Little Britain USA

After three seasons and a live tour DVD, David Walliams and Matt Lucas needed a change of scenery, or at least their viewers did. As hilarious as the two comedians and their Little Britain concept are — exaggerating British characteristics and traditions to an alarming and absurd degree — the characters were beginning to overstay their welcome. With the growing popularity of the show stateside on HBO, Walliams and Lucas relocated to Wilmington, NC, of all places, for six episodes set on mixing British humour with the American way. In many ways it gives their overexposed characters new opportunities to continue their behaviour. Possessive dandy Sebastian Love is now the British Prime Minister and crushes all over the black U.S. President, even fighting off stiff competition by the French PM (Paul Rudd); Harvey Pincher has some "bitty" while visiting distant American relatives; Carol Beer's computer says no to pregnant women and fragile old-timers in a hospital; and Marjorie Dawes gets to put her "Fat Fighters" program to use in the land of obesity, even offending her guest speaker, "fat lezzie" Rosie O'Donnell. However, both slapper Vicky Pollard and corpulent gold-digger Bubbles Devere are still too irritating to stomach after the first sketch; Daffyd Thomas's "only gay" routine doesn't have the same impact outside his small Welsh village; and Lou and Andy's shtick is running on empty at this point. But thankfully, the U.S. is also represented with its distinct personalities. Ellie Grace is a darling little girl who can't help but tell her mom, "I love you more than cum shots!" Mark and Tom are a couple of closet case bodybuilders with tiny cocks; Bing Gordyn, is the eighth man to walk on the moon and he doesn't want anyone to forget it; and my favourite of the bunch, Phyllis Church is an older lady who does whatever she thinks her King Charles Spaniel, Mr. Doggy, tells her to, like take a poop at the park. This American vacation works wonders for the series but these kinds of asides have limited runs. Little Britain's strength is its characters, not necessary character development, so more focus on writing new eccentric personas and ridding the series of Vicky and Bubbles would be a great reward. Surprisingly, there aren't as many extras as usual. Deleted scenes include a mysterious individual in a hotel who won't reveal his identity and Kenny Craig the hypnotist, who puts a grocery shopper under his spell. The "making of" talks about how much more difficult this series was since it was now based in American and through HBO, not British and with the BBC. Introducing new characters proved to be easier than displacing established characters, but Walliams and Lucas complain that even in America masculinity doesn't always work for them, hence all of the gay and female roles.