R.I.P Red Dwarf

[Eggie]

Comedy performance that's playing to an audience and comedy performance that's playing to a camera has a totally different tone, which alone I feel validates it's existence. The new Red dwarfs, especially the first one which was a lot less cinematic, felt like it needed an audience reaction to justify the kind of broad acting the cast were doing.

Of course they COULD have changed their acting style but they're old men, Progz. They're set in their ways.

[Stupot]

People always prefer to laugh in a group.  Laughter is very much a social thing, and is often infectious.  So it makes sense that any normal human would laugh more at a show when it has a laughter track.  Infact it's the very reason canned laughter was invented. It relaxes the viewer and lets them know that they're not laughing alone.

That said, I don't think even canned laughter could have changed my mind about this topic.

[Ali]

As an insanely committed Red Dwarf fan, I didn't watch this. The last two serieses(sp?) were so poor that I had no enthusiasm. I saw about 15 minutes of the first, and I didn't hate it, but it didn't feel right all the same.

To be honest the lack of a laughter track was the best point, in my mind. The laugh track on series 7 and 8 made it feel like you were watching with a crowd of tasteless morons.

[m0ds]

I enjoyed it But only cos I watched it back to back. If i hadn't I'd probably have hated it. Too few jokes in each "episode". But on the whole great stuff!!

Spoiler

I'm glad they just walked away like nothing happened in the end. Leaves it open to future episodes, which won't be a problem!

[close]

I'm not a fan of the later series, when all the crew was back or whatever - I only cared for the 4somes adventures in Starbug. And so this was quite a worthy rendition of those days I guess with CG settings, lots of locations & more modern humour it could be difficult to used canned laughter, they could've played it in front of a live audience to capture laughter though. I always find it difficult with shows that are so well known for their laughter elements and then specials like this that have none, but hey, its just like the Royle Family I guess -- you have to find your own favourite jokes .^^

I'm glad they did it, and I liked the intertextual theme, and I like how it ended, and I liked the referencing to Bladerunner... So overall, I guess I'm more than satisfied Good shit!!!

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

People always prefer to laugh in a group.  Laughter is very much a social thing, and is often infectious.  So it makes sense that any normal human would laugh more at a show when it has a laughter track.

I don't really agree with a single word of this, and it sounds utterly ridiculous to me that you'd laugh at something with a laugh track but not laugh at it without one and still claim it's funny.

[Stupot]

Not necessarily.
I watched Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle the other week and I thought it was absolute complete rubbish and I'm embarrassed for him. Yet thinking back, I actually did find myself laughing on cue, several times.

So why did I laugh more at this even though I thought it was less funny... I think it's not unreasonable to suppose that the fact that the show had audience laughter (it's half stand-up and half sketch show) might have had a subconcious effect.  I was responding more to the laughter than to the actual "jokes".

I didn't say I would only laugh if there's a laugh track. That would be ridiculous.  I'm still intelligent enough to make my own judgment about the 'funniness' of something, but my own laughter might not necessarily be a reflection of this. Instead it might just be a reaction to the canned laughter.

This of course is just my theory, but I would sincerely like to wager 50 bucks with you that if you showed 100 random people 30 minutes of comedy with canned laughter and showed another 100 people the same 30 minutes without, and then recorded how much each group laughed... The first 100 would win. 

They might come away with pretty even averaged results if you asked them to mark on a sliding scale how funny they found it.  This would prove that the canned laughter has an effect on the viewer's laughter even if it doesn't necessarily change thei mind about the quality of the comedy.

[Mr Flibble]

I don't really agree with a single word of this

The social laughter thing is true though. A good example of this is if you're watching something and you think it's funny, you're more likely to laugh out loud if you're with people. It's just the way it happens, I don't know why.

[LimpingFish]

Applying a Pavlovian property to canned laughter is highly dubious. I've watched many laugh-tracked sitcoms, and nary raised a smile. I accept that there is an intention to cue the viewer to laugh, but I seriously doubt it's effectiveness in most cases. And I doubt it would raise laughs from something you would find unfunny otherwise.

I do agree that we are more likely to laugh out loud in a group setting.

At least I am.

[Stee]

On a slightly different note, I have always wanted to pluck up the courage to go to a sitcom and laugh really loudly at the unfunny parts.

[Ali]

That's not as much fun as you think. I watched Nacho Libre in a small cinema full of people who were clearly not enjoying it while I found it very funny and laughed very loudly. It was quite awkward.

[Stupot]

Lets organise 'Sittens', an event where we all met up at some TV studio to watch the recording of a shite sitcom (they're all shite these days - My Family is the only half decent one going) and basically laugh off-cue and be total jackasses.  Last one to get chucked out of the studio is a rotten egg.

[DeviantGent]

My Family is the only half decent one going

+++OUT OF CHEESE ERROR+++

+++ERROR ERROR ERROR+++

+++REDO FROM START+++

[Stee]

Bring our own laughter tracks in and crank up the volume

[ManicMatt]

Taking wikipedia with a pinch of salt.. I read about this guy who invented canned laughter, Douglass:

"Charley Douglass' infamous invention was properly tested in 1965 when producers were trying to launch Hogan's Heroes. CBS screened two versions of the same episode to measure audience reactions; one contained the laugh track, the other was silent. As Hogan's Heroes required cerebral viewing, the audience watching the silent version were left confused, and the episode failed miserably. The version with the canned laughter succeeded and CBS gave the show a green light. After this incident, no sitcom went on the air without a touch-up from Charley Douglass' laff box"

[Revan]

It was 4 mins in and I was like: ok something's wrong... then it hit me, canned laughter (I always complain about a show with canned laughter, but now Red Dwarf seems more serious (and it's not meant to be)..

However I watched all 3 parts in one go, after missing part 2 +3 first time round on Dave. (Thank God that Dave always repeat) And I think it flows really well as a single episode. I really enjoyed it by the end.

Sure the acting wasn't what it use to be (It needed poorer acting from Craig Charles lol) And I was dissapointed that they didnt have a fast paced starwars text intro to 'explain' the transition from the last series. But I might try to edit one in and put in a laughter track, see what it does

But as I said over all a good job. Make more!!! lol

[Mr Flibble]

Having rewatched some old episodes last night, I can attest that the laugh track from the live studio audience does add something. There's a sense of community sort of, it feels nicer than watching it on your own. There's also something enjoyable about watching the actors ride the laughs and respond to the audience. I don't think piped in "canned laughter" ever adds either of these things, but listening to real laughter did.

The exception for me is when they show the show to an audience after its been filmed, and then dub in the laughs. That sounds just as bad as canned laughter does to me.

The other argument for the laugh track is that the actors raise their game when there's an audience, as most of the Red Dwarf cast have stated several times.

(Still, I wouldn't have preferred the specials to have a laugh track. The only option for that would have been canned or dubbed laughter, which is tacky and fake. And I didn't feel that the comedy was the main drive behind it, so I didn't feel an audience was that necessary.)

[TeenageAssassin]

personally i thought it was pretty good.

i will admit i haven't sat and watched every episode, tho i have seen a few and the ones i can remember were funny.

i agree that it probably would have been better having a longer episode instead of 3 smaller ones, or even just showing them back to back as waiting a day for the next episode made it a bit 'eh' as you cant remember the last episode as clearly.

my personal opinions on the 3 back to earth episodes were thus;

Spoiler

ep. 1: it had me laughing at some points but was pretty slow to get started, thus i'd see it as a 5.5/10
ep. 2: had a lot more gags and the 4th wall with them knowing they were fictional, i think added a bit of twist to the episode, thus i'd give it 9/10
ep. 3: i feel it didn't really tie up any of the loose ends from the previous series', however they do reveil that Kochanski isn't dead. leaving the ending open tho i did find a bit of a let down, however, maybe it was to see how many people still watched red dwarf and although it would be [in my opinion] vertually impossible to make a series set after 'back to earth' they might, if the veiwing figures were high enough make the movie that we've all been waiting for and tie up the loose ends in that. thus i give this part of the episode 7/10

[close]

^ hidden as it might contain spoilers

my overall rating of 'back to earth' would be placed at 7.5/10 which i don't think is pretty bad.

and personally i don't think it is RIP Red Dwarf 

[and yes i do know there are typo's in there, i can't spell]

[Revan]

TeenageAssasin: This Forum isn't labelled as spoilers.. could you hide some of your post that gives away the story

Just thinking others on the site might not have seen it yet...

[TeenageAssassin]

 :o sowwie i didn't realise.. how do you do that spoiler highlight bit?

edit: worked it out.. thank you revan for pointing it out

[Revan]

No worries... wasn't trying to be the spoiler police lol...