W1A - Twenty Twelve sequel

1356710

Comments

  • Hamlet77Hamlet77 Posts: 22,440
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Morning folks.

    I saw the trailer for this and I thought to myself: "This looks a bit like a show written by pretentious BBC types, about pretentious BBC types, for pretentious BBC types"

    So, was I right, or am I miles off the mark? Like the rest of the country, the 2012 thing past me by as it looked a bit like a show written by pretentious media types, about pretentious media types, for pretentious media types (though in hindsight, it looks as if 2012 was written by pretentious BBC types).

    Shall I tune in next weeK, or shall I not bother?

    Yeah, you got it, need not bother, your loss though.

    I was upset when 2012 ended, I am just glad the idea has been transferred to the beeb. Who says we take ourselves too seriously.
  • HarkAtHerHarkAtHer Posts: 2,099
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    You don't need to be in the Beeb to find W1A painfully accurate. It reflects pretty much every corporate ethics/values/brand discussion (interface) I've had the pleasure of attending. No Signal indeed.

    Love the voiceover too, as someone else commented. It's just wrong enough, very clever. And surely a special award to a British comedy that doesn't milk the laughs but moves swiftly on.

    Each of the characters is watchable in their own right, from world-hating Anna Rampton to gloriously asinine Siobhan Sharpe, super-slippery Simon Harwood, the nameless yes men (who I've just found out are called Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, ho ho)... W1A is like the best cake ever... it's too good and it'll soon be over!
  • suesuesuesuesuesue Posts: 15,992
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    Sublime. David tenants VoiceOver. The look on HBs face when Siobhan turned up. And carol v was a revelation. No acting training AFAIK but great comic timing and the look on her face when Sarah parish sent the food back was priceless.
  • xander63xander63 Posts: 669
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    Just watched it, absolutely hilarious opener a shame it's only 4 episodes. :o

    Amazes me how no one can finish a thought or a sentence! :confused:

    Roll on next week. :D
  • LostFoolLostFool Posts: 90,623
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Hamlet77 wrote: »
    Yeah, you got it, need not bother, your loss though.

    I was upset when 2012 ended, I am just glad the idea has been transferred to the beeb. Who says we take ourselves too seriously.

    I seem to remember the first series of 2012 didn't rate very well and was seen as a filler of a show on BBC4 but it became very popular when it transferred to BBC2 for the second series.

    I wonder where Ian Fletcher goes next? After the Olympics and the BBC maybe it's time for him to enter politics.
  • james_W85james_W85 Posts: 4,098
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    LostFool wrote: »
    I seem to remember the first series of 2012 didn't rate very well and was seen as a filler of a show on BBC4 but it became very popular when it transferred to BBC2 for the second series.

    I wonder where Ian Fletcher goes next? After the Olympics and the BBC maybe it's time for him to enter politics.

    politics could be good in a kind of "the thick of it" style think that could work
  • HarkAtHerHarkAtHer Posts: 2,099
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Mm, hope not. I like that it isn't politics. It's too easy to laugh at politicians, and anyway that ground is already well covered by The Thick of It.

    What 2012 and W1A do is take the p*** out of what a lot of the chattering classes - who normally get to take the p*** out of everyone else - do for a living. I include myself in that group, and it's quite cathartic to see the idiocies, machinations and cowardices laid bare!
  • VetinariVetinari Posts: 3,336
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Just watched this last night and very impressed.

    You need to really concentrate, though.

    In the very first few lines of voiceover there was an interesting snippet that Ian had been knighted. I heard no further mention of that.

    There was also what I thought was the most hilarious line of the whole programme when DT said that Ian's job had been created 'in response to recent learning opportunities'. An absolute classic of spin and double speak!

    Ian's assistant is super annoying, though, and not in an amusing way.
  • AbrielAbriel Posts: 8,525
    Forum Member
    HarkAtHer wrote: »
    Mm, hope not. I like that it isn't politics. It's too easy to laugh at politicians, and anyway that ground is already well covered by The Thick of It.

    What 2012 and W1A do is take the p*** out of what a lot of the chattering classes - who normally get to take the p*** out of everyone else - do for a living. I include myself in that group, and it's quite cathartic to see the idiocies, machinations and cowardices laid bare!

    The cowardice is spot on isn't it? No-one wants to take responsibility.

    The actor who played Herrick in being human is great in this:)
  • AmbassadorAmbassador Posts: 22,332
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Vetinari wrote: »
    If you ever get the chance to see him in 'Diary of a Nobody' (if you haven't already), take it. It's effectively an extended monologue and he's brilliant.

    I'd already read the book but found he really brought it to life (rather the reverse of the usual effect of seeing a book transferred to screen), and showed the genuine underlying affection the authors held for Pooter.

    Is that the George Grossmith book? Is it radio or filmed? Would love to catch that
  • Lou_25Lou_25 Posts: 693
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    malpasc wrote: »
    I work for the BBC and a lot of W1A was filmed in my office. Yes, I do actually work on the legendary 6th floor. I saw a lot of the filming whilst I was going about my daily business!

    Anyway, I quite enjoyed it. I worry that some of the jokes are maybe a bit too "in joke" for people outside of the BBC to really appreciate.

    It is a very broad parody of life in Broadcasting House, but there is some accuracy there. I'll stick with I I think.

    When the W1A people used the glass lifts they were certainly a lot faster than in reality, and I actually saw someone with an orange folding Brompton bike outside earlier today :D

    I think all of us who work for a large company or in an office environment can relate the jokes to our own life. I used to work in Westminster and most of this was sadly all too familiar!

    BTW do all BBC staff wear the orange lanyards now to co-ordinate with the decor? Used to be blue when I used to go to meetings at the old BBC TV centre.
  • VetinariVetinari Posts: 3,336
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Ambassador wrote: »
    Is that the George Grossmith book? Is it radio or filmed? Would love to catch that

    That's the one.

    It was a BBC series and is available on DVD for around £10. (It may be repeated on BBC4 at some point - it has already been shown more than once.)

    It's superbly done and I think it offers a slightly new slant on the book.

    Not that they have messed around with text to any great extent, but just the way HB plays the part.
  • malpascmalpasc Posts: 9,626
    Forum Member
    Lou_25 wrote: »
    I think all of us who work for a large company or in an office environment can relate the jokes to our own life. I used to work in Westminster and most of this was sadly all too familiar!

    BTW do all BBC staff wear the orange lanyards now to co-ordinate with the decor? Used to be blue when I used to go to meetings at the old BBC TV centre.

    You can get lanyards in different colours, but when you come over to New Broadcasting House you have to do a 'building induction' (in the same room, sorry, interactive space as the 'No Signal' meeting in W1A!) and you get issued with your red lanyard then. I think the original idea was to notify security/facilities who had been inducted to the building.

    Before I moved to NBH I worked over at White City and had a blue lanyard. First Aiders have a green lanyard in all the buildings.
  • AerrowAerrow Posts: 107
    Forum Member
    Takes up pretty much seamlessly from where Twenty Twelve left off. Great to see Fletcher back, lost as ever. Even better to see Nina Sosanya. If there's a patient and competent refuge somewhere in the swirls of corporate loonspeak, she'll probably be it.
  • Object ZObject Z Posts: 1,871
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    malpasc wrote: »
    You can get lanyards in different colours, but when you come over to New Broadcasting House you have to do a 'building induction' (in the same room, sorry, interactive space as the 'No Signal' meeting in W1A!) and you get issued with your red lanyard then. I think the original idea was to notify security/facilities who had been inducted to the building.

    Before I moved to NBH I worked over at White City and had a blue lanyard. First Aiders have a green lanyard in all the buildings.

    And in TVC we have a pink lanyard with `BBC TVC 2015` in white letters.
    The Beeb does love a good lanyard.:D
  • BellaRosaBellaRosa Posts: 36,512
    Forum Member
    suesuesue wrote: »
    Sublime. David tenants VoiceOver. The look on HBs face when Siobhan turned up. And carol v was a revelation. No acting training AFAIK but great comic timing and the look on her face when Sarah parish sent the food back was priceless.

    Imo David Tennant is the best voice over person ever. Whatever he does he does brilliantly :D

    Well this did not disappoint. I watched it twice for things I missed the first time. I love HB's facial expressions.

    Cannot believe there is only 4 episodes tho. I missed the man from Yorkshire tho.
  • EraserheadEraserhead Posts: 22,016
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    I really enjoyed this. I've never worked in an office environment but that didn't detract from my enjoyment of the whole confusing and rather pointless nature of corporate meeting spaces.

    Tennant's VO was great and I almost fell of my chair when Ian opened an office door to find Alan Yentob and Salman Rushdie arm wrestling!!
  • catinabasketcatinabasket Posts: 707
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    I'm sure a lot people liked this and can relate to similar situations in their own jobs.

    I recorded it and watched about ten minutes of it. I might at sometime be desperate enough for something to watch, to actually go back and watch more. But it's unlikely.

    As soon as I saw the bike, I thought. it'll be the same old jokes again, so for me I thought it'd be a bit "Wild Geese 2" for those who know what I mean.

    Oh Doghouse, give it another chance, its worth it. :kitty:
  • Hamlet77Hamlet77 Posts: 22,440
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    I'm sure a lot people liked this and can relate to similar situations in their own jobs.

    I recorded it and watched about ten minutes of it. I might at sometime be desperate enough for something to watch, to actually go back and watch more. But it's unlikely.

    As soon as I saw the bike, I thought. it'll be the same old jokes again, so for me I thought it'd be a bit "Wild Geese 2" for those who know what I mean.
    R
    Two points.

    1. Wild Geese 2 is a grossly unappreciated ....... Actually it is'nt

    2. W1A was proof it was not relying on the same old, same old, new job, new bike new humour.
  • Doghouse RileyDoghouse Riley Posts: 32,491
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Hamlet77 wrote: »
    R
    Two points.

    1. Wild Geese 2 is a grossly unappreciated ....... Actually it is'nt

    2. W1A was proof it was not relying on the same old, same old, new job, new bike new humour.

    Glad you enjoyed it, but I'm not really bothered about watching the rest of my recording.
  • Doghouse RileyDoghouse Riley Posts: 32,491
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Hamlet77 wrote: »
    R
    Two points.

    1. Wild Geese 2 is a grossly unappreciated ....... Actually it is'nt

    2. W1A was proof it was not relying on the same old, same old, new job, new bike new humour.

    The bike may have been new, but there was nothing different in him being unable to fold the bike up.

    Glad you enjoyed it, but I'm not really bothered about watching the rest of my recording.
  • technologisttechnologist Posts: 13,334
    Forum Member
    ✭✭
    LostFool wrote: »
    I wonder where Ian Fletcher goes next? After the Olympics and the BBC maybe it's time for him to enter politics.
    No ....HS 3 to connect Penzance to London in 50 minutes !!!

    But a great first episode ...... And resonates with so many things in business today ,
  • AcerBenAcerBen Posts: 21,273
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    Next time I go to a restaurant I want to try the "No I don't want this" line:D
  • VerenceVerence Posts: 104,577
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭✭
    Abriel wrote: »
    The actor who played Herrick in being human is great in this:)

    Isn't he just?? :)
  • TheGrumpWizardTheGrumpWizard Posts: 1,547
    Forum Member
    ✭✭✭
    I loved 2012 but struggled with this. Have to agree with the comments about it being one big in-joke and yes, I have worked at senior level in corporates. Some good pieces in the voice over agreed.

    Also have to agree about Ms V unfortunately. I take it HD didn't do her any favours.
Sign In or Register to comment.