The Office when it came out: very funny. As an American who worked in an office for over a decade, this hit very close to home. Not his character necessarily, but office life.

His movies: meh...

Derek: meh...

Extras: Good

After Life: Good

Golden Globe Host: Good

I don't follow what he gets up to off screen, "don't care."

Not crap.

The Office was good. Everything else, meh to dismal. I saw his stand-up last year, as my wife liked his Golden Globes stuff. He spent most of two hours moaning about being cancelled in front of a sell-out audience while telling mostly crap jokes, the bigoted digs garnering the biggest laughs. How he suffers for being so daring. He’s another thin-skinned millionaire going around telling the world that they need to be thick-skinned.

Edit: Crap.

This has inspired me to go back to an enrichingly scathing review of “Afterlife” by Limmy.

Stand-up comedians are always keen to point out he isn't one, he's a sitcom actor and writer who decided to try his hand at stand-up after he was already famous.

Anthony Flack wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 6:29 am Stand-up comedians are always keen to point out he isn't one, he's a sitcom actor and writer who decided to try his hand at stand-up after he was already famous.

That's obvious from watching this HBO special. Seinfeld, Louis CK and Chris Rock have standup running in their veins and Ricky does not but he wants to be one of the gang so badly.

I liked the British version of The Office a lot more than the American one, kind of on the fence with the rest of his career. He was great in the TV show Louie but that's mostly due to good writing. The dentist character is a real arsehole and Ricky nails it.

His disgusting anti-trans material feels like the desperate need for attention his character exhibited in Extras. It makes me wonder if he’s recognized this characteristic in himself for years—conflicting needs to behave with integrity and to achieve and maintain popularity and relevance.

It also makes me wonder if the true auteur of The Office and Extras was Steven Merchant.

Wood Goblin wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 8:27 am His disgusting anti-trans material feels like the desperate need for attention his character exhibited in Extras. It makes me wonder if he’s recognized this characteristic in himself for years—conflicting needs to behave with integrity and to achieve and maintain popularity and relevance.

FM steve's recent Twitter thread about him discusses exactly that: how people like this 'ironically' convey these traits for a while, before completely embracing it/maybe it was them all along.

It also makes me wonder if the true auteur of The Office and Extras was Steven Merchant.

I thought the same thing after being reminded of Merchant in that review Sparky posted.

tonyballzee wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 7:42 am

Anthony Flack wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 6:29 am Stand-up comedians are always keen to point out he isn't one, he's a sitcom actor and writer who decided to try his hand at stand-up after he was already famous.

That's obvious from watching this HBO special. Seinfeld, Louis CK and Chris Rock have standup running in their veins and Ricky does not but he wants to be one of the gang so badly.

In that video Seinfeld and CK both say they got into comedy because they "wanted to be one of those guys."

Wood Goblin wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 8:27 am His disgusting anti-trans material feels like the desperate need for attention his character exhibited in Extras.

One important criterion comedians who "say the unsayable" need meet: say things that a million other cretins aren't saying.

It also makes me wonder if the true auteur of The Office and Extras was Steven Merchant.

He seems more grounded, certainly. I've enjoyed far more things with Merchant involved than Gervais, even surprising roles like the one in Logan.

pldms wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 12:12 pm One important criterion comedians who "say the unsayable" need meet: say things that a million other cretins aren't

Oh, I know. One good criticism I read about Dave Chappelle is that his anti-trans “jokes” weren’t just hateful, they were also hacky. You can’t be a brave truthteller and also steal material from Reddit nimrods who can’t spell.

Audiences should heckle those creeps appropriately.

“Heh heh, well, I identify as a bicycle!”
“GOOD ONE! NOW ASK US WHAT THE DEAL IS WITH AIRLINE FOOD!”

This was--unintentionally--his best bit of cringe comedy.