Alan Partridge comes to BBC America

i wonder if he was clantily scad

Tash-hag

And of course people have reversed the backwards footage.

I know it's very obvious, but I just loved the way he crowded out every single woman on the "special women's episode", as happens so often in real life, blah blah.

I loved how you could see him tune out the second Deegle mentioned putting fuel in a turbocharger.

I didn't watch a lot of Mid-Morning Matters, so I'm not really sure I'm getting a grip on Simon's character. Does he have one, or is it just this? I don't really know what he thinks about anything.

lolly was a highlight again

the way the guy at the start flirted with alan was hilarious, and how alan’s responses to the guy gradually built up. kmkywap done with flair.

And call back to the ladyboys film in the Linton Travel Tavern.

best one yet

I loved how you could see him tune out the second Deegle mentioned putting fuel in a turbocharger.

the thing i loved most about this is that you know exactly what’s going through his mind the whole time (and so he doesn’t have to say a single word for this to work), but you need to really understand alan and why he’s trying so hard not to interrupt her, for the joke to really hit hard. when he finally cracked i actually cried laughing, mainly from the anticipation of him saying exactly what we knew he was going to say.

this episode in particular was full of beautifully timed gags that completely paid off. easily the best of the series.

also, now that there’s only one episode left, i can’t help wondering if it will end with him just... hosting the show. no sacking, no catastrophe, just the very real prospect of a second series.

Fucking rantillion!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-JL7zdjltc

Rantallion! It's one of the swears the woman at the British library taught him

I also really appreciated how he didn't touch the books, even though he was really frustrated and he clearly wanted to, and twenty years ago he would have, and there would have been a row. I was waiting for that to happen, and not looking forward to it.

no sacking, no catastrophe, just the very real prospect of a second series.

the Gibbonses are in pre-production on a new Alan project for the BBC to air later this year, probably a doco about British history. so he probably either remains in situ or gets promoted next week.

it'd be fine if he stays as the This Time host for a couple of years as a new status quo for the character imo. North Norfolk Digital was the home base for eight years of content, a change offers new scope for Partridge to be terrible again

Does he have one, or is it just this? I don't really know what he thinks about anything.

he's Alan's full-time on-air sidekick for most of MMM, and is baaasically smarter and more aware of things than Alan, but quite subservient to him, both professionally and due to self-confidence levels. so there is more to him that doesn't have a place in this series, where Key's main role is to shit himself in panic at being on TV.

(I reckon it would have been better not to add Simon until the second week, so Alan was a wee bit more established before bringing this unnecessary ninth wheel into a moving production)

the oysters segment was v good - "like a ghost's tongue"!!

still wildly uneven though. i thought the entire swear word package was v unfunny

and the joke w/lolly adefope contradicting him isn't funny enough to sustain the same joke repeated on every episode

the lolly joke is evolving though. last week she was deliberately faking the transatlantic delay. this week alan asked the exact same question and got a different answer. he knows she's doing it, is trying to catch her out, but she's still winning.

last two week's endings have relied on prosthetics, masks on top of the mask, i'm not sure i approve.

I found that one of the weaker epsiodes actually *shrug emoji*. I was knackered when I watched it last night though.

i thought the one with the IRA songs was better than the most recent one but yes, I was also knackered

The Lolly gag (ha) just gets better the more they do it. I'm a Stewart Lee fan btw

The Lolly gag (ha) just gets better the more they do it.

agreed. it's all in how OF COURSE someone like Alan would be easily provoked by Lolly, and how she triumphs over him every time.

last two week's endings have relied on prosthetics, masks on top of the mask, i'm not sure i approve.

― koogs, Wednesday, 27 March 2019 22:37 (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah, singing that shit song with giant lips wasn't funny at all, and you could see it coming from a mile off.

sic:

it'd be fine if he stays as the This Time host for a couple of years as a new status quo for the character imo. North Norfolk Digital was the home base for eight years of content, a change offers new scope for Partridge to be terrible again

yes! this would be perfect

Doesn't look like the series will end without a catastrophe:

"Something happens, as you might expect, next week; really, this should be Alan’s last “Aha”. He has had his last chance in the mainstream and comprehensively blown it; he should surely go back to the margins, to the broadcasting doldrums."

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/mar/26/is-this-time-alan-partridges-last-aha

that’s good news. i was thinking it might end without a catastrophe for alan’s career, which i suppose is still possible

oh god the sleep woman!

“I could harm them but choose not to”

was brilliantly creepy coming after me doubling up in laughter at the arse scratching.

Terrific Ep though I wish there had been more Jennie.

best episode of the series and I think it was because there was no Jennie

was basically an episode of Mid-Morning Matters by the end

rather strange and ambiguous ending

I don't know, it fits in with the Gibbons' comments that the next AP BBC show will be something different again - goes and has the chat, is still owed a favour by the Beeb for stepping into the gap so the spat with Jennie is put down to a personality clash and AP is given his own show to break up the partnership. As I speculated at the time, my guess is replacing Simon Farnaby on his battlefield archeology show after he's tainted by the This Time Yewtree brush. It sounded from the outset like the sort of thing AP would have done on Skirmish if it had a budget.

I just didn't really enjoy this series at all. It felt really broad! I guess Alan as a character concept needed to evolve to survive, but the weird funny voices he'd do didn't work for me, and mostly I just ended up feeling anxious over the inevitable fuck-ups, rather than enjoying any of them.

The IRA singer was great though. And the running gag with Lolly.

I was thinking the caller was going to fall from the ledge and die, glad they didn't go for that as too obvious.

I liked the series, not that much laugh-out-loud funny, but loads of moments that are worth coming back to, and I notice more every time I rewatch a bit.

aldo otm, jennie could cop the blame for being the one to storm off, and alan could come out on top for keeping the show together

Was Alan actually doing a good job by the end or is that just my investment in the character?

The police thing was really odd, don't think it worked really.

yeah it was a bit obvious

i do think alan (and simon!) were doing a reasonable job by the end, which i suppose is the point – a) as sidekicks they're on top of their game, and b) they made it work in a crisis. alan even exposed his interview subject for using his interpreter to try it on. it's like they've lined up 'this time' for a *cough*

The bit with the fashion designer was funny, in how he seemed to get into the swing of it as the segment wore on, but felt like a retread of the scissored isle bit where he really got into working on a supermarket checkout. And I don't know if it's just because we now live in A Different Time, but the hilarity of Alan's retrogade sexual politics - even though he's trying at least a little to be a smidgeon more woke this time round - just doesn't really feel very funny to me.

Wasn't it explicit that it hadn't gone well, ie Lynn not telling him it had gone well, the interview with the African water guy going badly, the exec producer being v angry at him?

Lynn not telling him it had gone well, the interview with the African water guy going badly

the former was in relation to the latter

and the exec seems much more likely to be angry about the recorded comments

I guess Alan as a character concept needed to evolve to survive, but the weird funny voices he'd do didn't work for me, and mostly I just ended up feeling anxious over the inevitable fuck-ups, rather than enjoying any of them.

I liked that Alan had some obvious professionalism compared to Simon - Simon's cheery tone when talking about the corrupt govt, for example, and Alan obviously thinking he should be doing sad serious voice instead

the former was in relation to the latter

no, Alan specifically asks her to tell him the fashion bit went well and she won't

Overall a slightly disappointing series - I feel the tone wasn't particularly well managed, and it was often quite self indulgent. When it was good it was very good, though.

Wasn't it explicit that it hadn't gone well, ie Lynn not telling him it had gone well, the interview with the African water guy going badly, the exec producer being v angry at him?

the interview ended in a pretty deft exposé, the exec producer is angry but it’s not clear why, and lynn’s poor judgement had been called out a couple of times earlier iirc. to me it really feels like it could go either way.

Overall a slightly disappointing series - I feel the tone wasn't particularly well managed, and it was often quite self indulgent. When it was good it was very good, though.

yeah, it missed the mark a hell of a lot, but the best bits were classic alan.

https://www.chortle.co.uk/news/2019/04/05/42703/alan_partridge_to_front_a_sweeping_history_of_britain

filming in may.

some people have been knocking the gibbons era but this has been absolutely fine. ‘this time’ is definitely better without the weight of expectation (in australia it’s just gone up on iview so i’m watching them all again), and i maintain that ‘welcome to the places of my life’ is easily one of the best pieces of partridge in existence.

Overall a slightly disappointing series - I feel the tone wasn't particularly well managed, and it was often quite self indulgent. When it was good it was very good, though.

That about sums it up really

Disappointed we didn't get to see Ruth in the last episode

some people have been knocking the gibbons era

I've liked all the stuff they've done up to now, but 'This Time' felt too much like Partridge fan fiction to me. Did enjoy the CPR doll/Another One Bites The Dust scene, though, and his fantastic selection of jackets.

interesting you should say that, because to me the cpr scene felt more like fanfic than anything in the whole series

on rewatching the whole thing in a day, the quality of the writing really jumps out. the dialogue is crafted to within an inch of its life, even if some of the broader aspects don’t land, and the acting (especially from fielding) is far better than i remember from classic partridge.

the series arcs were pretty jarring though: the ruth thing building up and then just stopping, the way they handled simon and lucy hooking up, jennie suddenly storming out in the last one.

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2020/feb/15/the-trip-series-four-greece-rob-brydon-steve-coogan

3rd of March

Yeah. I’m seeing the new Winterbottom-Coogan film tomorrow and frankly it looks really shit but I’m not above being psyched for a new series of this

this time series 2 and a podcast coming