Thursday, April 30, 2009

WTF Britain?!?: Garth Marengi's Dark Place

England is a really weird place. They call elevators 'lifts' and eat 'spotted dicks.' What is wrong with those people! The only thing weirder than their nomenclature and eating habits are their shows. Take for example...
To get a little back-story on the show, you need to look back to the 1980s and at one famous author: Roald Dahl. The author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory made his own Twilight Zone-esque show called Tales of the Unexpected. Nobody really followed it in the United States, but that did not stop a bunch of comedians from parodying it.
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It's not that simple though. You see, the show is portrayed as a revisiting of Garth Marengi's show from the 1990s. Garth is not a real person though. Confused yet? Keep up, people. Garth and the cast inter-cut the show footage to explain the problems/fun they had making it. Oddly, the female lead of the show does not appear in the 'modern footage.' They never quite explain it, though I imagine that has to do with the show not getting more than six episodes.
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What is the show about? Garth is the head doctor at a hospital that is rife with weird happenings. It is run by Dean Lerner, who is played by the show's producer...who is played by an actor. It also features a Spanish doctor who is always dubbed for no reason. The female doctor is a bit quirky, at one point having psychic powers related to her period. No, really. The setting is very weird. At one point, they show the female doctor and the Spanish one coming back from what looks like fencing practice. Throughout the show, people often travel from one side to the other via a jeep. What?
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The series was short, but strange. One show is about Garth protecting an eye-ball monster due to repressed feelings over the death of his grasshopper-esque son. Another has an outbreak of a Caveman virus throughout the hospital that is definitely not related to the green-glowing water. There are also numerous jokes throughout the show where Garth (in character) talks about random Garth Marengi novels and how they are better than people think. The lack of subtlety is intentional, for sure. I can only imagine what they would have done with more than a half-dozen shows.
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Is this show for everyone? Clearly not. The humor is weird, barely-explained and often hard to understand. It is one of those shows that really speaks to people who enjoy obtuse or complex humor...mixed with puns and sight gags. The jokes about the show-within-the-show are often just as funny. Enjoy the series in its entirety right here. The show has spun off into Man-to-Man with Dean Lerner and numerous stage shows. It's funny, misunderstood and completely insane- enjoy.
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More British shows to come. How does another obscure parody show sound? Stay tuned...

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