The Thick Of It: Series 1

Good morning my little chicks and cocks.

New year, same old broken man but plus side I get to talk about more british television that I adore. Do not even ask me how I came across this programme, I think it was the pure power of the best Doctor, Peter Capaldi, that hooked me. Needless to say it was time well spent! For a first series, it's only 3 episodes mainly due to the BBC giving a low budget to series creator Armando Iannucci, centered on a department of government who just got a new director as various things go to complete hell resulting in well written satire and thus good comedy. Now I don't want this to steer you off considering it's government, even to an absolute out of the loop fool like myself in all stances and structure of government, whether it be american or british, it really doesn't matter. Again it's due to the well written scripts that you can piece together who these people are, what position they have in the government, and most importantly how they absolutely shit the bed. Yeah big shock coming in, the comedy is based around what absolute idiots are running the country and how even they don't fully comprehend the breadth of the political landscape. Which I suppose you could argue not only makes it easy to watch and enjoy because they're not throwing out a thousand specific terms per episode, but makes it a touch relatable that even politics are run by normal people. Which is an entirely fair point to be honest. But it can't just be all writing, so how's the cast? Pretty damn great, and the show has that same continuity of Blackadder with the same cast sticking around for the remainder of the show. I don't need to tell you my favorite, I'm sure he's everyone's favorite so I'll just give a shout to my two other favorites. James Smith as Glenn Cullen and Joanna Scanlan as Terri Coverley, they do such good work having that balance of proper seriousness and biting funny dialogue which is the style of the show. And I love the style of the entire show, the very loose free moving and zoom filled camera work which never felt intrusive or amateur to me but I can understand that it's not everyone's cup of tea. At least they don't shake the camera like a hyperactive Parkisons riddled monkey. And something I didn't even notice because I was that into the scenarios and characters presented until I read it is the fact that, there is zero music used. No orchestra, no pop music, it is silence from start to finish every time. I cannot name a single show that has ever done that, I mean that is such a rare thing in film and even more so in television. But again it doesn't hurt the production side of it in the slightest, it does make it feel almost documentary-esque which is brilliant. It's a very basic introduction to the concept and characters we will be seeing with an absolute auteur control over the complete series until the very end. 4 stars, 8.5/10!