Karl & Co

This is a great TV Show that is very funny. Every episode is funny and even if the show is old and the quality of the video is bad the show is still one of the best TV shows ever made. It is only beaten by Mot I Brøstet.

The show is about Karl a businessman who just moved in to an apartment. Soon he gets an unwanted friend Ulf. The TV show is about Karls life and all the stupid funny situations he finds himself in. The show is the best comedy show ever made in Norway. I highly recommend to watch this. its a reason they are still sending this on TV, 10 years after its first release.

There is not much to say about these series. The actors suffers from Severe Overacting Syndrome, and the "humour" is based upon the firm foundation of five year old children's fascination of that which starts where the back ends. It is the sequel to "Mot i Brøstet", and completely fails to reach it's level. And *that* wasn't very good either.

As far as sitcoms go, this one is hitting every standard for its time, and it does so in a slightly above average manner. It's a sitcom that when it first aired, was watched and enjoyed by well over 3/4th of its country's population, and at the time of the writing of this review (almost 30 years after the show's first airing) it's still considered a relevant, beloved and well known phenomenon, which doesn't have an equal in Norwegian TV history. It's a show that has been enjoyed by everyone from people in the highest political, economical and social elite, to the old, the poor, kids and the average person.

Some of Norway's all time greatest comics and actors stars in, frequent and make guest appearances in this show, a factor which contributes to increasing its overall quality, and making it more enjoyable. This also causes the show to have more of a "cozy" vibe, a feature that has viewers feeling more charmed and entertained, as well as being a key element in keeping them around and having them enjoy whatever they're watching - even when a show isn't at its best. This is also something that this shows predecessor "Mot i Broestet" was famously known for.

Like most good shows, there are both brilliant and not quite so amazing episodes. This does not however; reflect negatively on the shows creator, writer, director, composer and producer Tore Ryen, whom just about single handedly wrote and directed every episode of Karl & Co (as well as all of his other shows) completely on his own. A fun fact regarding this, is that Ryen would always write one episode for his sitcoms every week, and at one point in the late 90's - he had 3 sitcoms running at the same time (a feat which most writers would consider to be an almost impossible achievement). It's also worth noting that Ryen's record on writing a sitcom episode, is merely 6 hours. Normally, a tv show will have anything from 2-20 writers on each episode, with up to 300-400 writers working on a show throughout its entire lifespan. Most TV show writers usually also have 1-3 weeks to write out an episode together AFTER the episode's story has been broken (I.e. Outlined), and therefore do not need to come up with everything within a few days like Ryen usually would.

Is this a perfect sitcom? No it's not, but then again I have in all fairness yet to discover such a thing. I also can't really say that I've ever watched a sitcom that's either funnier and/or more enjoyable than this one. "Two and a half men", "The Big Bang Theory" "Family Guy" and "The IT Crowd" are some shows that are fairly equal to ours in terms of greatness and how funny they all are. Sadly, they all lack both the type and amount of feel good factor and soul found in "Karl & Co".

Naturally enough, the show at times contains a certain amount of cheap and/or repetitive gags, as well as some plots, story lines and endings that one definitely doesn't need to be psychic in order to predict. This can sometimes get a bit boring and/or annoying to some people, this guy included. It's important to note however, that this is a consumer product that's made to be consumed and enjoyed by as many "normal" people as possible, and that it's therefore (neither by definition or intention) NOT a culturally elitist art piece that's intended for miserable cultural snobs and critics (even if many of these people actually have admitted to more or less secretly enjoying this show).

With said things taken into consideration, "Karl & Co" becomes an even more impressive sitcom, and all in all there's a great time to be had with this one - especially if you have the ability to appreciate the things that it does best, which is to entertain, amuse, engage and make us love and cherish its characters.

I didn't catch much of the show during its original run in 1998, and even if I did, I wouldn't have understood it as I pretty young at the time.

Seeing the show in numerous reruns, it amazes me, in a weird way. The way its built up is extremely dull, predictable and at times stupid. It completely lacks touch with reality and doesn't have shred of credibility at times. Karl Reverud, the businessman who thinks too high of himself, repeatedly finds himself in situations way over his head, something that always has to end in him making a fool of himself, to everyone's amusement and his great irritation. It clearly conflicts with the life he leads. He has a large apartment in what's obviously a rich neighborhood and he's obviously had some financial success, but that can in no way be the same Karl as the one who's portrayed in the show.

The show is clearly cheap. It's built up in a simple way: The main stage is the main character's living room. His friends, acquaintances, neighbors and seemingly random people walk in and out of it, something he irritates himself over almost every time. There is laughter in the background so that anyone watching knows where the good jokes are, unfortunately they aren't. Any special effects, if they can be called special effects, are poorly made.

Still, there is something to this show that doesn't become apparent at first glance. The characters', especially Karl's personality, fits his character perfectly. Having studied introductory psychology myself, I immediately can identify his reactions to to various things that happen in the show. Whether this was intended by the script writers is unknown, but to me, it's quite interesting, especially in a show which in general is very poorly made.

This is the sequel to "Mot i Broestet", which wasn`t any fun. And as a normal sequel, this is even worse than the original series. As before, we get the same poor actors, all the episodes are the same and the jokes are pathetic and tired, and makes you cry of the fact that a Norwegian tv-series rarely is worth seeing. Just as the original, this isn`t really worth seeing. But see it if you like poor humour. This series needs to be put to bed now.