The Red Green Show

A fantastically funny show about Red Green and some other men living up at Possum Lodge in the Yukon Territory. It's Canadian, but you don't need to be Canadian to love this show. Some of the older episodes are a little bit boring, but they still manage to top American shows like "Will and Grace". I will be very sad if this show goes off the air.

...and you might come close to getting the essence of what made "Red Green" so enjoyable. Never mind "The Man Show", THIS was the real deal!

What originally attracted me to the show was that it was indeed funny (in a bemused, Newhart way), but it also had a bit of an edge to it. There were some genuine barbs and mean-spirited feelings, some real cynicism and misanthropy concealed in the campfire songs and moose-poop jokes. In the last few years, that edge sort of went away (similar to the way "The Simpsons" lost a lot of their original venom after more than 10 years), but it was always funny and packed with clever word plays and tongue-in-cheek observations of the male psyche and character.

Many characters came and went over the years mostly wonderfully played by talented actors; the one I missed most was 'Garth Harple', the first "Animal Control Officer", whose sad sack demeanor and heavy handed irony ( his motto, "Another Super Day!!" could be teaser for every awful work assignment you ever had) was perfect for the show.

I admire Smith and company for quitting when they were still ahead...it must have been hard to abandon the money machine and a relatively sure thing, but to admit that you need to move on to other projects is the hallmark of true craftsmen at their best. Many many thanks to "The Red Green Show" for innumerable moments( over more than a decade) where I would almost snort beer (or milk) out my nose at some well done jape, sight gag or pratfall.

I can't help but watch this show, and I am a girl, but find it so funny. The humor is original to me.. And they are all a riot!! I can't help but wonder if in real life they all act like that, silly? And, I was wondering, would Steve Smith ever consider being in a serious movie on TV, or film? I think he could play a serious role, not sure what type, but I just feel he has all the qualities needed. I also wonder, is there a lodge like that, that is on this show? And, where is this show filmed in Canada? The humor is unique!! I really like the show a lot..The best part is when they read letters and ask questions to the experts! Funny stuff!

Look out! This show has supplied me life-saving laughs since the early 90s. I feel so lucky to have on tape nearly every episode, from the very beginning of the series - when old Red was so clean-cut and young that you can hardly recognize him as Steve Smith.

It definitely has lost its edge in the last couple of years, but the rustic humor is still pure. They just seem to be out new ideas for the Bill segments, The Experts and the Word Game.

I can't think of any other show or movie that could match this, in its style of humor and its near-accidental staging. This kind of show only comes along once. The way it's staged, it could have been a great live hit in the earliest days of TV.

It's more than likely that I love this show because it talks about people like me, who'll use duct-tape to fix a machine I depend on my life for, because it's easier than drilling holes and setting bolts.

No show that I'm aware of has done so much to celebrate men, even though the show mostly ridicules them. I'm sorry to see how much it's degenerated, in the last season, but you can only come up with so many believably outrageous (or is it outrageously believable) stunts.

I don't know from whence the concept originated, but I'll always love Steve Smith and Pat McKenna for giving me a show about myself, and the people I know.

...but it helps to know what the "Canadian Content Law" and other Canadian references mean. Lucky me, I am and I do.

Even so, The Red Green Show is a human cartoon with all of the pitfalls, screw-ups, lapses of judgement and fun that one could expect from The Simpsons, Warner Brothers and Family Guy.

Besides that, Red Green is a parody of everything that men are expected to be by either gender. Red's Handyman's Corner shows a man more obsessed with getting the job done quickly and cheaply, and have his project stay together just long enough to be effective.

And while his projects somehow survive, nothing else seems to fall the way of the gang at Possum Lake. Their get-rich-now schemes verify the wisdom of the adage "Those who strive to create a fool-proof plan too often underestimate the ingenuity and persistence of fools".

Red may keep his stick on the ice, but his head and those of his friends, God only knows where they've gone.