[arethuza]

"David Tennant's character is notably very bad at his job; that's why he got exiled to a backwater town."

Worth noting that in Hot Fuzz (also featuring Olivia Coleman!) the main character is exiled to a rural location for being too good at his job.

[jacquesm]

That movie is a long series of spoofs nicely spliced together to form a story. To the point that it even works in the reverse, you've seen Hot Fuzz and then years later you watch some other movie and suddenly you realize that's where they got it.

[WalterBright]

Should watch "Zero Hour" (1957). "Airplane" is nearly a shot-for-shot remake, except it's done for laughs rather than a thriller.

"I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue!"

[rapind]

Airplane! also features tons of other TV and movie references doesn’t it? Basically what would have happened in these well known shows and movies when you add absurd scenarios while still playing it straight (the joke is never acknowledged of course!).

[seanc]

We had to pause the movie and explain to our kids who June Cleaver was.

It was a fun echo, because when I was a kid I watched it with my parents, and my Mom had to explain to me who Ethel Merman was.

[samplatt]

Not just jokes and scenarios - it's full of many actors that for years (and decades) played very serious "leading man" type roles. Seeing all these all-american heroes just being utter idiots helped make it so impactful.

[fhdkweig]

I was very confused when I recognized Leslie Nielsen in Forbidden Planet. I had never seen him in a non-farcical comedy role.

[jacquesm]

Thank you, I will do that. Never heard of it before!

[Insanity]

She’s also in Peep Show, which to this day is my favourite British television series.

It’s such a good piece of dark comedy.

[timthorn]

And the lesser known "Look Around You" which might also not land so well with an American audience.

Thants.

[vizzier]

For season 1 it very much satirises the early morning open university tv educational media format from the 70s through the early 2000s [1]. I'm not sure it'd land quite the same way for other countries or even for gen-z onwards.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/anniversaries/january/op...

[timthorn]

I wondered, but my 15 year old loved it.

[techterrier]

i think the skibidi toilet crew would love spiders on drugs

[Aeolun]

That’s actually pretty cool. I can think of worse things to watch in the mornings.

[benjijay]

While we're on an Olivia Colman thread, I can't leave 'Green Wing' unmentioned

[CommieBobDole]

What are birds?

We just don't know.

[teknolog]

Correct!

[petepete]

I love that 15 years before winning an Oscar she played the mother of a boy with an arse for a face, too.

NSFW, obviously.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGvH86wfrzk

And she was terrific in Fleabag.

[gertrunde]

Similiarly vintage classic Coleman...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAssh20BF-k

(Circa 2004-ish?)

(Not really sure if it counts as SFW/NSFW tbh?)

[awesome_dude]

For real humour starting Olivia, I STRONGLY recommend get appearances on Graham Norton - she's a great sport

[HPsquared]

And that's a show about people who are bad at relationships.

[Insanity]

True! Two “losers” as protagonists

[FrostViper8]

I personally never liked it. All the characters were deeply unlikable and a lot of the jokes are just disgusting shock humour. When I used to live in a shared house, I always skipped it if it was on the television.

[dumb1224]

Well depending on your taste of TV shows and the general culture.

When I moved to the UK early 2000s I could understand but can't appreciate that type of humour. I think its rooted in culture. Luckily that was the golden era of British comedies and there were great diversities so you can pick and choose what flavour you like.

[iso1631]

> Luckily that was the golden era of British comedies

You'll find people saying that about every era.

[FrostViper8]

TBH there is a few standout really good British shows and the rest is forgotten about. A lot of humour in some of shows was really tied to the time of making and a lot of audiences won't get the joke.

If you watch Today Today or Brass Eye, unless you grew up at the time, it isn't funny. Most people under 30 won't know who any of celebrities are in the show.

[iso1631]

There are some which seem timeless. 80% of Yes Minister could apply today

[dumb1224]

Yes it's only relevant if you know the reference at that time. The day today and the other satire shows aimed to follow certain general formula though so even if it's not funny for some its archetypical characters still fit in that genre of comedies in my opinion.

[dumb1224]

True that. So it's down to our preferences : )

[FrostViper8]

I actually didn't see that era as a Golden era and actually much prefer the sketch shows in the 80s and 90s such has the Fast Show.

I don't like any Mitchell and Webb stuff and don't particularly find either of them very funny.

David Mitchell's (at least on panel shows) brand of comedy is just doing a stupid face and making sardonic/cynical remark which is often some thinly veiled political jab, that the target audience often already agrees with. That isn't comedy. It is activism. Once you can see it, you can't un-see it and I find nauseating.

[hbarka]

In the 12th century a Welsh writer named Walter Map wrote the line "no good deed unpunished, no bad one unrewarded". Not quite English but maybe he was already expressing the whimsy of the English kingdom.

[Cthulhu_]

A lot of people cite Hot Fuzz as one of the best examples in filmmaking. Almost everything is a setup for a joke or scene that resolves later on in the film.

[nebula8804]

Warms my heart to see fellow Edgar Wright fans here. Felt bad about his recent film results. I waited years for that. :/

[tialaramex]

I saw Baby Driver, which I really liked but I haven't seen any of the three movies since that.

The Cornetto trilogy are excellent. I'm a big fan of Three Colours (my favourite is White) and I think that actually in the same way that Kieślowski clearly doesn't care about the supposed theme, he just wants money to make movies, we can say the same for the Cornetto movies. We're bringing the commonalities to it in our interpretation, Wright didn't pour great effort into ensuring that these movies "work" as a trilogy, but they do if you squint, in the same way that Kieślowski didn't put great effort into relating his three films to the French flag but if you squint you can make it work fine.

[nebula8804]

At the end of the day, Hollywood is a business unfortunately and his last two films did poorly

Last Night In Soho was a absolute cinematic treat but had mixed reviews. I was fortunate to see it a week before release in 35mm in NYC and it was truly a special moment. But lets be real, even with films being graded on a curve due to the pandemic, the movie still did poorly.

Ok fresh start a few years later with The Running Man. This time he got big money, three time more than Baby Driver. (34mil vs 110mil) and the result? Baby Driver brought in ~227 mil and Running Man? Just ~69 mil.

Maybe he is better off producing smaller budget films and while I want nothing but success for him since he's my all time favorite director: Hollywood is a business. They will not look kindly on someone that keeps losing money.

[chilmers]

To be fair to Wright, there were a bunch of big budget movies in 2025 that flopped: Thunderbolts, Tron Ares, Snow White, etc. There’s definitely a wider phenomenon at work of cinema struggling in general. But I agree, Wright’s big-budget career is likely over.

[nebula8804]

I like to think that if he managed to produce another smash hit maybe studios will take another chance. Studios know he is respected by the fans. Hes just got to show that he can bring in the dough and that Baby Driver wasn't just a fluke. Running Man seemed very sloppy and not what we have come to expect from him and I heard on the grapevine that the studio pushed down a lot of executive decisions. If true, that could explain some things but still surprising given his past history with Ant-Man.

[eli_gottlieb]

The older I get, the more I suspect the Neighborhood Watch Alliance of being behind all society's problems.