It's the plain situation, there's no negotiation, with the fellas at the freakin ABC

Has enough time lapsed since the last post? Must get this in quick, otherwise it'll be irrelevant...

I'll tell you this for free, I don't care at all for this stupid blathering about how "controversial" Summer Heights High is. Whoever seriously thinks that Chris Lilley and the executives in charge of the ABC* are trying to use the death of some chick who died of an overdose to score a cheap laugh are clearly suffering from something much worse than Heightened Morality Complex - they've got The Stupid.

I was watching A Current Affair tonight for the first time in ages (well, it was either that or get emotionally worked up over the dreadful state of Neighbours) and their story on it was so predictable and annoying. They interviewed some lame experts, all of whom agreed that taking drugs is most definitely NOT funny, and that having a joke at the expense of a "victim" of drugs is WRONG. Um, derbrains, the joke wasn't against the girl who had the overdose; the joke was Mr G's appallingly insensitive reaction to the death.

And it WAS funny.

Plus, some of those songs he wrote were kind of catchy. So... deal with it, everyone.

That the girl in the program and the girl who died of a drug overdose had the same name is coincidence, since the program had ceased production ten days before this woman died. The ABC shouldn't be expected to edit out that entire plotline, or even change the name (I'm presuming with the use of a lot of "Mr Black" type dubbing, a la Krusty), and its managing director, Mark Scott, was being way too reactionary in apologising to the girl's family. Believe it or not, this style of mockumentary is meant to cover some of the things that most of us, for some reason or another, would really rather avoid. It's called satire, look it up.

This kind of thing is what I consider to be real political correctness - I mean, it's rated M, everyone who watched this show has to know by now that it isn't actually real, and most of the 'edgy' content isn't really all that edgy anyway. And yet people continue to bitch about it.

I cringed more during the scenes where Jonah had some mysterious stains on his shorts, and when Ja'mie was trying to hit on a little year seven boy. How much did you feel sorry for him when she stole his phone, looked through his messages, and smashed it right in front of him? Poor kid.

* B1 and B2.

PS -- a million points to whoever gets the reference in the title.

PPS -- apologies to my fellow Square Arses for being responsible for all the yucky Google hits.

'Thank god you're here, grandma's been raped!'

Jacob here. Thanks again to Chesty for adding me as a contributor to this blog, and a big hoy-hoy to the readers of this now fledgling blog escapade. I just know we'll be the best of friends! *curtsy*

****

Now, down to my first ever post!



Tonight was of course the first episode of Chris Lilley's new series Summer Heights High, his first project since the wildly successful (and milk-snortingly hilarious) We Can Be Heroes. I watched that series and loved every episode, all six of the fictional nominees for Australian of the Year seemed to strike a chord in some way or another, and Chris Lilley's aptitude for character acting impressed me no end.



I remember that by the end of the series I was completely hooked. Unfortunately I missed the final episode because I was at some thing for school - against my will mind you - so I didn't know what happened in the end. When I bought the DVD, I couldn't wait to find out which one of them won, and I am ashamed to say that I actually cried when Pat Mullins died. I cried for poor Terry ("you make me very merry!") for having lost his wife, and she didn't even get to complete her roll to Uluru! Sad.

That's what is so great about Chris Lilley: making his creations so bloody convincing. Some of you might remember when he was interviewed on radio as Ja'mie King that a few idiotic listeners called in to complain about her, believing she was for real. How stupid of the Seven network to let the ABC snatch him up for his own show, when he was on The Big Bite, a show that I can't even remember, so it must have been a while ago. In fact, Wednesday night is such an enviable night for the other commercial stations, what with Spicks and Spicks (which I love) and followed by the Chaser (which, awesomely, has returned after a short break), but that's another post entirely.

After watching the first episode tonight, I quite like the set of characters this series. Ja'mie King is back again. How could she not be? She's clearly his best character: she's offensive, in a funny way, and Shiva H Vishnu does she ever ring a few familiar bells! You know the kind... overachieving beeyatches with a superiority complex and a gaggle of subservient girlfriends and a penchant for describing everything as “random”. I love the bit where she's giving a welcoming speech to the school, subtly insulting the students as she shows them a gratuitous slide show of her modelling photos. I wonder if there will be another group dance routine, like in Heroes? That’d be ace.



There's also Mr G, the effeminate drama teacher, and Jonah, the recidivist bully who likes to draw the ‘cock and balls’ sign on every available surface. I think he's supposed to be an "Islander" or something, but his accent was sort of a weird jumble of South African and New Zealand, with a bit of a wog inflection thrown in for good measure. A quick shuffle over to the Summer Heights High website informs me that he is indeed Tongan. Hm. Anyway. I didn't find Jonah as funny as the other two characters, but there's still seven more glorious episodes to go... yay!

Lots of gay jokes abound in the character of Mr G. He makes me wonder whether my high school drama experience might have been different if I didn't always have female drama teachers. He sounds a lot like Pat Mullins, but he's channelling a bit of Ricky Wong's spirit, labouring under the misapprehension that he is, in fact, a decent actor. Once again I love the reactions of his students, who are all actual students at the high school where the mockumentary was filmed, when he says and does completely bizarre stuff.
In case you were a little bemused by the title of this post, that's one of the lines that Mr G came out with at the start of one of his improvisational theatre-sports type games. I laughed until my clacker ached. Grandma wasn't too impressed with my sense of humour.

I liked also the support cast, who I firmly believe were a great factor in the success of Heroes. The principal, a few of the teachers, Jonah and Ja’mie’s friends, and Jonah’s dad all make Chris Lilley’s interactions as funny as they are. I hope that in the coming episodes Ja’mie’s mother from the previous series will make an appearance - that scene where Ja’mie raged into the telephone and to her mum was pure molten comedy gold.

Summer Heights High - I thought it was a terrific first episode. Chris Lilley's performances all sort of seem to be a bit rehashed from his earlier characters, but that's to be expected I suppose.

The newsies are saying that this series will be "controversial" which is journalist speak for "it will prompt someone somewhere to complain" but what really matters is that he does it well, extremely well in fact, and I already can't wait for next week.

What did y'all think? Was it as good as We Can Be Heroes?


Summer Heights High airs on ABC TV at 9:30 on Wednesday nights.