing are completely ineffective, because it's impossible for the viewer to relate to it.

One could be forgiven for thinking that the whole Simpsons/Gervais combo would work, but the unanimous disapproval pretty much proves that certain types of humour are just completely incompatible.

branners69

The Simpsons has been dead for years.. so I wasnt expecting much from the episode..

Anyone who saw Ricky Gervais when he met Larry David saw how unfunny Gervais actually is, he was way out of his depth..

He should take a break for a couple of decades..

I might find him funny again when I am in my 50's!!

Bixmoo

well that programme with Larry David was based on two popular comedians who are fond of each other's work sitting down and talking about their influences. two legends might I add. ricky is a huge fan of the simpsons so I think his choice to take on an episode was a bit blinkered. I wish he didn't do it, he set himself up to take a lot of flak, even though the Simpsons have been rubbish for a very long time and even jesus himself probably couldn't turn it around.

radiospan

DS wrote:

Yeh, crap. You could see a lot of Office inspired stuff in there, Gervais' character was clearly based on Brent in terms of humour. The interesting thing was how unfunny it was in an animated context. The documentary style and very "real" environment in the Office created a tension that Brent's kind of humour thrived on. But it was completely lost in a cartoon where awkward social situations and that kind of thing are completely ineffective, because it's impossible for the viewer to relate to it.

One could be forgiven for thinking that the whole Simpsons/Gervais combo would work, but the unanimous disapproval pretty much proves that certain types of humour are just completely incompatible.

Spot on, DS. Their attempts to re-create Gervais' facial expressions in his character looked very forced too.

branners69

Bixmoo wrote:

two legends might I add

Thats a huge statement, there was only one legend to me on that programme..

Gervais has a hell of a lot to prove before he will be up there as a legend, one very decent programme, one decent stand-up show and a couple of lemons would hardly make him a legend in my eyes!!

I'd agree with the Simpsons comments though, he shouldnt have touched that with a barge pole..

Wait and see, that episode will be blamed for the demise of the Simpsons even though it was long dead in the water!!

Bixmoo

yeah Larry David is definitely the king. And while we're talking about that show, he came across as an extremely likeable guy as well.

I bet this Simpsons movie is going to be a whole pile of crap

_Kaiser_

This episode is on Sky at the moment and it's actuallly worse than I expected - even after reading this thread! :eek:

Nonsensical, unfunny, forced and generally a perfect example of why I haven't bothering watching any "new" episodes in ages.

Doodlebug

DS wrote:

The documentary style and very "real" environment in the Office created a tension that Brent's kind of humour thrived on. But it was completely lost in a cartoon....

Yep. Spot on. The amount of hype that was thrown about was another nail in the coffin for this episode I'm afraid...

Sky are laughing though (for now) - It was one of the biggest audiences they ever managed to pull in.

Matt Groening has also said he plans to work with him again in the future.

Ah well. Bring back Garth Merenghi I say!! Now thats funny!

TheAlmightyArse

The blokes behind Darkplace are doing a comedy chatshow, "Man to Man With Dean Learner". Garth Marenghi's publisher Dean Learner will be the man in the chair, and of course, Garth Marenghi will be one of his guests.

So, no second series of Darkplace for now, but a Knowing Me, Knowing You knock-off that hopefully won't be as bad as it sounds. Richard "I am acting" Ayoade in a lead role? Crimson Christ.

Doodlebug

Anything from that stable - if its even half as good - should be worth waiting for!
Hurray!

---

Hospital Canteen Chef (while being killed): "Goddamm. Sunovabitch"

munkeehaven

anyone know when the new "extras" will be finished? that lad that plays harry potter is supposed to be in one of them..his name escapes me..

J.R.HARTLEY

daniel radcliffe, i heard pitt was turned down for a role, there's people who've worked in tv all their lives would kill to have the ability to tell a major hollywood star to get lost

Eoin

And let's not forget the obligatory drunken Irish joke he managed to fit in.

TheAlmightyArse

But it's Ricky Gervais! It's obviously ironic when he's blatantly offensive, so that's okay! The big spastic.