I've been watching this a couple of episodes at a time because it is a hit and miss comedy, some episodes are excellent and some are tired farce. After watching of one the latter I swear I'll never watch another episode again, but, the only reason I do is because Tamsin Greig and Paul Ritter are excellent even in the worst episodes.
It sounds like a great idea for a comedy series, two sons come home every Friday night for dinner with their parents. They are a Jewish family, but, don't follow their religion strictly and Friday night dinner is almost a shabbat ritual, but not quite.
Martin is my favourite character, quirky and annoying, but, not in a negative way, instead a bit like lots of husbands can be, while Jackie is loving and her family are important to her, together she and Martin are the best thing in this show.
As for the sons, who the hell would allow their adult sons to behave so atrociously, spiteful, nasty vindictive to each other and to others. Horrible and unfunny characters, but, still not as dreadful as Jim. Seriously what is Jim meant to be, is he supposed to have learning difficulties or is he just plain self centrered? Why doesn't the family tell him to bugger off when he knocks on their door during every Friday Night Dinner? And the running joke of him and his dog ran out of steam by episode three of series one.
The writer appears to want to produce memorable secondary characters that people remember, such as the Soup Nazi in Seinfeld or the hard of hearing lady in Fawlty Towers, that is the only reason I can think of such ridiculous characters as the little girl in the girlfriend episode or the blind piano tuner. But, they were so stupid and poorly written it was embarrassing.
Sadly I stuck with it because it had great episodes but, as time went on they became fewer and far between. It's a show that should have been one or two series at the most. There's only so much you can do with two self centered immature ill disciplined sons and the annoying neighbour from hell and two series more than covered that.
Review of Friday Night Dinner
