Suburban Shootout

This TV series has not aged well now that there's a "suburban shooting" nearly every week. The show might make more sense if set in West Texas where the gun culture is like a religion, but in domesticated England? Nope. Rather than playing comedy seriously, the actors know they are in spoof and mug accordingly. It's rather sickening to watch considering the subject.

I kept watching just to catch TH, but he had not gotten passed his teen years' ungainliness when this was filmed. He had bad skin and un-brightened teeth with little muscle tone, kinda shocking to see him as he was then compared to later. He got better looking.

I hail form Greece and being part of the European Union (at least sometimes I think we are) we are no strangers to true British comedy. From the Kenny Everett show, to Men Behaving Badly, Only Fools and Horses, to the Benny Hill show and of course the Black Adder, along with numerous VHS tapes and occasional screenings of Monty Pythons's movies, we've seen and heard it (almost) all. But then a hidden gem like this comes along and brings a bright and nutty smile on one's face again. From the seemingly peaceful little British town and quiet paradise of Stempington comes a colourful array of innocent housewives, leading an ordinary and boring life. But things are much different below the surface, with gun totting criminals, naive police enforcement, corrupt officials, deviant old ladies and sex crazed menopausal wives, springled with asylum seeking refugees and cheese loving French gangsters, this series has it all! From bonkers crazy themes, to surprise attacks of equal amounts of laughter and mayhem, often at the same scene, it is a truly hilarious and darkly satisfying black comedy, promising to entertain you as only british comedies can. Before Vicious came into play, it is truly a marvel to behold. A special nod to then just aspiring actors Ruth Wilson (Luther/The Affair) and Tom Hiddleston (the name needs no introduction nowadays) as the Romeo-And-Juliet-esque doomed lovers, who show us a very different and comic performance than we are accustomed to...

Suburban Shooutout only has one joke and you guessed it it's the one in the title. If you find it hilarious that middle England housewives are in fact gun slinging gangsters and feel like having that gag rammed down your throat in various different ways for half an hour then this might be the show for you. Most will hate it. Or just not notice it.

The worst aspect is the characterisation. It's non existent. Everyone is one dimensional and there are no motivations based in reality. The relationship between the main dippy woman and her husband, the copper played by Ralph "Finchy" Inneson, is the most stupidly unbelievable thing going.

Basically it's kids' TV. Bad kids' TV at that. Awful and unfunny. Could have been good if there was anything beyond the "hilarious" premise but there's not. Avoid.

It is wry, dark and humorous with a perfectly pitched line in silliness. Do not expect hard edged drama, do not expect much in the way of mind melting plot twists. Having said that there is enough plot that i was most irritated to miss the final episode. Do not expect much detailed characterisation, certainly not for the supporting cast. Do expect the p..s to be taken out of everything. Do expect to laugh. the botox episode was particularly amusing.

i really hope they make a second series of this, it was kind of hidden late on a Thursday night on channel 5 and i doubt many actually watched it. It made me chuckle more than anything else on recently.

I'm on a quest to watch everything Ruth Wilson has acted in. She's brilliant and steals this show as well. Here she hams it up tremendously as a ditsy/nutty sex pot. She plays the daughter of one of the gun toting old ladies who sets her sights on the son of another (Tom Hiddleston in an early role). While a fun idea this would've been better suited for a 30min short film. Old ladies touting guns and having turf wars in a quaint little town gets really old really quickly and they couldn't possibly have stretched this out further than the two seasons that were made. While fun and sometimes even brilliantly so this has a tiresome undercurrent of male bashing. Points subtracted for that. Besides that this is a mostly fun watch but it does get old and towards the end of the second season my interest had severely waned and I found myself surfing on my smartphone while glancing at the screen every now and then. Watch it if you are curious about early appearances from Tom Hiddleston and Ruth Wilson. Especially Wilson is broad camp to the hilt and she plays it wonderfully.