Hyperdrive

[Oddboy]

that dark-haired over-acting security chief bloke used to be good in a sketch show.
.... with Simon Pegg.  I'm seeing a patten here.

[House of Usher]

that dark-haired over-acting security chief bloke used to be good in a sketch show

"The actor Kevin Eldon". He used to be in Big Train, Fist of Fun, This Morning With Richard Not Judy, and Attention Scum.

Yeah he's terrible in hyperdrive. Shame.

[Matt Timson]

"Hobbies"

[House of Usher]

Fantastic. In the live show he used to pick on some kid from the audience. "What's your name? How old are you, Steven? 15? I know what your hobby is..."

[Rob Spalding]

You may now drink your weak lemon drink.

[MIKE COLLINS]

That bloke over-acting constantly whilst hunting down the alien was ludicrous: but not funny.

Apparently in the pilot, the role was played by Mark Gatiss... it makes it look like a bad Mark Gatiss impression.

This show suffered by NOT being as funny as Sky One's CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD. That is how you do funny SF-- you pretend it's a serious show... still dead giveaways were the troubled youndg female weather scientist who -angry with her boss- gets a job at Coyote Ugly.

AND it has Randy Quaid in it sending up his role in Independence Day.

Pure deep fried gold.

[Funt Solo]

Talking of Sky One comedies - lastnight I caught a show called "Over There", in which a ridicoulously attractive group of US infantry go to Iraq to help keep the peace, but are thwarted in their purely altruistic goals by shifty swarthy un-named arab madmen, mine-laying evil children and the truth-twisting media empire of evil known only as Al Jazera.

When they're not being unfairly shot at whilst just trying to do an honest days work, they relax back at camp by unveiling their amazing hidden artistic talents.

At least I presume it's a comedy.

[House of Usher]

Sounds vile !

[longmanshort]

I caught myself false-laughing at Hyperdrive, merely to fill the embarrassed silences that followed their attempts at The Office-style humour, but with the canny scripts. Or the jokes.

Nice premise, good SFX, but poor writing. Rather than showing humorous social difficulties, the 'awkward silences' merely highlighted how thinly spread the jokes were. The whole Peterborough thing was funny, perhaps, three times. But after that, you realised that was all there was to the plot. Personally, (even without seeing the rest of the series) I'd have thought about compressing all the jokes into a one-hour special or two-part series. As a longer series, it's looking disturbingly threadbare.

Disappointing, but still funnier than Red Dwarf.

[Matt Timson]

"Disappointing, but still funnier than Red Dwarf"

Except it wasn't, was it?  Red Dwarf had its low points, but there was nothing in Hyperdrive that was better than the best of Red Dwarf- no matter how cool it is to dislike Red Dwarf these days.

[longmanshort]

Hey, I found Red Dwarf unfunny waaaay before it was cool to do so ... while the first two seasons had some merit, I think it was the ubiquitous RD slogan t-shirts that finally pushed me over the edge.

[Thursday]

Hmm... I've always though Red Dwarf I-V were pretty good, reaching nigh-genius heights at its very best.  VI was good, just not as good.  After that...

My hopes for Hyperdrive were scuppered pretty much from the opening lines: instead of some unfunny tannoy announcer talking about the clone officer, they really should have called it the Clone Arranger.  Yeah, it would have been a crap joke, but at least it would have been a joke.

[Matt Timson]

The whole 'red alert' bit was funny the first time I saw it (in fact, I think I enjoyed series six best of all), but was one of the things killed by the subsequent T-shirt campaign- so I'll give you that one.

Of course, I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you exactly which moment in Hyperdrive you thought was funnier than the best that Red Dwarf had to offer (this should be good).

[Dudley]

Hey, I found Red Dwarf unfunny waaaay before it was cool to do so ... while the first two seasons had some merit, I think it was the ubiquitous RD slogan t-shirts that finally pushed me over the edge.

Never understood that argument - if I were surrounded by 5 billion people wearing "Catch-22" slogan T-shirts, I'd still find the book funny.

[hag]

from radiotimes.com

"Let's hope this series gets a chance to establish itself because amid all the talk of the death of the sitcom, it's a little gem. Life on board HMS Camden Lock, flogging British business interests around the galaxy, is deliciously lowrent, for all the aspirations of deluded Commander Henderson (Nick Frost). As the ship makes contact with an unexplored planet, Henderson waxes lyrical, while his boss barks across the video link. The pace occasionally flags, but there are some beautifully turned jokes. Look out for the information fllm the crew have to watch before they depart, in the fine tradition of Simpsons information film pastiches ("Remember," it booms, "Alien sex is danger sex"), and the aliens' wonderfully rubbish doom ray. But best of all is Frost, who pulls off the perfect sitcom combo of being ridiculous and lovable at the same time. A star in the making."


I'm watching it just to see if this guy is on crack.