Jeeves & Wooster

Well, I finished watching the entire series.

Let me state for the record that after I've watched a lot of BBC TV, I start 'speaking' differently. Not with a different accent, but with a different 'voice'. Similar to when Caucasians hang out with their black friend from "da hood" and start speaking the White People Version of Ebonics.

So, let the review commence:

Too much singing, IMO. In Seasons 3 & 4, they had a few episodes where Jeeves & Wooster were in New York. On those episodes, they had Broadway-like tunes. So I fast forwarded until I thought I saw a person talking.

I hate musicals. Did I tell you that before? Surely I have. If I haven't, let me state clearly that I HATE MUSICALS!

This show isn't Viva Laughlin by any stretch, but it's a whole lot of freaking singing. And NO, I've never watched Viva. Not my cup of tea even before I heard it was a musical series.

One day this month I might get into why I hate musicals (because I'll need something to write about during NaBloPoMo). But let's stick to Jeeves & Wooster for this post.

So, too much singing.

In almost every episode, Wooster is playing the piano and singing a song from that nonsensical era in song writing.

I love Hugh Laurie as much as one can love someone having never actually met said person, but My Honeyed Hambone does NOT have a good singing voice. (Sorry, Hugh!)

I do enjoy his comedic talent. For the most part. He pulls a few way too many faces for my liking. (Similar to Jim Carrey on "In Living Color".) His timing is excellent, though. He and Stephen Fry are an incomparable team.

Which leads me to another thing I didn't like about the series.

WHY does Wooster have to be so stupid?

When I'm crushing on someone, I don't want to see him making an ass of himself. I don't generally enjoy broad comedy, but I really don't like seeing "my guy" as the butt of all the jokes. (When The Rock played the simple-headed wannabe actor in "Be Cool", it was the beginning of the end of my long imaginary relationship with him.)

I shall console myself with the thought that no one would buy Stephen Fry as an idiot, not with his resonant baritone. So Hugh Laurie had to be dim witted Bertie Wooster. Their roles suited their strengths.

Or some similarly solacing thought...

I also found myself rolling my eyes every time on of Wooster's friends showed up.

Here's a general plot line for the series:

One of Wooster's idiotic friends or aunts shows up.
Said friend is having a problem with the woman he loves. (If it's an aunt, she wants Wooster to marry someone, steal something or convince someone to do something.)
Wooster tries to help said friend but invariably makes things worse.
Jeeves saves the day.

It gets hard keeping all of those characters straight. Almost every character, other than Jeeves or Wooster, seems to be re-cast in each season. If this was an American soap opera, we'd at least hear "The part of Tuppy is now being played by..." Alas, no such indication.

That brings me to another thing I do not like about Jeeves & Wooster. This is the fault of the BBC and A&E more than the actual show, however.

There is no closed captioning and no "play all" feature on the DVDs.

I can't hear the television very well. It's those years listening to Prince albums at full volume on my record player combined with the A/C & Evan making perpetual noise, I suppose. But it's especially hard to understand foreign accents. It's convenient to just be able to read WTF someone just said.

I should sue. Not having closed captioning is discriminatory & exclusionary. Or something...

And it's annoying having to play just one episode of of the show at a time.

I said yesterday that it puts me to sleep. If there was a "play all" option, I could set the DVD player to repeat. But nooooooooooooo, I have to be rudely interrupted from my precious sleep because I keep hearing the annoying menu song over and over and over and over.

I should definitely sue. How can they produce something that finally helps me get to sleep and then jerk me out of that ever so nectareous respite so rudely????

I just remembered, when you're giving criticism, you're supposed to soften the blow by saying something nice.

Nice things about Jeeves & Wooster:

Hugh Laurie

...

Evan likes it. So I can save on my electricity bill by having him watch TV with me instead of paying to run extra lights, an extra TV and an extra DVD player. Best of all, I don't have to hear motherflipping cartoons to do it.


Um...


Ok, I'll have to get back to things I like about Jeeves & Wooster.

And I have to pee.

Angelika, out.

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Now playing: Elliott Yamin - Alright
via FoxyTunes