Trailer Park Boys: Live in F**kin' Dublin

Let me first preface this review by stating that I am a big fan of the Trailer Park Boys TV show. I have all the seasons on DVD, as well as the blu-rays of their feature movies, as well as their direct-to-video movie. And as a fan, I must warn every and all TPD fans to avoid this "special" at all costs. Unless, of course, you'd like to have your memories of the classic show tainted by this garbage.

The special starts off well enough, with a montage filmed in the Sunnyvale trailer park, which sets up the overall premise behind the show - Bubbles has won an all-expenses paid trip to Dublin, Ireland, to see Rush live in concert. Somehow thinking that a private plane means the passengers are exempt from customs inspections, Ricky quickly gets arrested for trafficking narcotics into Ireland, and the rest of the boys (and Randy) get hauled off to court.

The judge happens to be a fan of the show, and agrees to drop the charges if the boys will do a live show in Dublin, explaining the dangers and risks of alcohol and narcotics. All this is just a framing device for the live show, which follows immediately after this setup.

I honestly don't know how much those Irish fans paid to attend the show, but they must be incredibly upset. The boys do the show in character, meaning that there are no carefully-rehearsed skits and lots of lots of them trying to ad-lib stuff in character, but it all falls incredibly flat. It's like a poorly thought out high school play, with actors who have barely had time to read their lines once. While drunk.

There are times where one or another character is on stage, just looking around, yelling backstage for the others to come out and help entertain. These moments actually feel genuine, as you can kind of feel that the boys realize the mistake behind a live show almost immediately after it begins. They look uncomfortable and at a loss as to what to do, and the crowd rarely, if ever laughs.

Honestly, I couldn't even get through this travesty in one sitting. I'd be constantly wincing and invariably switch to a different movie or show just to cleanse my palate. In total, it took me 6 sessions to get through this 90-minute torture session, and I really had to force myself to power through. I dare any TPB fan to make it up to Ricky's hypnotist act in one sitting...

If you're a TPB fan and you intend to watch this show despite all the warnings against it, all I can recommend is to watch the filmed framing devices shown before and after the live show and fast forward through the rest. Those parts are the only redeeming element of the show, and why I decided to give the special a 2 instead of a 1.

Ricky, Julian, Bubbles...you guys are geniuses when it comes to scripted comedy, but stand-up comedians you definitely are not. Stick to the small screen.

I really enjoyed the show, made me laugh out loud. So much fun!

I've been on this site for years but only to read trivia facts about my favorite shows and movies and to see what reviews they got from users on the site. I been on a trailer park boys binge since a friend told me about it and I have watched everything related to the series and when I looked up a review for the latest trailer park boys special, Live in Dublin, I was shocked to see only one review and not a very good one at that!

Lets get one thing straight here, if your coming into this thinking it's going to be like another episode of the show or a feature length movie, your very mistaken. There is an opening and closing skit that will seem like they were pulled from a trailer park boys episode but that's about it. The rest takes place on a stage where the gang perform improv comedy in character and even play a few tunes. The review I read said that the actors were not in character but I would like to disagree.

Without ruining the moments of the show, there's plenty of callbacks to people and running gags from the show. Since its all a live performance and mile smith (a.k.a. Bubbles) is an accomplished musician, he even performs a few songs. Some are created for this show but if you know what the character of bubbles is all about, the songs will garner some laughs and you will see how in character he still is. There's even some covers of his favorite band performed by Bubbles himself. They even get the crowd involved and their interactions with the crowd are again things I could see Bubbles, Ricky, and Julian doing.

Can't really say much else without ruining this very entertaining special except i wish i could have gone to see it live! For those who are big fans of TPB and can ignore that the guys are out of their normal element, give this a chance and you won't be disappointed!

This had all the feel of a bunch of actors trying to squeeze a bit more money out of their fame. If they were attempting improv - it failed colossally. The Trailer Park movies are hilarious because these guys rehearse and follow a script.

This was nothing of the kind.

They may have tried to be funny but ended up just being stupid. ... and even their stupidity was mediocre!

If I had been in the live audience (and paid for a ticket) I would have been majorly upset! I doubt I'll ever waste time on a Trailer Park Boys show again.

I don't understand all of the negative reviews this is getting. No, it's not the TPB series, it's a live show that is SCRIPTED. The actors were playing their characters. The nervousness they showed was all part of the act. They even add the live act into one of the episodes in series 8. So get ready to see it there, for those of you who didn't enjoy it.

Yes, the audience did laugh, as did I. They looked to me like they were enjoying the show, end enjoyed participating in the games. They sang along with Bubbles, bought Randy's cheeseburgers and went along with Ricky's hypnotism attempt.

I hope they continue to do live shows. I would love to go to one of them if they did one near me.