Television Ricky Gervais- SuperNature

Bebe

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It was...alright. Nothing more, nothing less. Watch it and forget it material for me. Doubt it would get any significant attention if not for the twitter crowd constantly retweeting the trans joke clip.
 

hobbers

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I'm not having a go at you personally here.

When does this thinking stop or become dated?

I'm an Asian bloke who came to this country when young and have heard this pretty much from the late 70's onward.

From it ain't half hot mum to Alf Garnet to Del boy in only fools. And now David Brent.

Is it because the average bloke in UK is a racist, misogynistic type or is it because of something else.

All I know is that as an Asian kid what these fellas said was repeated to "us" on the ground. Words like the paki shop, chinkies, spear chucker, gunga din etc were used from the play ground to the town centre. Wasn't funny tbf
To be fair David Brent was a product of the early noughties. That sort of character wouldn't land the same now.

The problem with Ricky Gervais is that what he finds funny hasn't evolved at all and that's why his stand up is 60-70% the same stories and gags he was cackling about on his radio show 20 years ago.
 

Dante

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I see Nish Kumar's rant got taken down.

Another misogynistic hack who uses his status as an ethnic minority to spout his misogynistic bullshit and not get called on it.

He first claims that gender ideology opposition is a movement of "straight white men". He must have missed where gender ideologues had to create a new slur "TERF" in attempts to silence women who were standing up for their rights. He must have missed the thousands upon thousands of rape threats and death threats J K Rowling receives from the trans community. He must have missed the women's rights campaign in Manchester last week whereby trans activists turned up in balaclavas to intimidate and assault women who were in attendance.

I don't know who this arrogant fool is thinking he can speak on behalf of ethnic minorities, because every ethnic minority I know thinks he's a cnut. He suggests gender ideology opposition is a "white" movement, why doesn't Nish go to a black neighbourhood and ask a good sample of people whether they think biological males should be in women's changing rooms, women's prisons, women's sports, whether biological males should be calling themselves "lesbians" and whether any lesbians who won't date biological males are "transphobic". Why doesn't he go down to his local mosque and ask the Asian community for their thoughts on gender ideology. Let's see what responses he gets. Maybe this racist and misogynistic idiot will soon realise he has no right to be speaking on behalf of ethnic minorities he has no connection with.
You seem pretty racist yourself.
 

Amar__

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The one everyone here is talking about is the one Ricky wrote and acted in.
I understand now, people who quoted me talk about UK office, but my initial post was about US one, there was a missunderstanding, you are right :lol:
 

Solius

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Fair play to you for bothering but I don't envy you having another 5 pages of brigading added to this thread against you by the usual suspects now
This is like when two villains team up.
 

Pogue Mahone

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He first claims that gender ideology opposition is a movement of "straight white men". He must have missed where gender ideologues had to create a new slur "TERF" in attempts to silence women who were standing up for their rights. He must have missed the thousands upon thousands of rape threats and death threats J K Rowling receives from the trans community. He must have missed the women's rights campaign in Manchester last week whereby trans activists turned up in balaclavas to intimidate and assault women who were in attendance.
At the risk of being the third villain in the piece, I agree with this.

Never mind him being wrong about them all being men, they’re also not all straight. There’s a hell of a lot of gay men, as well as women, taking issue with the more extreme trans activists. The ones Gervais is mocking.

Definitely a generation gap though. If Kumar had gone with “middle-aged” and no other adjectives he’d have been closer to the truth.
 

Sweet Square

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Why doesn't he go down to his local mosque and ask the Asian community for their thoughts on gender ideology. Let's see what responses he gets. Maybe this racist and misogynistic idiot will soon realise he has no right to be speaking on behalf of ethnic minorities he has no connection with.

In September 2012, a publicity shot of a pensive Nish Kumar found its way into the possession of some mischievous members of the far right. The image was subsequently turned into a meme known as the “Confused Muslim” and used to peddle such piercing religious jousting as: “Angry that Christians insulted my prophet. Cannot insult Jesus as he is a prophet too.” Kumar, who was “raised Hindu”, dedicated an entire section of his stand-up routine to responding to the meme, and admits it did leave him a little confused. “I didn’t even know they’d used it until someone shared it on my Facebook page!”

https://www.newstatesman.com/cultur...goodness-gracious-me-and-choosing-comedy-over
 

dumbo

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What a flex:
I know many lesbians personally, both friends and family.
Everyone stop fighting and check out this cool guy right here.^^

I know many lesbians personally, both friends and family.
I cede all ground to you (and your lesbian friends and family), you are right - you must be right with such credentials. You are seriously cool and not completely lame as feck.

So cool.
 

Dante

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Because I called out a misogynistic hack who perpetuates the incredibly offensive notion that racial minorities are a hive mind who hold the same views as him by default, thinks he can speak for minorities of which he's never spoken to and attempts to silence the views of those minorities who don't hold his viewpoints? Sounds like you're another shill for racist and misogynistic hacks, presumably you're offended because you hold the same misogynistic and racist views as he does.
This post is so utterly stupid I don't know where to start.
 

RedRoach

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I haven’t seen the Netflix show but I watched this show live in Brighton (probably the gay and trans capital of the UK and a large portion of the audience fell in this group including friends of mine) and he had the whole audience in stitches. Nobody in the audience was offended because nobody took themselves that seriously.

The problem is online nothing can be said anymore without it becoming a scandal and social media in general is a cesspit and that is coming from someone who voted for the Greens in Brighton at the last election I participated in if you want to attempt to put a political angle on it.
 

Kag

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A joke’s a joke. It’s funny or it isn’t. Constantly agonising about who is the target and how their status compares to the status of comedian (or the audience) would be the end of comedy. Luckily, most reasonable people are able to tell when a joke is mean spirited or not and react accordingly.

One thing’s for certain. Standup comedy is infinitely more thoughtful and less mean spirited now than it was 10 or 20 years ago, never mind 30 or 40. We’ve come a long way.
Someone pegged it earlier in the thread. He's a very average stand up comedian playing to larger audiences than he should be because of his fame.

I like Gervais. I'll give any of his sitcoms a chance, but I won't be rushing to watch his stand up
Both of you seem to sum this whole thing up.
 

Raoul

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It was...alright. Nothing more, nothing less. Watch it and forget it material for me. Doubt it would get any significant attention if not for the twitter crowd constantly retweeting the trans joke clip.
My take as well. A few good jokes amidst a majority of average ones. The way he occasionally laughs at his own jokes is also a bit cringe.
 

DOTA

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I too know many lesbians and mine aren't transphobic weirdos.
 

GBBQ

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Haven’t watched it yet but I’ve watched the last few from him and Chapelle and they don’t tend to be as incendiary as Twitter makes out or as funny as the defenders would have you believe.
I do feel it’s a little bit weird though that so many Netflix specials are leading with anti trans sentiment though.
 

DOTA

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Haven’t watched it yet but I’ve watched the last few from him and Chapelle and they don’t tend to be as incendiary as Twitter makes out or as funny as the defenders would have you believe.
I do feel it’s a little bit weird though that so many Netflix specials are leading with anti trans sentiment though.
Assume it's an attempt to appeal to older people, as they realise they can't afford to keep prices low enough to keep their younger subscribers.
 

cafecillos

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"I have many lesbian/black/brown/etc friends". It's 2022 and you still read/hear this regularly :lol:
 

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Haven’t watched it yet but I’ve watched the last few from him and Chapelle and they don’t tend to be as incendiary as Twitter makes out or as funny as the defenders would have you believe.
I do feel it’s a little bit weird though that so many Netflix specials are leading with anti trans sentiment though.
Not going to wade into the trans vs feminist debate here as it is a massively complex issue and the only true winner in that particularly nasty fight is the conservatives who once again get to watch two progressive groups tear each other to shreds whilst they go right on dragging us back to the last century whilst furiously widening income inequality.

With regards to why so many specials are leading with trans sentiment it simply comes down to it being the hot button issue of the day. Comedians write material drawn largely from observing the world around them, trans issues are in vogue hence that becomes part of their schtik, social media highlights that 5 minute segment of each special generating huge publicity, comedian sees topic trending, writes more jokes, more outrage, rinse and repeat until something else finally displaces trans issues at the top of the news cycle.
 

GBBQ

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Not going to wade into the trans vs feminist debate here as it is a massively complex issue and the only true winner in that particularly nasty fight is the conservatives who once again get to watch two progressive groups tear each other to shreds whilst they go right on dragging us back to the last century whilst furiously widening income inequality.

With regards to why so many specials are leading with trans sentiment it simply comes down to it being the hot button issue of the day. Comedians write material drawn largely from observing the world around them, trans issues are in vogue hence that becomes part of their schtik, social media highlights that 5 minute segment of each special generating huge publicity, comedian sees topic trending, writes more jokes, more outrage, rinse and repeat until something else finally displaces trans issues at the top of the news cycle.
Perhaps. But it’s not like there’s not 100 other dumpster fires to focus on. Just seems like it’s shooting fish in a barrel. Supposed masters of their crafts making cheap ‘I identify as avhelicopter’ type jokes with no revelation behind them.
 

Smores

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Watched it last night and I'm surprised to hear it's caused much of a stir at all. It was alright but largely the same as his prior work so a bit tired now.

Always find it bizarre when people take such offence over a joke and analyse its impact. You can clip it to make more offensive I'm sure but seems more like some looking for an excuse to argue.
 

Sweet Square

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Perhaps. But it’s not like there’s not 100 other dumpster fires to focus on. Just seems like it’s shooting fish in a barrel. Supposed masters of their crafts making cheap ‘I identify as avhelicopter’ type jokes with no revelation behind them.
The likes of Chappelle and Gervais are just bored middle aged guys who spend far too much time online, thats where the focus on trans issues comes from. The shite jokes will because they are now so famous they can't to bomb, so there's really no need for them to keep up standards.
 

Gandalf

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Perhaps. But it’s not like there’s not 100 other dumpster fires to focus on. Just seems like it’s shooting fish in a barrel. Supposed masters of their crafts making cheap ‘I identify as avhelicopter’ type jokes with no revelation behind them.
Very much like shooting fish in a barrel but as with most forms of entertainment the most famous and successful are rarely the masters of their craft just the best at following trends and packaging them in easy to digest form for the masses.
 

Raoul

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Watched it last night and I'm surprised to hear it's caused much of a stir at all. It was alright but largely the same as his prior work so a bit tired now.

Always find it bizarre when people take such offence over a joke and analyse its impact. You can clip it to make more offensive I'm sure but seems more like some looking for an excuse to argue.
There's obviously a massive difference between the norms of LIVE audiences who pay to go to these shows and those within various social media circles who comment on specific issues online.
 

FriedClams

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He regurgitated material from previous shows. Like the segment about the 600lb man being carried out, he has already done something very similar. There were a few other instances too where it was almost as if he was plagiarizing his own work. He never misses the opportunity to say how rich he is too.

The only thing I found funny that was his take on changing diet just so he could live an extra ten years?, which are for most people the shittest years to be alive (80-90)
 

Suv666

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Watched half of it.
Absolute shite. Seemed like an inside joke with his twitter followers. I don't know why old comedians are so fixated on trans issues.
Get some new material lazy cnuts
 

GDaly95

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I enjoyed it.

It's a formula done to death but it doesn't mean it's not funny.

Bit like an Ed Sneeran song
 

maniak

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I know many lesbians personally, both friends and family, and I haven't watched this special.
 

The Cat

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I like a bit of edgy comedy but repeatedly making jokes about kids having cancer isn't funny to me.
 
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2 man midfield

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Finally got round to seeing this. Wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. There were some good bits, some shit bits. Some big laughs, some cringe.

Amazing how willing he is to go over the same old ground though, for what his 5th special running? Atheism, cancer, Twitter, saying how rich he is, saying the word cnut. He clearly can be very funny, but his quality control is a bit lacking.
 

CassiusClaymore

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The trans jokes were just lazy and unimaginative tropes that you find on Twitter and YouTube comments but that follows on from most of his stand-up material. He's not particularly good at crafting jokes in complex ways like George Carlin, Chapelle or Stewart Lee. He goes for shock value far too often and it gets tedious.

Now I'd really like to hear Stewart Lee do a routine about Gervais.
Seems your wish has been granted. I went to watch him do the Snowflake/Tornado show last night in Colchester and the Chapelle/Gervais routine was one of the highlights of the night. Won't spoil it but apparently they filmed it in York a few weeks back and it'll be on the beeb later this year.
 
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Volumiza

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I'm a big RG fan but I found Supernature to be tired and forced. Just because he walks back to his lectern laughing at the end of a joke doesn't make it funny. Shame. Feels like a 'for the money' job as opposed to 'for the love'.