You're all a bunch of Idiots - Seth McFarlane was executive producer.

Family Guy is better though :P

If this series was animated everyone would be laughing at, as there are actors performing it everyone seems to take it so seriously. Don't people know what satire is?

He's got away from us Jack...

"You're all a bunch of Idiots - Seth McFarlane was executive producer"

...he was a contributing producer. i realize this is splitting hairs, but that's a big difference.

Most likely no one will read this as the form seems somewhat dead, but I must agree with the OP (for the most part).

I'd be lying if I said my instant reaction to watching The Pitts was "This is satirical genius", because that isn't what I thought, my initial reaction was probably the intended one.

I flicked on to this half way through the episode where the daughter gets the haunted car and my initial reaction was 'dear lord, this is appauling'. ITV used to show a few of the really awful US sitcoms in the early hours of the morning and so my first thought was that this was another version of Grounded For Life just even crappier. However I caught an episode a few days later, which for some reason I watched and it actually clicked that this was actually meant to be awful, something that I didn't get straight off the bat, because it was actually TOO good, it did look like an actual straight comedy show (if that makes sense?), everything about it is damn near perfect at recreating that bad US sitcom look and feel, the dialouge seems genuine, as does the acting, but once I realised that they were sending the genre up, I really liked it.

As someone said, if it had been a cartoon it would have been a success, people expect that kind of send-up from a cartoon, but they don't see it coming from a live action series.

I think the ultimate reason why The Pitts completely failed was because it was just too good. Anyone who likes that kind of sitcom would turn off straight away because they would find it too absurd and probably wouldn't get the level on which the humour is supposed to work. While people who do enjoy that kind of comedy will most likely flick on, decide it's just another (particularly bad) US sitcom of that 'light-humour' vein and write it off, because you really have to sit down and watch it to realise just what it is.

I'm really glad I did give it a second chance and frankly I should be pleased it was even broadcast in the UK, but I do think it's a shame that it only got 7 episodes...

[deleted]

Seth MacFarlane was executive producer? I beg to differ, for two reasons:

1. It isn't animated.
2. It isn't loaded with 1980s references.