The Inbetweeners (2012)
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| This article was copied (instead of imported) from the now-deleted Terrible Shows & Episodes Wiki from the Internet Archive. |
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 This show's almost as bent as Neil's dad.
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The Inbetweeners is an American television sitcom developed by Brad Copeland for MTV. The show stars Joey Pollari, Bubba Lewis, Mark L. Young, Zack Pearlman, Alex Frnka and Brett Gelman. The show is a remake of the original UK series of the same name written and created by Damon Beesley and Iain Morris, who served as executive producers alongside Copeland, Aaron Kaplan and Lauren Corra. It ran on MTV from August 20, to November 5, 2012. On November 28, 2012, the series was canceled after one season due to poor ratings and reviews.
Why It's A Literal Bus Turd
- The main criticism with this remake is that it lacks the charm and comedy the original British version did so right. Tragically, the humour went from being funny, clever and relatable to obnoxious, cringeworthy and just plain unfunny in general. Some examples include:
- Neil's comment "My dad's not gay!".
- The scene where Will throws a football and it hits a student with crutches, causing the latter to fall flat on his face. The reason this worked in the original is because it takes its time to build up to the joke, letting the characters' reactions sink in. But here, they pace the scene so poorly to the point where it becomes extremely unfunny.
- The scene where Will tells Carli's brother that his parents would be killed by a bomb doesn't work because it's delivered in too serious a tone, whereas in the original, Will said it in a casual, almost friendly demeanor.
- In perhaps the biggest insult to the original, the iconic "Bus wankers!" line was bowdlerized into "Bus turds!". While the word "wanker" is rarely used in the US, it still doesn't change the fact that the line is just insulting to the fans.
- The infamous line "I'd literally bone her so hard that my penis would be pushed back inside my body!"
- The characters don't match their British counterparts in the slightest:
- Will lacks glasses and his unique tone.
- Simon, while looking similar to his UK counterpart, lacks the voice and height.
- Jay and Neil diverge the most. Jay is short, fat and has ginger hair, while Neil looks like he belongs in a garage band. Did the producers of this reboot not bother watching the British show?!
- The side characters don't fare much better, either. Will's mother somehow looks as old as him (if not younger), Donovan doesn't look or feel like a threat at all, and Mr. Gilbert (whose first name is now "Gene" instead of "Philip" for some reason) is a coward who isn't intimidating at all.
- Their personalities don't match their British counterparts either, since Donovan goes from a legit threat that could and would kill someone like Will to an elementary school bully, and Jay goes from an all-talk sex pest who lies just to impress his friends to a full on unlikable creep.
- Jay is turned into a pedophile (or, for anyone who lives in Great Britain, a nonce) in this series, as he forms a full-on romantic relationship with a 13-year-old girl - and he never gets called out on this. He even calls her, we kid you not, a "blank sexual canvas", which is quite possibly the creepiest thing someone could say about a minor.
- Like WIS#1 says, some lines will make you cringe more than laugh like Jay's quote about having sex with Will's mum.
- The acting was wasted here, as the spoken dialogue is utterly terrible.
- Some of the original show's payoffs and punchlines are changed or even removed entirely, such as the entire "bumder" exchange, Neil having wasps in his costume and Will and Simon calling Neil's dad a pedophile.
- The episode "Reading Gives You Wings" is essentially a 30-minute ad for Red Bull.
- Half the jokes, when they aren't butchering jokes from the original, consist of unfunny sex jokes that wouldn't be out of place in a 2 Broke Girls episode or characters falling over.
- Due to network algorithms, the funny lines from the original show were heavily edited and made cleaner, ruining the spirit of what made the original show so good. The most tragic changes were "My dad's not bent!" to "My dad's not gay!", "She's fit" to "She's hot", and of course, "BUS WANKERS!" to "Bus turds!". Although, in this show's defense, words like "bent", "wankers" and "fit" are British slang that most Americans are not familiar with.
Redeeming Qualities
- Thankfully, it only lasted 12 episodes and 1 season.
- There are a few jokes from the original, such as Will getting frustrated at disabled people on a rollercoaster, that aren't 100% butchered.
- While they are mostly few and far between, there are some lines still worth a giggle.
- The episode "Fire!" is passable, as its plot is mostly original and there are some good jokes in it.
- Decent theme song by OK Go.
- Bubba Lewis does at least do passable job as Simon, and he at least had an iota of an idea on what made him work in the UK series.
Reception
The show was universally panned by critics, audiences and fans of the original show for its unfunny, cringeworthy humour, acting and characters. Some fans even called the show "more bent than Neil's dad" after a running gag in the original where Jay, Simon and Will believe that Neil's dad is gay.
Trivia
- Taika Waititi (the director of Jojo Rabbit and Hunt for Wilderpeople) directed some episodes.
- A movie adaptation of this show, titled Virgins America, was planned. However, it seems to have been cancelled, since there hasn't been any further update since it was announced way back in 2012. The show's negative reception, along with the fact that it has since vanished into obscurity, clearly had something to with the movie's cancellation.
- Joe Thomas, who played Simon Cooper in the original British version, was very critical of the American reboot in a 2018 interview, where he criticized the show for its lack of swearing and toned down humor.
- There is a misconception that this show killed the Inbetweeners franchise. In reality, the franchise was actually intended to come to an end after the 2011 movie adaption of the British series was made, and the reason a sequel was made in 2014 was due to the popularity of the first film. The actors of the original Inbetweeners have also stated that they are too old to play the characters again, especially since they are nearing their 40s now.
Videos
LUMBARDI's 12-part series
Other Videos
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