Your Least Favourite Character

naseby: "Hi - don't worry about the 'American' jibe - it's nice to have an American appreciate this series. But how did you get into it? Did u see it on the BBC (America) channel, or you been to Britain etc? Take care, mate!"
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How about a little American history lesson on British television? Ready?

In America, we have an educational network where we watch Sesame Street, the network is called ETV (Educational television). ETV began circa 1969 or 1970 (when it was available in my area).

When ETV (which has no commercials even today) had timeslots to fill and had to get cheap programming, they obtained a British comedy called Monty Python. I'm sure you are familiar with that.

I don't know when Monty Python aired back then (I'm sure it was late at night), but it was a huge hit with American college students.

So ETV knew to just get British comedies and programming and put that on.

This led of course to Fawlty Towers.

Now 30 years ago, I do recall seeing Fawlty Towers (and had not a clue what was wrong with that man).

Another show turned up, called To The Manor Born, no doubt because its final episode was the highest rated episode in the UK (until the finale of Only Fools and Horses).

Now I do recall some of Dad's Army even back then. I think the only episode I saw involved Mainwaring with a grenade down his pants. Or was it Jones?

This then brought us to early 1980s and a certain timelord.

Tom Baker had finished his run as the Doctor and now America was getting him and he became an incredible cult hit, airing five days a week in the afternoons.

There was yet another lapse of sorts (Doctor Who was running into its problems and I was getting older), and then we got another show called Are You Being Served? in the latter 1980s.

Like Doc Who, AYBS apparently came to America after the show had ended in the UK.

And like Doc Who, AYBS was run into the proverbial ground in reruns here.

In no time, we were handed Hyacinth Bucket (pronounced, . . . yes) and that was it.

After that, it was put on Britcoms (what we call the shows over here) and see if they get an audience, on the ETV network.

i don't have BBC America, tho, but on ETV alone, I've seen Vicar of Dibley, Allo Allo (not a fave), As Time Goes By (another unfave), One Foot in the Grave (pulled much too soon), Brittas Empire (also pulled much too soon).

Quite a while back, we had Don't Wait Up (actually very funny) and To The Manor Born again.

Mulberry has aired a couple of times, I recorded it to dvd last time it aired.

We were even given 'One Season Wonders' with The Savages, Office Gossip, Brotherly Love and that one about the little village that seceded from the UK. I recorded them all.

Dad's Army turned up a couple of years ago, when I managed to get the virtual smattering of shows I have (about one and a half).

Oh, yes, we had Mr. Bean and Thin Blue Line.

I had to buy Black Adder, AbFab, Only Fools and Horses, 12 eps of Hi De Hi and 12 eps of On The Buses.

AYBS was run into the ground so badly, for a while we were given Come Back Mrs Noah, with Mollie Sugden, but that wasn't six episodes, was it?

Oh yea, just before AYBS, we had Good Neighbors, which is the Good Life in England, isn't it? No idea why the title was changed.

I think that has been it (we had a show called 'Barbara' but I never watched that one).

Only one out of this loop I can recall was Red Dwarf, which aired on another network, late night on Saturdays.

Oh, I forgot to mention. My mother is English.

Oops, forgot. There was also a very brief airing of Oh Dr. Beeching (having seen Hi De Hi and On the Buses, I woulnd't mind seeing Dr. Beeching again), and My Hero had a pretty strong run for a while.

we currently have As Time Goes By, Hyacinth, Allo Allo and Fawlty Towers. With so few Fawlty eps, I expect it to vanish soon and wait to see what replaces it.