Up the Women

We are in need of a comedy what with having to endure ITV's latest offering 'Vicious'and this show provides the perfect opposite to that.

Although it's not a laugh a minute it manages to both be entertaining and also informative about the time period in which it is set. Hynes has said that she aimed to create a retro style of sitcom and it is because of this that is stands out so well from all the other dross that is on right now.

Jessica Hynes is good as the lead but it does not all feel like it is on her head because the show contains a good supporting cast with the brilliant Ryan Sampson being the stand out.

By being placed on BBC 4 to start with I hope this show gains a small but loyal following and will get re-commissioned beyond the three episodes we have so far.

I am mainly writing this review to answer the review left by jan-cunningham.. Jessica Hynes, the writer of the programme, is a huge devotee of the history side of the suffragettes and the Pankhursts. She knows all the history, she supports it all and has probably read and sunk in more about it than you based on your appallingly insulting review! What she admits she has done in this sitcom is bring the basic era to life to a new generation some of whom may not have even heard of it, and if you actually watched the show you will see (as Jess has said herself in interviews) that the members are not actually part of the WSPU, they are their own version not affiliated. So you cannot accuse her of belittling the cause, when the characters are shown to be idiots but the cause and the actual WSPU are not! So lighten up - it's a sitcom, funny or not (erm a little patchy but i enjoyed it mostly), and it brought an era to peoples front rooms for a while. But to come online and write the kind of rubbish you wrote, i think you're the joke.

I wanted to burst into tears. That a woman could write this condescending neo-feminist rubbish. It's all very well from her angle. A young woman who knows nothing of the fight for women's rights. From her perspective, in a more emancipated age, perhaps it looks like the vote for women was just all a jolly jape. Yeah right. It was deadly serious and you dear sitcom writer are very naive. Grow up and recognise your superiors from decades before you. I am ashamed this was penned by the hand of an English/welsh/irish/Scottish hand. I think you only care about being known at Highgate and Hampstead dinner parties. Reply to me, a real feminist if you dare. You have made money, pengar, baksheesh, but that's all. You will be forgotten in a heartbeat. And that's good, very good. The worrying thing is that there are probably thousands of sad women who are of the same ilk. God help us the women of the world!

Up The Women This is written by Jessica Hynes, who wrote Spaced!!! But didn't get as much credit for it as the now extremely popular Simon Pegg.

BBC Four has started many good sitcoms over the last few years Lead Balloon, The Thick of It and to be honest I don't think that this has much potential. Yes it was funny and overall a pretty promising comedy, but it's not a very relatable and popular topic. Unlike ITV's new sitcom Vicious about 2 elderly gay men which is set in modern day and everyone can imagine happening. Also (although this may sound ironic considering that Up The Women is about suffragettes and women's rights)this is almost certainly going to be more popular with the female audience than the male audience like me. Overall UP THE WOMEN is an average sitcom which will definitely make you chuckle but I really doubt will advance to BBC Two or One 7/10

A good original subject for a sitcom with a great title, they gathered a good cast too but did not get the budget, being commissioned in the middle of drastic cutbacks at the BBC. I cannot remember a watching a cheaper looking sitcom production ever. All the 'action' took place in the one building, two room set - a wooden village hall with a kitchen. From the first episode it looked like a slap in the face from the BBC, commissioning a 3 episode series that cost less than the comedy executives' lunches.

Hynes led the ensemble valiantly but after the first few dozen lines it was clear she didn't write the script with as much conviction. It was woolly, too mild and too focused on gentle character nuances rather than subject related comedy punch lines as befits a proper sitcom. It had the trad sitcom look, a good historical story behind it and could even have been a female Dad's Army had it the ambition to, but it didn't seem to have an ounce of it. It had the semblance of quirky characters needed but even the strongest of them had little that was that funny to say.

It ended up looking more like a period parody of (spoof mini sitcom) Acorn Antiques but no where near as funny. It was pleasant enough to watch with some eccentric mumbling characters but without having enough conflict from without or within to drive a decent episode story. So although its pleasantness gained it a second series, this went nowhere quickly, limited by its tiny budget, script and ambition. In hindsight it may have been better to end it on the relative medium high of just one short series. Could have been, in another year, maybe with another creator, a very good sitcom, but that would have been a totally different one to this.