Garth Marenghi's Darkplace

This is a comedy spoofing the best and worst of TV from the 1980's. Garth Marenghi is a horror writer who created a show during the 1980's so deep and meaningful that the networks banished it to storage. Now in 2004 the vaults have been opened unleashing it for the world to enjoy. By taking inspiration from classic shows including "Twin Peaks" and "The A Team" a fantastic show has been created. It centers on a Hospital where the docs carry guns and fight supernatural beings. The scripts are deliberately cheesy, the editing is poor and the acting is very wooden. But that is what makes it so funny. There are even those alwful end tags popular with American shows were the main characters laugh at some rubbish joke. If you lived during the 1980's you must see this!

glad to see here that I'm not the only one already hooked after just 3 episodes.

I've tried to explain to people why they must watch it, but the only way they will understand is to watch it!

Its hilarious: terrible acting, atrocious script, wobbly sets, appalling dubbing, and some very alarming wigs.

And lots of slow motion (well, its hard to fill a half hour slot with story all the time)

I'm looking forward to saying 'I told you so' to lots of people when they 'discover' this show in 6 months!

I'm Garth Marenghi. Author, dreamweaver, visionary, plus actor. You're about to enter the world of my imagination. You are entering my Darkplace. Garth Marenghi is genius, and as Dean Lerner himself said:"Garth is the most significant artist that I have ever worked with, and I have worked with Lulu and four other people.". And when Dean Learner says that. At the beginning of every episode Garth Marenghi reads excerpt from his novels that only further proves his masterful writing abilities (Mike stared in disbelief as his hands fell of from 'Slasher'.). Music by Stig Baasvik, based on melodies originally whistled by Garth Marenghi.

'Garth Marenghi's Darkplace' is fantastic horror and behind the scenes spoof. Probably the best there ever is. It ran only six episodes before the show was cancelled because the low viewer numbers, and it is sad. But on the other hand, the long run would have become repetitive and finally turned stale. Six twenty five minute long episodes is perfect length for such absurdity. The writing is masterfully bad as the acting and directing (all of this is on purpose of course). Constant continuity errors and bad dialogue offers laugh after laugh. But not most of the jokes are on your face, at least half the jokes are very subtle that you notice them on the second (or fourth or even on the sixth) viewing, or when someone points it out for you. TV show inside TV show have never been funnier, and the really funny part about it is that I actually cared about the show and characters Garth Marenghi had created.

Gun doting doctors in hospital constantly plagued by supernatural forces can never be any cooler than in Garth Marenghi's imagination.

I watched this show with trepidation expecting it to be another hit and miss, or even plain miss, of a mini-series. I was more then pleasantly suprised when the show proved not only to be hilarious but a much needed break from the vapid 'reality' shows that have come to expunge any palatability from our viewing pleasure. The 'bad acting', or 'showing the truth' as Garth puts it, is amazingly funny. This is especially true in the character of Garth's boss and the chef (The Office's Stephan Merchant). Overall, it can tend to be a bit tedious by the end but at the moment it is hysterical and I can't wait to see where they go from here.

In the 1980s horror writer Garth Marenghi wrote, directed and starred in a TV series so cutting edge that TV channels refused to show it. It's now the early 2000s and the series is finally being released. Set in Darkplace Hospital, Marenghi plays Dr Rick Dagless, a caring yet unconventional doctor. His colleagues are Drs Lucien Sanchez and Liz Asher and boss is Thornton Reed. Together they deal with some bizarre, paranormal cases.

A hysterically funny, highly unconventional series. First of all, it's a series within a series as we have actors playing characters playing characters. This allows for two strands of humour. First, there's a satire on the makers of the series (Marenghi et al) and the making of the series.

Then there's the series itself which is filled with absurdist, over-the-top humour. While there's some great visual gags and punchlines part of the comedy is the intentional cheap, B-grade feel to proceedings: deliberately hammy acting (Richard Ayoade as Dean Lerner as Thornton Reed is fantastic here), poor production values (e.g. Seeing the strings attached to flying objects), badly synced voiceovers, cheesy jokes. It's so intentionally bad it's brilliant.

The main cast - Matthew Holness as Garth Marenghi as Dr Rick Dagless, Richard Ayoade as Dean Lerner as Thornton Reed, Matt Berry as Todd Rivers as Dr Lucien Sanchez, Alice Lowe as Madeleine Wool as Dr Liz Asher - are excellent. Ayoade and Holness also wrote the show and Ayoade directed it.

We also have notable supporting cast members: Julian Barratt and Noel Fielding of The Mighty Boosh fame and Stephen Merchant of The Office and Extras fame. The appearance of Barratt and Fielding shows the quality and sort of humour you should expect.

Superb comedy series.