The one hundred thirty-first TV show: #144 Monty Python's Flying Circus
After finally getting through some other shows, I thought I'd go back to Monty Python - it had been a while since I'd seen it and would make for a nice diversion in a difficult time. Having watched the first twenty episodes - probably about half of the best era of the show - it's been welcoming as we watched at least two episodes most nights. Now, some of it is quite dated - there's more blackface than there should be, for example - but the show holds up. It's not as innovative as it might have been at the time, with things like odd transitions being more common in comedy, especially the alt comedy scene.
What's more delightful, however, is how incredibly silly the show gets. It gets weird, it gets side tracked and feels like it keeps doing its own things, sometimes with non sequiturs or diversions that lead nowhere, or as often with a normal, well developed sketch that's just written and performed well. It goes broad sometimes, but just as often is as smart as you'd think. It's a writer's show, with the writers performing their work as well, but focusing on performing that the best rather than adding their own thing to the show. It's stayed watchable, and especially when you find the relative gems - not the few scenes that are repeated by everyone, but the weird bits that just sit there without as much acknowledgement from the world as a whole.