10 Moments Of Genius From Charlie Brooker

7. Nathan Barley

nathan-barley-20090623192634_625x352 Spinning off from a regular (unmentionably titled) tvgohome listing, Brooker teamed up with comedy legend Chris Morris for this six-part Channel 4 comedy. Barley, played beautifully by Nicholas Burns, is the inexplicably popular title character who Brooker described as "a self-facilitating media node" - basically, one of the new media idiots who broke through in the 2000s that had you wondering - do people really like this stuff? With his website trashbat.co.ck (yep, that really exists) Barley's rise to prominence is counterpointed by Julian Barrett (he of The Boosh) as Dan, a writer himself who despises the way audiences react to the rise of idiocy. Part sitcom, part social satire, Nathan Barley captured a moment in time when London's Shoreditch was full of people with terrible ideas and had the means to communicate them. Basically, 90% of the people who you now see on Twitter. Featuring a host of comic talent such as Richard Ayoade, Noel Fielding and Rhys Thomas, Barley isn't to all tastes (in places it's as dark as much of Chris Morris' other work), but it's genuinely original and is bursting with some fantastic ideas. It's a shame to spoil many of them, especially as you can pick up the DVD cheaply these days. Genius Moment:Dan's initial "Rise of the Idiots" newspaper feature, narrated by Barrett, which sums up the spirit and theme of the show perfectly. A visual and aural treat - "They babble into handheld twit machines." If you like this 38 seconds of the show, chances are you'll love the rest of it.
Contributor
Contributor

I'm a Westcountry exile now living in Yorkshire with lovely wife and cats (also lovely). I'm a big fan of films, robots, timetravel, and films about timetravelling robots, as well as lots of other action, sci-fi and comedy. I'm currently trying to write a sitcom that doesn't involve robots, and I also blog nonsense on timolsky.blogspot.com. Thanks for taking the time to read my stuff, and feel free to comment.