Hello,

I love the series 'The thick of it' https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b006qgrd/the-thick-of-it. As a person new to this city and country, its peculiar British sensibility, real-ish fiction, and excellent insults are delightful and revealing.

What should I watch next which is in similar ballpark?

by One-Poet4606

18 comments

  2. You might enjoy the original House of Cards or Yes Minister

  3. You might like Twenty Twelve, a comedy “documentary” about the planning committee for the London 2012 Olympics.

  4. Peep Show  Also set in London (ok, Croydon, but it’s close) also a very British sensibility, and also dark and very very funny.

  5. People Just Do Nothing is particularly good but might be difficult for a person new to this country to make sense of. See what you think

  10. Spaced

    Black Books

    (and seconding Drop The Dead Donkey and Yes Minister. Also Yes Prime Minister)

  11. Life On Mars. Captures Manchester in the 1970s. Brilliant watch

  12. 2012.
    For a more dated version, Yes, Minister
    Also Spooks and Slow Horses (spies)

    This Life.
    London Spy

  15. Thank you for your recommendations. You have shuffled my series queue and sorted my watchlist for rest of the year. <3

  16. Some great suggestions in here.

    Could try Industry as well. I haven’t watched the latest season, but the first season in particular shows an exaggerated version of working in the city. Pretty entertaining.

  17. A few more recommendations (all thriller/crime/action… but based in London and surroundings):

    * Slow Horses
    * Luther
    * Gangs of London

    I particularly liked the first one because of its *sense of humor.* And because Slough. Ok, well, maybe not because Slough.

  18. I like your question and am glad you like The Thick of It so much. It is hard to find anything quite like it.

    It might not be your thing at all because it’s a different vibe, but the original Mr Bean series and Monty Python’s Flying Circus were both filmed around West London – they both require you to like those sorts of humour though!

    More recently, ‘This Time with Alan Partridge’ is a mock light chat show and Alan occasionally goes out of the studio and walks around BBC Broadcasting House. It’s filmed ‘as live’ within the half an hour of the chat show, and you see behind the scenes as different parts of the show are being broadcast. Probably helps if you’re already an Alan Partridge fan but still entertaining if you’re not.

    Black Ops is a sitcom from 2023 which is set in East London and was very funny. About two PCSOs who then get asked to go undercover to bust a drugs cartel, but they are seriously under qualified to do it.

    What else? New Tricks is a BBC police drama (with lots of humour) from the 2000s featuring three retired male cops who are brought back to help solve cold cases, under the watchful eye of DI Sandra Pullman. So there is this group of four who all gel really well and their relationships and friendships really make the show have such a warmth to it. There hasn’t really been a TV drama since and it ran for years. That is set in London so you see a lot of it, and they regularly drink at a Hammersmith pub, which you can visit and it mentions being the ‘New Tricks’ pub (along with appearing in a Bond film).

    Speaking of spy films, you see a lot of London in the first Johnny English film; around Whitehall, the Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, Brompton Cemetery, and many helicopter shots… not necessarily filmed in Westminster Abbey or the Tower of London but it’s convincing! And that’s a comedy too.

    Sorry this is such a long comment, I know I’ve missed loads out…

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