[Ruffian]

Having been sent slightly deranged by free to air TV I have now resolved to avoid it wherever possible by buying/'borrowing' quality viewing experiences and skipping the middleman entirely.

The current programming is just shooting itself in the foot - by changing screening times arbitrarily, playing episodes out of order, repeating seasons randomly interspersed with new material, and my favourite, simply pulling a series half way through for no obvious reason.

The following is a list of shows that were pretty good.
Can anyone suggest anything in a similar vein (ie family viewing or borderline family viewing) that I've missed?

- Almost everything produced by Joss Whedon, esp. Firefly, The Dollhouse, and Dr Horrible's Singalong Blog
- Green Wing
- Due South
- Pushing Daisies
- The Lost Room
- Weeds
- 30 Rock
- Big Bang Theory
- Arrested Development
and things like Scrubs, Black Adder, Blacks Books, Dr Who, Torchwood, Star Trek etc.

Any suggestions would be welcome.

[tor]

 Ruffian, on 25 January 2012 - 06:57 AM, said:

- Almost everything produced by Joss Whedon, esp. Firefly, The Dollhouse, and Dr Horrible's Singalong Blog
- Green Wing
- Due South
- Pushing Daisies
- The Lost Room
- Weeds
- 30 Rock
- Big Bang Theory
- Arrested Development
and things like Scrubs, Black Adder, Blacks Books, Dr Who, Torchwood, Star Trek etc.

Any suggestions would be welcome.

ARCHER!!!!!!! animated drunken bastard james bond.

Misfits was very very good for the first 2 seasons, haven't watched 3 yet, maybe MA type material.
Daily Show with Jon Stewart.
Miranda is great. Giant she chick does english awkward humour, I'd put it up there with Green Wing (if you have the holiday special of GW let me know, can't find it anywhere).
The thing with the family, overcrowded or something, very good, new season on ABC. ooops called outnumbered. Kids are great in that. If you have kids it might be a bit like the office where I hated it because it was too close to my life to be funny.

Futurama, Jeeves & Wooster of course. An Idiot abroad for Ricky Gervais and cringeworthy TV lovers which would also mean grab The Ricky Gervais Show

oh and, just in case I forgot:

ARCHER!!!!!! season 3 just started.

(plus if you like archer you'll probably like Dr Katz, again animated but that NY humour aspect, very old now, is available on DVD maybe downloadable, Dr Katz is definitely in the kid friendly range, and hilarious)

[wim]

 Ruffian, on 25 January 2012 - 06:57 AM, said:

Any suggestions would be welcome.

Red Dwarf

[staringclown]

Don't tend to watch much as I prefer music and can't stand the ads. I do like docos. I record these and skip over the ads as I do with most other free to air. You just have to watch it slightly later with an appropriate ad buffer.

Comedy:

• Jeeves and Wooster
  
• QI
  
• Goodies
  
• black books
  
• father ted
  
• spaced
  
• the league of gentlemen
  
• Hyperdrive
  
• red dwarf (the early series)

I prefer british comedy to american in the sitcom stakes. The daily show is a notable exception (Though not a sitcom). Stand up is different. US have some crackers.

• Bill Hicks
  
• Bill Maher
  
• Rich Hall
  
• Steve Wright
  
• Arge Barker
  
• to name but a few.

Only a few australian comedies that I think make the grade.

• The games (and John Clark is a kiwi)
  
• Frontline
  
• some Chaser
  
• Flight of the Concordes (Again kiwi)
  
• The Gillies report
  
• some Denton
  
• Aunty Jack
  
• Norman Gunston.

I'm rather partial to midsommer murders actually. </ducks for cover>

Anything Sci fi. Can't understand why Firefly was discontinued. I'd like to see more Pratchett but editing that stuff for TV must be a bitch.

I like those HBO shows like the wire and deadwood (you cocksuckers) .

Haven't heard of Archer and will have to check it out.

Quote

(ie family viewing or borderline family viewing)

Just read this bit. Disregard just about all of the above.

Family eh? Hmm...

• Wallace and Grommit
  
• All creatures great and small (early series)
  
• I'd love to watch "The Samurai" again. Shintaro was pretty cool when I was a youngun.
  
• Rumpole of the bailey (legal education)
  
• Yes, minister (political education)
  
• Friends tell me the west wing is good.
  
• Timeteam (History education)
  
• Coast (Assorted education)
  
• Antiques roadshow
  
• Bargain hunt
  
• American pickers
  
• Monster ice engineering ship moving disaster investigations
  
• Insiders
  
• The ABC news (for dirty realism)

[Ruffian]

Thanks all!

SC you are right on the money - almost everything you mentioned we have already watched... I just forgot to list them...

- So I will go thru your list carefully and follow up the few that are not familiar ASAP.

Ditto Archers, which sounds amusing. Never heard of Miranda, but will keep an eye out for it.

Red Dwarf was great the first time around but doesn't seem to have travelled very well. I laugh, but there is a stoney silence from other quarters. Go figure.

[sydney3000]

 Ruffian, on 25 January 2012 - 06:57 AM, said:

Having been sent slightly deranged by free to air TV I have now resolved to avoid it wherever possible by buying/'borrowing' quality viewing experiences and skipping the middleman entirely.

The current programming is just shooting itself in the foot

Saying you escaped free to air TV by going to another source is like saying you escaped your street dealer by going to the coca farmer.

You have been conned. Haven't you noticed the exponential rise of media content production and distribution? Since every person has a different taste and every person has a growing disposable time they keep throwing more content wildly into the atmosphere with the goal of making all of us stick one more minute glued to one more digital screen. They don't care if you like the distribution schedule. All they care about is having you glued to a screen because that determines if you are vulnerable for eternal milking of your wallet.

I was walking down the street in Newtown the other day surrounded by three other strangers walking in the same direction. I had my eyes on the sidewalk. The others had their eyes on their mobile phone screens. Doom pending...

This post has been edited by sydney3000: 25 January 2012 - 12:23 PM

[mattau]

For me, i like to avoid watching free to air TV altogether. Only prefer to watch movies OR series that I watch on DVD.
I hate watching commercials, and often there are alot of random/bad shows on free to air!

[tor]

Can't believe you guys haven't seen Archer.

[Ruffian]

 sydney3000, on 25 January 2012 - 12:20 PM, said:

Saying you escaped free to air TV by going to another source is like saying you escaped your street dealer by going to the coca farmer.

You have been conned. Haven't you noticed the exponential rise of media content production and distribution? Since every person has a different taste and every person has a growing disposable time they keep throwing more content wildly into the atmosphere with the goal of making all of us stick one more minute glued to one more digital screen. They don't care if you like the distribution schedule. All they care about is having you glued to a screen because that determines if you are vulnerable for eternal milking of your wallet.

I was walking down the street in Newtown the other day surrounded by three other strangers walking in the same direction. I had my eyes on the sidewalk. The others had their eyes on their mobile phone screens. Doom pending...

Maybe.


But at least my way you skip the ads. (& almost none of what has been suggested has product placement).

Also we are, at heart, a species that loves our stories.

Before TV there was radio, before radio there were penny dreadfuls, before that there was reading aloud before the fire, and before all of those - and still a going concern today, there were poets and sagas.

Mind you we seem to have lost the bards and the long spoken stories & histories along the way - probably at the time of the printing press.

Returning to the point, I don't think anyone is giving up their media any time soon. Essentially we all want more stories, quicker.

It would be nice if something could be done about the admen, though.



BTW and totally off topic, does anyone know a good - reliable - hangover cure?
It's too late for prevention & sleeping it off is not an option & this keyboard is too damn noisy....

[Ruffian]

 tor, on 25 January 2012 - 05:00 PM, said:

Can't believe you guys haven't seen Archer.

!
That was f*cking hilarious.
Good artwork, too.
Just moved up to No.1 on the must-get list.

This post has been edited by Ruffian: 25 January 2012 - 07:34 PM

[sydney3000]

 Ruffian, on 25 January 2012 - 07:27 PM, said:

But at least my way you skip the ads. (& almost none of what has been suggested has product placement).

I don't think anyone is giving up their media any time soon. Essentially we all want more stories, quicker.

Content itself is propaganda at the best of times and ads at the worst of times.

I hope media booms because I work my last day in mining on Tuesday and my first day in media on Wednesday. I never caught the mining bug because I was more concerned about the damage it can do than the profit it can generate. I have a similar feeling about media but my criticism may be silenced because I have a weakness for the creative arts and working on the front line (aka backstage) of digital content creation and distribution may unleash a secret passion I didn't know I had.

This post has been edited by sydney3000: 25 January 2012 - 08:53 PM

[Ruffian]

 sydney3000, on 25 January 2012 - 08:52 PM, said:

Content itself is propaganda at the best of times and ads at the worst of times.

Yes, but that is a given. All content, always, is propaganda of some description. It doesn't really matter because it is a universal truth and, on the whole we don't care - we just want to know how the story goes.

Moving into media is smart, because there will always be a demand for it.

[sydney3000]

 Ruffian, on 25 January 2012 - 09:39 PM, said:

Moving into media is smart, because there will always be a demand for it.

There was nothing smart about it. Life just happens. I applied to 1000 jobs, eventually I came upon people who made an offer no matter my strange personality and viewpoints and I signed because I never reject to help people if I am capable to do so.

This post has been edited by sydney3000: 25 January 2012 - 10:13 PM

[Witchsmeller Pursuivant]

Trailer Park Boys, seasons 1-8.
Game of Thrones- only season 1 made thus far.
And GET ARCHER NOW!