10 TV Shows That Failed To Stick The Landing

The British sitcom is famous for its brevity. The Office and Fawlty Towers, two of these shores’ best, called it quits after two seasons, and few go for the distance they do in the USA. Sometimes that leaves fans wanting - but the latter days of Peep Show demonstrate that less really is more.

What began as one of the best and funniest comedies on UK TV sadly died with a whimper a staggering nine seasons in.

Really the writing was on the wall about half way through its run, but Peep Show still gave us the goods for many of its later years. In the ninth season, however, things just got a little silly. A show which was once so great at skewering the nation’s minor insecurities and foibles became cartoonish and silly (Super Hans gets a snake! Mark and Jeremy are clearly insane people!). The voice-overs became far too prominent and the whole thing got a bit lazy.

And even more crucially, the writers made the decision that the two leads in fact hate, and are trapped with, each other, making the ending quite a bitter pill to swallow.

There are enough great episodes of Peep Show to establish it as an indisputable classic UK comedy, but it’s a shame it ended in such a sluggish and forgettable manner. While other shows leave a legacy of perfection, Peep Show’s admirable ambition to dig in deeper with these characters means that there’s a portion of the episodes you’d just never really bother rewatching.