Who's watched Arrested Development?

[tst]

For a little over 2 years Fox has been running what is arguably the best show on TV - Arrested Development. The show was created by the people who did (among other things) Happy Days, Macgyver, 24, Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind, From the Earth to the Moon and the upcoming, probably hugely popular, adaptation of The Da Vinci Code. In short, a competent bunch.

This show is regarded very highly by the critics and its fans and has received quite a few awards.

It consistently displays a respect for its viewers by providing several layers of humor and by having an almost infinite attention to minute details. Oh, and it's hilarious (for those who can understand all of the jokes).

The reason I'm bringing all of this up is because the show's future is unclear. It's apparently not promoted very well by Fox and it seems that even if it was, people prefer watching stupid reality shows instead. It has been scheduled for cancellation more than once and is again now. I'm not going to describe the show here, because any textual description would do it a great injustice. I will just say that I think that it's mostly one of the cleverest shows I've ever seen (definitely much more thought out than the Flying Circus, for example) and will probably still be funny 50 years from now.

I was just wondering if anyone here has been watching it and what they thought of it. For those who haven't watched it, what would you think about a show which is truly well thought out and really really funny? Would you watch it?

[LV_Pro]

Unfortunately I have seen a continual trend towards "dumbing down" on U.S. TV, historically and particularly recently. But don't worry too much tst, if it is cancelled it will almost certainly come out on DVD, then you just need to get a bunch of people to buy them and the network will reinstate the show (well it worked for "Family Guy", although I wouldn't put that too much into the "intelligent humor" catagory).

"No one expects the Spanish Inquisition"! I made a reference to that quote over the weekend and got blank stares from my friends 😞 Nice to know that in my other "circle of friends" that there are those that remember the "Circus"

P.M.

[tst]

Actually, at least the first season (and probably the second too by now) did already come out on DVD and I'm definitely considering buying it because this is something you can truly rewatch several times and a) keep on laughing and b) find minute details which you didn't see before, because they're only refering to things which come months (and sometime years) later. It really is that clever. Unfortunately, it also (rarely) descends into some annoying slapstick, but that's really very rare. Rare enough for me to mention it.

And regarding your friends, you should consider yourself lucky. I once said "Nobody expects the spanish inquisition" to someone and they responded by "Oh, so you've seen Sliding Doors too?". That's because they had a line there which goes like this:

James: Cheer up. Remember what the Monty Python boys say.
Helen: "Always look on the bright side of life"?
James: No, "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition."

While I like John Hannah a lot, knowing that line only because of him is just not right.

[Jim_Kring]

tst: My wife and I love watching Arrested Development.  The humor is smart and it is full of inside jokes that reward faithful viewers.  If you want to help save the show, fox has set up an official petition site here: http://www.getarrested.com/ .  Yes, it seems like TV is moving towards appealing the least common denominator of viewers.  This show would do great if it were picked up by HBO, but unfortunately they prefer to develop original shows (which are great, BTW) rather than pick up existing ones.

[tst]

Actually, I think that if it was on HBO, it would probably lose some of its edge. Part of what makes it funny is the way they make fun of the system while still remaining inside the rules and you can't do that in HBO.

I promised myself I wouldn't do this, but I have to say that my favorite U8 character is GOB. He quite simply gets the funniest lines ("Yeah, but where did the lighter fluid come from?") and after looking at some of Will Arnett's clips in that site I think it's just part of the actor's personality, which makes him funny in real life as well.

[crelf]

The Inquisition, here we go, the Inquisition, what a show!

We know you're wishin' that we'd go awaaaayyyyyyy...

...but the Inquisition is here and it's here to staaaayyyyyy!"

http://otherside.junik.lv/misc/inquisition.mp3

[devchander]

tst,

something tells me the 'bluths' will stay!

there seems to be a lot of backing to keep it on air.

[tst]

I just checked and it seems that the first 2 seasons on Amazon are 42$. That's good enough for me. I think I'll buy it.

[Henrik_Volkers]

I remember the days, when we had just (I didn't say only) 3 TV channels here in Germany and RTL (Radio Luxemburg) was a AM Radio (1440kHz?)

And there was a serios discussion about a TV-Free day

Since the commercial stations grow even the non-comercials "dumping-down"

I.  The amount of information in a restricted bandwidth (TV/Radio band) is constant.

II. The amount of channels increase, so the information decrease 

Replace information with interlectual any kind of level  

However HAPPY NEW YEAR

[tst]

Well, I did place an order on Amazon for the DVDs of the first 2 seasons. Maybe my 40-odd dollars will convince them it's worth keeping on the air.