Conclusion: It’ll Never Be as Good Again

Abstract

Today’s popular culture is defined by one inescapable narrative, that of nostalgia. As confirmed by the regressive nature of high performing live-action comedy shows, such as Not Going Out (2006—to date), Miranda (2009—to date), Mrs. Brown’s Boys (2011—to date), Citizen Khan (2012—to date), Vicious (ITV 2013—to date) and straight revamps, such as Birds of a Feather (ITV 2014), it appears that the middle ground within mainstream television comedy has been re-asserted with a relentless force that seems to preclude risk-taking and experimentation. It currently appears as though British comedy is stuck in a cycle. The 1970s were presented by broadcast networks as the singular narrative by which to access ‘One Nation TV’ once more (Thompson, 2004, p. xii). So pressurising are the expectations enforced by ratings, cross-platform performances and the immediate (and often un-nuanced) judgements dispensed on social networking, that writers of situation comedy now have to negotiate a far more complex set of hurdles. When writer/actor Jessica Hynes constructed a sitcom about the early suffragette movement (the 2013 Up the Women) it appeared that the only way forward was now (curiously) backwards and the only way this project could be executed was to use 1970s sitcom Dad’s Army as the template, in that ‘it would work if you went really retro with it’ (Hynes cited by Williams, 2013, para 4). It seems in today’s accelerated culture and marketplace, pleasing the middle ground appears to be a necessary survival strategy.