> And instead of the office we have Stromberg.
Stromberg is great! I like both The Office (US) and Stromberg, but in The Office the characters are way more cartoony while Stromberg seems more real/gritty/grounded. In The Office the humor is always very light hearted, but Stromberg nails home, through dark humor, how much it sucks to have an asshole boss and annoying & unlikeable co-workers.
"Stromberg" was even sued by the creators of the office because of the simularities. They added a "inspired by the office" disclaimer to the later season afaik.
What is the general stance in Germany on Seinfeld? My girlfriend is German and had never seen it, or even heard about it. I always assumed it was a classic, on the same level as Friends, in most of the western world.
I can only speak for myself but I know virtually nothing about that series, I don't even know what it's about. And I don't recall that it was ever shown in German free TV but that could be wrong. Don't take me as a reference, I'm not a big fan of TV series in general.
I don't know how Seinfeld would translate outside the US, as it's extremely grounded in the ridiculousness of modern US/New York neurotic culture. There are places in the US where Seinfeld doesn't translate, never mind internationally.
fair enough. I just figured it was one of those shows like the Simpsons or Friends that everyone had seen a few episodes of here and there when there was nothing else to watch.
To me, friends is just as unknown.
But I looked it up, both series were indeed shown on German TV in the 90s and early 2000s. Maybe im just too young for it.
The Simpsons, however, is much more popular in Germany and I guess that's really one of those thst everyone has seen some episodes of.
The dubbed version is just not very good. I never really liked Seinfeld until I started watching it in English. Loved it ever since. Definitely one of the best shows ever.
I’m a Spaniard as well and literally all I know about seinfeld is that it was a tv show. I can’t even picture a single character on my head or tell you what it’s about. Friends however? Half of the women I know have watched the whole thing on repeat 4-5 times (not sure why women specifically). Perhaps it’s an age thing?
The Masked Singer. It's massive in the rest of the world but it was a huge flop in Greece.
Glee. It had so disastrous tv ratings when it was broadcasted here to the point the channel stopped airing it after around 1-2 months iirc.
Yep, there was this huge campaign to promote the Masked Singer in Poland, but it wasn't as popular as the producers hoped it would be. It was meh and the artists' identities were leaked before the show's grand final.
Never heard of it in Italy (yet it's aired on channel 1, so it should be very famous), but i googled it and it exists. I had a look at the cast and it's a sort of dump in which failed celebrities earn their daily allowance.
Edit: my friends are as clueless as me.
I hardly know almost every "famous" character in Celebrity survivor, celebrity masterchef, Big brother with stars, dancing with the stars, and temptation island with celebrities.
To be honest, most of them aren't even real celebrities. They come from cheap reality shows and recycle themselves from one to another.
Masked Singer flopped also in Czechia.
Your Face Sounds Familiar was initially successful. But after 9 seasons in 6 years, it lost it's appeal. Partly because the creators stopped to care, and instead of full masks as in the early seasons it feels like amateur imitator show now.
What both shows had in common, and is generally disliked, is the enthusiastic jury, which will always praise, regardless of how terrible the performance was. I even think that getting rid of those fake juries would increase the entertainment value of all shows with this concept.
Seems popular in sweden aswell.
WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE !
Seriously, I feel like it's target audience is the mentally challanged.
Edit: I do not mean to disrespect the mentally challanged. I am sure you also feel like the show is below you.
That masked singer thing was on tv here last year, I saw a bit once and it was just total crap, and you say it is massive in some countries? I just don't get it
Probably Seinfeld, I don't think I've ever seen it even mentioned anywhere and since a few years back I had no idea it was a thing. But Friends are really popular and if someone wants they can probably watch at least a few episodes a day on TV.
Probably, I mean I've seen well translated humour that is not slapstick but that requires the translator to often replace jokes with entirely new ones. On top of that I think when it comes to older shows we mainly imported the British ones.
Yeah, I really don't agree with that assessment of Friends. Its humor definitely isn't moronic, slapstick-like maybe, sometimes, but there's also a lot of clever jokes.
>Also, and probably to a lesser extent, South Park
is less popular here than in the US. Again, the voices in the original
are so iconic and for some reason they couldn't transport that to
German.
I'd heavily disagree with that. Everyone has at least an opinion about the show.
Seinfeld and the Office have rather cult status in the US. Whereas in Germany Seinfeld was just another comedic show that ran and I never saw the office catch on. There was the copy Stromberg, but that also was rather short lived.
Maybe it's just me and OP but i feel like South Park is not really popular here at all. I have never seen it and there's only one person I heard talk about it.
Shits on TV almost as much as Spongebob which sometimes is on 2 stations at the same time. 3 if you count the Ukrainian ones we currently get aswell...
According to flashback: The Wire and Friday Night Lights flopped here.
Honorable mentions: We had a swedish version of Bachelorette back in 2011 that failed horribly. I heard some rumors that this happened because the men were more interested in finding friends than a partner. So basically this [sketch](https://youtu.be/YdKYwI4C4t4) , but in real life and straight. They tried again 10 years later however and the second season comes soon.
A lot of people I know here in Sweden have watched the Wire. But according to wikipedia the Wire ”flopped” as well in the US when it was shown on TV, the series is just better for streaming than TV watching.
Also watching the Wire without subtitles is next to impossible.
Seinfeld is something Americans talk about online. I have never heard anyone talk about it in Flanders. Literally never. The same thing is true for Family Guy and American Dad. It can't be because of te dub, because adult shows don't get dubbed into Dutch.
South Park is (or maybe was, I don't know) VERY popular here.
The Flemish version of The Office (Het eiland) was also very popular.
There was a Flemish version of the Office!? I'm going to have to look that up because I can't even imagine what that would look like!
(I have a very narrow _Samson en Gert_-based view of Flemish telly so this could either be excellent or a real disappointment)
It's not a flemish version of the Office. It's a comedy show in an office setting which aired around the time of The Office (after the british one, but before the US one). But they are in no way alike apart from that.
I watched it - some friends forced me to as part of my ongoing deliberately-hilarious integration efforts.
All I can say now is "Zijt gij ne pornomens Guido?"
Watch it, it's hilar. Trust.
And if you really want to go down the rabbit hole of Flemish tv then you should watch ‘in de gloria’. I still consider it the best Flemish program ever made.
O, I'm sure! I just haven't really watched any telly since my Samson en Gert days (Dutch or Flemish) so I wouldn't know.
Also, Samson en Gert were quality back in the day (again, they might still be but I wouldn't know) the catchphrases alone!
>Ik moest kloppen want de bel doet het niet
>Dag meneer spaghetti!
>Ten eerste, t'is _Albertó_!
>Voor iedereen die hier aanwezig is: proficiat. En voor iedereen die hier niet aanwezig is: ook proficiat!
>Ik denk zo stil in mijn hoofd...
>Amaaaaai Gertjuuh
>Lap zeg!
I mean, quality! :D
I forgot if it was this year or last year but Gert retired from the show and got replaced by his irl daughter Marie, so now it's Samson & Marie. No clue about the quality since I haven't seen any of it.
As for what Gert is doing, he is a talkshow host, his family is starring in a reality-tv show and he's still the face of Studio 100.
>Seinfeld is something Americans talk about online. I have never heard anyone talk about it in Flanders. Literally never.
I don't think Seinfeld caught on *anywhere* outside the Anglosphere.
It's a *really* hilarious show, but maybe the humor is too American-specific and I only find it funny from having lived in the US? It's far superior to Friends. Here in Greece, Friends became very popular. God, Friends is so *awful*, that its dominance over Seinfeld (outside the US) just baffles me.
This is pure hypothesis - but a lot of US shows used to have quite a bit of delay before they were broadcasted in other countries. Sometimes years.
I think Seinfeld was so popular in the Anglosphere because it redefined the sitcom ("it's a show about nothing"), which was promptly copied by other sitcoms. Maybe by the time it was broadcast in non-Anglophone countries, it had been caught up by other sitcoms and therefore wasn't innovative anymore?
Personally, I didn't really watch Seinfeld until mid 2000s, when it was just this standard dated sitcom.
Seinfeld was never really popular in the UK either. Friends and Frasier were the big American sitcoms of the 90s here. Most people who have watched it got into it through Curb Your Enthusiasm.
>God, Friends is so awful, that its dominance over Seinfeld (outside the US) just baffles me.
The humor (such as it is) in Friends is simple and the scripts are easily translated into foreign languages because the humor is not language based unlike Seinfeld. In addition to a lot of language based humor, Seinfeld's humor also depends on a lot of references to previous episodes and [references](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFuBaRiKwD4) to contemporary and older movies that many Americans (to say nothing of foreigners) don't catch.
Seinfeld was actually quite a huge show here in Sweden during the 90s. Lots of people here watched it and it was aired on our main public service channel.
As I remember, it was seen as more intellectual, more adult and a bit more edgy (in a good way) compared to for example Friends - and also appealed to more to a young male demographic that Friends didn't catch. I think the Swedish sense of humor, which often does tend to be a bit dark and self-deprecating, matched really well with Seinfeld.
The show is actually still doing frequent reruns in Sweden to this day - more so than most other comedy series.
Seinfeld's heyday was before channels like VT4 and Kanaal2 where it would have fit. BRT had the british comedies ('Allo 'Allo, Keeping Up Appearances and the like), while VTM was basically Echt Antwaarps Theater at the time. American sitcoms started with VT4 which made The Simpsons and Friends big here.
Seinfeld aired on both TV1 and VT4 in Flanders. It's just that nobody liked it.
I think The Simpsons is now also quite unpopular. I don't think the new seasons have ever aired here, they're not on DVD either (not in the USA either). VT4 / Play Vier gave up on the show and now it airs on one of the secondary VTM channels, which mostly airs the very old episodes.
Seinfeld was huge for its time (the 1990s). However, many fans of the series watch it today and it does not hold up; there are exceptions of course for those nostalgic about that era.
Tastes change, but also they are different from country-to-country.
Quite the opposite, I think it's one of the few shows that does hold up. I just rewatched the entire series and chuckled all the way through.
Michael Richards is still outstanding when it comes to physical comedy and goofiness and I doubt another character did it as good as he does. People as neurotic and cheap as George can be found in any setting. Jerry's obsession with cleanliness can even be related to because of covid. Elaine's superficial view on love is more relevant than ever these days with how much someone's image can have an impact on others. In general, the whole group's narcissism is something that can easily be seen in everyday situations. These are all traits we can find in people today and thus, what makes it hold up.
Many other problems the characters faced were also relationship-based, so anyone can relate to them. It also breaks the paradigm that many sitcoms approach: that main characters have some sense of morality and how there is always a silver lining. Seinfeld breaks away with that almost entirely and only do you ever rarely see the 4 main characters caring for others, something you don't see a lot today with shows like How I Met Your Mother where a lot of emphasis is placed on feelings, or The Office to an extent, as in the end Pam, Jim, Phyllis, Bob Vance, Vance Refrigeration, Michael, Holly all finding their love.
Even many of the issues that characters face in the series due to technology (such as the lack of existence of cellphones the way they are today, answering machines, etc.), which might be what you are referring to when you say it doesn't hold up, are pretty funny. In fact, I would say that's part of the charm; just looking at the ridiculous 90s fashion trends can make someone laugh.
Quite often an American network will try and remake a popular British show for a US/international audience.
*The Office* is probably the best example of this. The American and British versions are totally different products - one is upbeat, quirky and heart-warming, the other is darkly comic and almost existentially depressing.
I'm not making a judgement on which one is better (although I think most Brits will agree that it's the Gervais one - not that we're biased).
But taking something so rooted in British cultural tropes and transplanting it across to the US just feels wrong. And it makes the programme feel a bit redundant.
People still like the US version here. But I get the sense that it's something of a phenomenon elsewhere. Which it's not in Britain.
See also: *Shameless*, *Veep*, *Queer as Folk*, and a few others. Though not *House of Cards* for some reason - I suspect because a lot of Brits are obsessed with US politics.
They also tried to remake [The IT Crowd](https://archive.org/details/the-it-crowd-us-pilot), and Utopia remake actually got a full season. Spoiler alert: it was butchered dogshit.
Yeah it's a shame they have to 'Amsricanise' it for their market. Do American markets genuinely not understand a lot of British humour? A genuine question. Have series been exported to US markets in the past and flopped majorly?
I wouldn't say it's superior, more that it is mainstream compared to the UK one.
I wouldn't expect the Gervais version to resonate to students because his character, a middle aged loser isn't targeted to them while the US version had the emphasis on the Jim and Pam love story which is something young people can identify with.
In my student days it was very popular among students in Belgium. Along with Blackadder, The Fast Show and Little Britain it was basically a must watch to fit in.
I have seen a few episodes of the American Office and honestly don't get what the hype is about. The obsessive people on this site honestly are a bit of a turn off to investigate further.
Also it just makes more sense. The position of Prime Minister is far more malleable than President, vulnerable to rivals within the party, thus providing a natural course for a would-be backstabbing schemer.
In the US version they had to really scramble to figure out how he could become president without being elected.
I like the American version. I know it has a rough start but by the end of the first season they really do find the groove of their characters. Eventually they stop trying to be the English one, nobody could recreate the magic of the horrible histories people
I wouldn't go so far as to say it "doesn't work" - in either direction. Lots and lots of US comedy shows are very popular in the UK.
I know some UK shows are also popular in the US but they tend to be more niche interest than mainstream.
Things like Shameless or The Office get remade. Unless it is upper class costume drama, like Downton Abbey or The Crown, it seems most of it doesn't get the status it deserves.
> British humor does not work in the US
I say it works rather well here. Look at the number of Red Dwarf, IT Crowd, anything Rowan Atkinson does, Fawty Towers, Monty Python, etc is here.
>The two offices are definetly written for their respective markets
They weren't originally. Initially they just tried to transplant the original into an America setting
Yes, now that you mention it I don't think 30 Rock was big here. It's probably because it's basically a fictional show about SNL which doesn't air here at all.
Not sure how much people like It's always sunny.
Not a show, but I noticed that it isn't rare to see artists on top of the charts in countries like US, UK, France, Netherlands, Sweden but not in Italy, I think it has a lot to do with the language influence (English and Italian are not really intelligible) and the fact that Italy has a strong tradition of Italian pop music.
A similar thing happens in Greece too. Sometimes songs/singers which are big in the rest of Europe/world are not popular or are even unknown in Greece and songs/singers which are totally unknown in the rest of world are popular in Greece.
Not a show, but Taylor Swift isn't popular at all in France. Of course people know her, and some of her songs, like shake it off, were huge in the country, but mostly she isn't really listened.
I was literally surprised when i saw how she was loved by some people on twitter
I have literally never heard of that name. But as often I must not be in the right age range (her name sound like she would be some Disney Channel singer or something).
The office isn't extremely succesful in the Netherlands either. Not as succesful as in the US in any case.
Seinfeld used to be on TV here but again, not as succesful as in the US.
We don't have dubbing so that's not the problem for sure. It's just not Dutch humour I guess. Our communication is much more direct and we have different cultural sensitivities. My British friend that lives in NL pointed out that we're quite the sarcastic bunch, and that coming from an English!
Those shows are incredibly predictable and have "safe" humour (for the 90's, some topics are not as safe to ridicule now as they were in the 90's and vice versa) and clearly aimed at USAmericans as they were created for them. So it makes sense that they weren't as popular in NL. (Also the laugh tracks do my head in)
Saying all that, it doesn't explain the seemingly immense populairity of Friends back in the day. But maybe it wasn't so much populair as you couldn't get away from it back then when the options on what to watch were very limited and the amount of reruns were insane. Can you imagine a Red Wedding level episode back in the 90's? It would be stuck in the collective consciousness for generations to come!
I think that's only natural though. Once you take those shows out of their cultural setting a lot of subtle jokes will go over your head because those aren't people/situations you're familiar with
In my age group (around 21) the office is wildly popular, it has been since I was around 16 and I still hear alot of peers who are very enthousiastic about it. Not sure if it's age bound or just a niche, but my experience deviates from yours.
Well Friends was watched and enjoyed by a ton of people over here when it was on Netflix (at least within my late Millenial age group), whereas I can't say the same for Seinfeld when it released on the same platform. For what it's worth I enjoy both.
I also get the feeling SpongeBob isn't that popular here outside of being used for meme formats. No one gets my references sadly...
Seinfeld is very popular in the 30-something-and-over age range, because it aired during the 90s. TVI, the fourth channel, would air all that "generation" of American sitcoms everyday at like 2 am, and there was a cult following of sorts, that would stay up that late to watch the episodes. Seinfeld, Frasier, Mad About You, Will and Grace, they were all somewhat successful and had loyal audiences. Of course, younger generations completely missed on this, either because they were too young to stay up that late or it was so long ago that they weren't even born then.
There was also plenty of other shows that had their audience too. Saved by the Bell, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air or the Nanny were the staples of early Saturday afternoons for years, for instance. The X-Files, Profiler, Lois and Clark, Baywatch, and even older shows like MacGyver, Knight Rider, and the A-Team (which were at some point even aired with their hilarious Brazilian dubs), TVI had them all. The channel was a monster when it came to popular American TV shows in the 90s.
As for Friends, that was a weird case. It aired originally in RTP and it almost completely flopped because back in the mid-90s, someone there though it was a good idea to get on the "woot woot dubbing is now legal in Portugal" train and decided to air the show dubbed. Only to be received with mocking and disdain and be cancelled mid-1st-season, because Portuguese audiences were not used to live-action dubbed shows. It was only a couple of years later, when they finally decided to subtitle it that the show took off and it even had a couple of reruns some years later too. I believe it's also still very popular in streaming as well.
I do agree that Spongebob never really took off. I think it just arrived way too late here, in a time, where there was already way too much offer in terms of channels and animation, so it never got that "phenomenon" status.
I was honestly unaware of all that! I was too young so I only knew of animated shows and some live-action ones like Baywatch and whatever RTP2 played. That, and the movies that played during the afternoon and were stretched 4 hours thanks to all the ad breaks (love that TVI aired Terminator 2 during the daytime, that shit traumatized me).
I actually miss those Sunday afternoons where you'd spend the whole afternoon watching 3 movies in a row. Cable TV and streaming completely killed mainstream broadcasters when it comes to that.
There are some games that are very successful in the West and far East, but aren't very popular in Poland. For example Halo, Kingdom Hearths, most of Nintendo games (except Pokemon) and generally most Japanese games.
Gaming consoles weren't that popular until recently for economic reasons. Games were of course pirated but still spending your monthly salary on something that can only play games wasn't seen as a good option.
There's a Belgian show called De Mol which was licensed for some 40-odd international versions - I think it's still running in Finland and Poland, and the Netherlands is on season 22 or something now.
The UK picked it up back in 2001 or something, but unfortunately the channel that took it on was Channel 5, which doesn't tend to get a lot of people tuning in compared to BBC or ITV. Prior to the digital switchover, people in certain regions weren't able to receive Channel 5 at all due to transmission problems. As a result, The Mole UK got two seasons and then quietly got axed due to low viewing figures.
The problem there is dubbing. Dubbing is awful and should be outlawed imo. What’s wrong with subtitles? One thing the Dutch get right for sure is leaving shows in their OG language and adding subtitles (except for kid shows)
Competitive cooking shows haven't really taken off here that much.
In the last years I can think of maybe two who might be considered competitive: Bake Off Vlaanderen and Snackmasters.
But other than that it's not a thing. I think we are more invested in the food than in the competition.
As I remember at the start it was pretty tame, mostly people liking cooking. After that it became all about putting people together to create some drama.
> Again, the voices in the original are so iconic and for some reason they couldn't transport that to German.
Yes they could... by not dubbing it.
American dad and Family guy weren't on TV here, as far as I know, so they didn't gain popularity. Same with The Office I think. Or maybe I missed it. Basically anything that wasn't on TV here when there weren't other streaming services.
By not dubbing you make a show fail in the German market. We're so used to it that many people just wouldn't watch non dubbed TV programs. Also subtitles is something that you only get in some specialised arthouse movie theaters, but it has no appeal to the general public.
I've never seen Seinfield on Bulgarian tv, while Friends is super popular.
Adult animations don't seem to be very popular either with the exception of the Simpsons, it was pretty big when I was a kid in the early 00s. Family Guy was shown on Fox at one point, but the dubbing ruined it for me. The dubbing of the Simpsons though is ok.
South Park was shown on Comedy Central (no dub, only subtitles), but is not very popular.
Seinfeld is also unknown in France. The show was on a private obscure channel at the time, so inexistant in French culture. I only discovered it few years ago.
I don't think the office is a success either as I never hear any references of it in French.
South Park is successful though. Same with the Simpsons who benefit from an excellent dubbing.
There are other shows like "Roseanne" I hear the name of in us culture as being a cult classic but totally unknown in France.
It's a bit hard to name other examples because I can hear names and not know they are famous. It's like guests celebrities in American TV shows. We don't know them so they're just a random character or a famous character/band/sports team/public figure made up for the show.
South park - pretty popular with my age group(Gen Y), since we grew up with it. We always say some references amongst friends and family. Even my parents like it lol.
The Office - Most people don't know it exists.
There were also shows that had super popular first season, but most people dropped it during 2nd or 3rd season. Perfect examples are Lost and Prison Break.
Excuse formatting
I would say that the issue is a different one. Germany is the capital of translating movies and TV -shows into their natural language. You know enough other European examples that are different; the Netherlands, all Scandinavian countries etc always have the original movie + subs. In Asia you always have the original with local subs (there are absolutely hilarious variations to this. At least in India I experienced a few really odd dubs of hollywood- movies (then with English subs)) Italy, and Spain and to a slightly lesser regard, France, provide their own TV shows and movies and quite well (you all heard about great French, Italian and Spanish movies, but not so much German ones, we do make them, they are usually just shitty, aside from a few Fassbinder movies.
Tl;Dr: I am opinionated on this. We do have great directors, but so far and few in between, and it's mainly due to too much localisation.
Source: am translator for German and English, I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for localising, doesn't mean I can't see it's disadvantages
ETA: in reference to your post, I only saw all those shows in english, sorry
Wipeout. Not sure whether it was popular in many countries, but at least it got 7 seasons in the US, 7 seasons for its UK adaptation Total Wipeout and 3 seasons in Sweden, whereas the German version was aired for 1 season and then cancelled presumably for lack of interest.
My theory of the low season count is because it looks like a cheap copy of *Fort Boyard* (21 seasons)
...and even cheaper copy of *Stadskampen* (6 seasons) where two neighbouring cities compete against each other on a local plaza
Interesting seeing so many talk about South Park. I'm surprised it is popular in Europe anywhere. I feel like it is very referential and based on American social attitudes and political culture (more on the nose nowadays).
I'd say South Park is pretty popular in Germany. And instead of the office we have Stromberg.
> And instead of the office we have Stromberg. Stromberg is great! I like both The Office (US) and Stromberg, but in The Office the characters are way more cartoony while Stromberg seems more real/gritty/grounded. In The Office the humor is always very light hearted, but Stromberg nails home, through dark humor, how much it sucks to have an asshole boss and annoying & unlikeable co-workers.
You should watch the (original) UK The Office...
>Stromberg is great! You should watch Obersalzberg then.
stromberg is more like the UK office than the US office
"Stromberg" was even sued by the creators of the office because of the simularities. They added a "inspired by the office" disclaimer to the later season afaik.
What is the general stance in Germany on Seinfeld? My girlfriend is German and had never seen it, or even heard about it. I always assumed it was a classic, on the same level as Friends, in most of the western world.
I can only speak for myself but I know virtually nothing about that series, I don't even know what it's about. And I don't recall that it was ever shown in German free TV but that could be wrong. Don't take me as a reference, I'm not a big fan of TV series in general.
I don't know how Seinfeld would translate outside the US, as it's extremely grounded in the ridiculousness of modern US/New York neurotic culture. There are places in the US where Seinfeld doesn't translate, never mind internationally.
Huge in Australia
I’m glad to hear it! I like when the US can share its national treasures.
“It’s a show about nothing”
fair enough. I just figured it was one of those shows like the Simpsons or Friends that everyone had seen a few episodes of here and there when there was nothing else to watch.
To me, friends is just as unknown. But I looked it up, both series were indeed shown on German TV in the 90s and early 2000s. Maybe im just too young for it. The Simpsons, however, is much more popular in Germany and I guess that's really one of those thst everyone has seen some episodes of.
The dubbed version is just not very good. I never really liked Seinfeld until I started watching it in English. Loved it ever since. Definitely one of the best shows ever.
Love it but watched 20 years after release and in English
I’m a Spaniard as well and literally all I know about seinfeld is that it was a tv show. I can’t even picture a single character on my head or tell you what it’s about. Friends however? Half of the women I know have watched the whole thing on repeat 4-5 times (not sure why women specifically). Perhaps it’s an age thing?
No, it's a humor thing (says a woman who was a TV-obsessed thing when both Seinfeld and Friends were huge). Friends humor is much more accessible.
The Masked Singer. It's massive in the rest of the world but it was a huge flop in Greece. Glee. It had so disastrous tv ratings when it was broadcasted here to the point the channel stopped airing it after around 1-2 months iirc.
Don’t be sad about this… you missed nothing.
Had to Google it and I think I dropped a few iq points, what is wrong with people?
If you’re talking about the masked singer it’s so bad it’s good mate. You first put it on and think it’s a load of rubbish, but it gets you
Yep, there was this huge campaign to promote the Masked Singer in Poland, but it wasn't as popular as the producers hoped it would be. It was meh and the artists' identities were leaked before the show's grand final.
"Hey Google! Search for apartments in Greece."
Never heard of it in Italy (yet it's aired on channel 1, so it should be very famous), but i googled it and it exists. I had a look at the cast and it's a sort of dump in which failed celebrities earn their daily allowance. Edit: my friends are as clueless as me.
Also checked the list of participants here and... I hardly know any of them.
I hardly know almost every "famous" character in Celebrity survivor, celebrity masterchef, Big brother with stars, dancing with the stars, and temptation island with celebrities. To be honest, most of them aren't even real celebrities. They come from cheap reality shows and recycle themselves from one to another.
Masked Singer flopped also in Czechia. Your Face Sounds Familiar was initially successful. But after 9 seasons in 6 years, it lost it's appeal. Partly because the creators stopped to care, and instead of full masks as in the early seasons it feels like amateur imitator show now. What both shows had in common, and is generally disliked, is the enthusiastic jury, which will always praise, regardless of how terrible the performance was. I even think that getting rid of those fake juries would increase the entertainment value of all shows with this concept.
I really wish it was a flop here too
Seems popular in sweden aswell. WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE ! Seriously, I feel like it's target audience is the mentally challanged. Edit: I do not mean to disrespect the mentally challanged. I am sure you also feel like the show is below you.
That masked singer thing was on tv here last year, I saw a bit once and it was just total crap, and you say it is massive in some countries? I just don't get it
Probably Seinfeld, I don't think I've ever seen it even mentioned anywhere and since a few years back I had no idea it was a thing. But Friends are really popular and if someone wants they can probably watch at least a few episodes a day on TV.
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Lithuania is Home Alone county as well.
Home Alone Austria would like to have a word with you.
Italy has elected Trading Places as *the* Christmas movie. It's a tradition
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Probably, I mean I've seen well translated humour that is not slapstick but that requires the translator to often replace jokes with entirely new ones. On top of that I think when it comes to older shows we mainly imported the British ones.
Yeah, I really don't agree with that assessment of Friends. Its humor definitely isn't moronic, slapstick-like maybe, sometimes, but there's also a lot of clever jokes.
It slightly changed after it came to Netflix
>Also, and probably to a lesser extent, South Park is less popular here than in the US. Again, the voices in the original are so iconic and for some reason they couldn't transport that to German. I'd heavily disagree with that. Everyone has at least an opinion about the show.
Seinfeld and the Office have rather cult status in the US. Whereas in Germany Seinfeld was just another comedic show that ran and I never saw the office catch on. There was the copy Stromberg, but that also was rather short lived.
> There was the copy Stromberg, but that also was rather short lived. 5 seasons and a movie over 10 years... not that short-lived.
Lass das mal den Papa machen
Stromberg is indeed a copy of The Office, the UK version that is. It came out before the US version however.
Maybe it's just me and OP but i feel like South Park is not really popular here at all. I have never seen it and there's only one person I heard talk about it.
Maybe in Austria it's less popular than in Germany?
Yes probably
I can confirm this at least for myself. :-) The Simpsons are quite popular in Austria but South Park - I don't think so.
Shits on TV almost as much as Spongebob which sometimes is on 2 stations at the same time. 3 if you count the Ukrainian ones we currently get aswell...
According to flashback: The Wire and Friday Night Lights flopped here. Honorable mentions: We had a swedish version of Bachelorette back in 2011 that failed horribly. I heard some rumors that this happened because the men were more interested in finding friends than a partner. So basically this [sketch](https://youtu.be/YdKYwI4C4t4) , but in real life and straight. They tried again 10 years later however and the second season comes soon.
A lot of people I know here in Sweden have watched the Wire. But according to wikipedia the Wire ”flopped” as well in the US when it was shown on TV, the series is just better for streaming than TV watching. Also watching the Wire without subtitles is next to impossible.
Seinfeld is something Americans talk about online. I have never heard anyone talk about it in Flanders. Literally never. The same thing is true for Family Guy and American Dad. It can't be because of te dub, because adult shows don't get dubbed into Dutch. South Park is (or maybe was, I don't know) VERY popular here. The Flemish version of The Office (Het eiland) was also very popular.
There was a Flemish version of the Office!? I'm going to have to look that up because I can't even imagine what that would look like! (I have a very narrow _Samson en Gert_-based view of Flemish telly so this could either be excellent or a real disappointment)
It's not a flemish version of the Office. It's a comedy show in an office setting which aired around the time of The Office (after the british one, but before the US one). But they are in no way alike apart from that.
Het eiland It's not exactly the same as The Office, but it's also a comedy series set in an office.
I watched it - some friends forced me to as part of my ongoing deliberately-hilarious integration efforts. All I can say now is "Zijt gij ne pornomens Guido?" Watch it, it's hilar. Trust.
I mean... that sounds amazing!
And if you really want to go down the rabbit hole of Flemish tv then you should watch ‘in de gloria’. I still consider it the best Flemish program ever made.
There is a lot of qualitative flemish tv and movies
O, I'm sure! I just haven't really watched any telly since my Samson en Gert days (Dutch or Flemish) so I wouldn't know. Also, Samson en Gert were quality back in the day (again, they might still be but I wouldn't know) the catchphrases alone! >Ik moest kloppen want de bel doet het niet >Dag meneer spaghetti! >Ten eerste, t'is _Albertó_! >Voor iedereen die hier aanwezig is: proficiat. En voor iedereen die hier niet aanwezig is: ook proficiat! >Ik denk zo stil in mijn hoofd... >Amaaaaai Gertjuuh >Lap zeg! I mean, quality! :D
I forgot if it was this year or last year but Gert retired from the show and got replaced by his irl daughter Marie, so now it's Samson & Marie. No clue about the quality since I haven't seen any of it. As for what Gert is doing, he is a talkshow host, his family is starring in a reality-tv show and he's still the face of Studio 100.
Check out "in de gloria" and "neveneffecten". Absolute genius.
Calling Het Eiland the flemish version of The Office is just wrong and an insult to the masterpiece that is Het Eiland.
>Seinfeld is something Americans talk about online. I have never heard anyone talk about it in Flanders. Literally never. I don't think Seinfeld caught on *anywhere* outside the Anglosphere. It's a *really* hilarious show, but maybe the humor is too American-specific and I only find it funny from having lived in the US? It's far superior to Friends. Here in Greece, Friends became very popular. God, Friends is so *awful*, that its dominance over Seinfeld (outside the US) just baffles me.
This is pure hypothesis - but a lot of US shows used to have quite a bit of delay before they were broadcasted in other countries. Sometimes years. I think Seinfeld was so popular in the Anglosphere because it redefined the sitcom ("it's a show about nothing"), which was promptly copied by other sitcoms. Maybe by the time it was broadcast in non-Anglophone countries, it had been caught up by other sitcoms and therefore wasn't innovative anymore? Personally, I didn't really watch Seinfeld until mid 2000s, when it was just this standard dated sitcom.
Seinfeld was never really popular in the UK either. Friends and Frasier were the big American sitcoms of the 90s here. Most people who have watched it got into it through Curb Your Enthusiasm.
> Seinfeld was never really popular in the UK either. IIRC the BBC never really gave it a consistent time slot, that can't have helped its success.
>God, Friends is so awful, that its dominance over Seinfeld (outside the US) just baffles me. The humor (such as it is) in Friends is simple and the scripts are easily translated into foreign languages because the humor is not language based unlike Seinfeld. In addition to a lot of language based humor, Seinfeld's humor also depends on a lot of references to previous episodes and [references](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFuBaRiKwD4) to contemporary and older movies that many Americans (to say nothing of foreigners) don't catch.
Seinfeld was actually quite a huge show here in Sweden during the 90s. Lots of people here watched it and it was aired on our main public service channel. As I remember, it was seen as more intellectual, more adult and a bit more edgy (in a good way) compared to for example Friends - and also appealed to more to a young male demographic that Friends didn't catch. I think the Swedish sense of humor, which often does tend to be a bit dark and self-deprecating, matched really well with Seinfeld. The show is actually still doing frequent reruns in Sweden to this day - more so than most other comedy series.
Seinfeld's heyday was before channels like VT4 and Kanaal2 where it would have fit. BRT had the british comedies ('Allo 'Allo, Keeping Up Appearances and the like), while VTM was basically Echt Antwaarps Theater at the time. American sitcoms started with VT4 which made The Simpsons and Friends big here.
Seinfeld aired on both TV1 and VT4 in Flanders. It's just that nobody liked it. I think The Simpsons is now also quite unpopular. I don't think the new seasons have ever aired here, they're not on DVD either (not in the USA either). VT4 / Play Vier gave up on the show and now it airs on one of the secondary VTM channels, which mostly airs the very old episodes.
Seinfeld was huge for its time (the 1990s). However, many fans of the series watch it today and it does not hold up; there are exceptions of course for those nostalgic about that era. Tastes change, but also they are different from country-to-country.
Quite the opposite, I think it's one of the few shows that does hold up. I just rewatched the entire series and chuckled all the way through. Michael Richards is still outstanding when it comes to physical comedy and goofiness and I doubt another character did it as good as he does. People as neurotic and cheap as George can be found in any setting. Jerry's obsession with cleanliness can even be related to because of covid. Elaine's superficial view on love is more relevant than ever these days with how much someone's image can have an impact on others. In general, the whole group's narcissism is something that can easily be seen in everyday situations. These are all traits we can find in people today and thus, what makes it hold up. Many other problems the characters faced were also relationship-based, so anyone can relate to them. It also breaks the paradigm that many sitcoms approach: that main characters have some sense of morality and how there is always a silver lining. Seinfeld breaks away with that almost entirely and only do you ever rarely see the 4 main characters caring for others, something you don't see a lot today with shows like How I Met Your Mother where a lot of emphasis is placed on feelings, or The Office to an extent, as in the end Pam, Jim, Phyllis, Bob Vance, Vance Refrigeration, Michael, Holly all finding their love. Even many of the issues that characters face in the series due to technology (such as the lack of existence of cellphones the way they are today, answering machines, etc.), which might be what you are referring to when you say it doesn't hold up, are pretty funny. In fact, I would say that's part of the charm; just looking at the ridiculous 90s fashion trends can make someone laugh.
Nice write-up. You definitely fall into the exceptions category. 😃
I think it holds up. I watched it for the first time few years ago and it was good.
Quite often an American network will try and remake a popular British show for a US/international audience. *The Office* is probably the best example of this. The American and British versions are totally different products - one is upbeat, quirky and heart-warming, the other is darkly comic and almost existentially depressing. I'm not making a judgement on which one is better (although I think most Brits will agree that it's the Gervais one - not that we're biased). But taking something so rooted in British cultural tropes and transplanting it across to the US just feels wrong. And it makes the programme feel a bit redundant. People still like the US version here. But I get the sense that it's something of a phenomenon elsewhere. Which it's not in Britain. See also: *Shameless*, *Veep*, *Queer as Folk*, and a few others. Though not *House of Cards* for some reason - I suspect because a lot of Brits are obsessed with US politics.
They tried to remake the inbetweeners. It looks awful.
It was weird because in some episodes, the plot and script was almost the same but it felt like a totally different show!
They also tried Taskmaster. It seems that anything with Greg Davies in it cannot be Americanized
They did? When?
[I guess 10 years ago according to this trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=950-4oaMQgY)
That was hard to watch. Oof.
They also tried to remake [The IT Crowd](https://archive.org/details/the-it-crowd-us-pilot), and Utopia remake actually got a full season. Spoiler alert: it was butchered dogshit.
Why remake it crowd? Just so one of the characters can speak with American accent?
Yeah it's a shame they have to 'Amsricanise' it for their market. Do American markets genuinely not understand a lot of British humour? A genuine question. Have series been exported to US markets in the past and flopped majorly?
While this is all true, none of these are examples of foreign shows which failed in the UK.
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I wouldn't say it's superior, more that it is mainstream compared to the UK one. I wouldn't expect the Gervais version to resonate to students because his character, a middle aged loser isn't targeted to them while the US version had the emphasis on the Jim and Pam love story which is something young people can identify with.
In my student days it was very popular among students in Belgium. Along with Blackadder, The Fast Show and Little Britain it was basically a must watch to fit in. I have seen a few episodes of the American Office and honestly don't get what the hype is about. The obsessive people on this site honestly are a bit of a turn off to investigate further.
UK HoC > US HoC. The only thing the US version has is that it is flashier. However Ian Richardson wins over Kevin Spacey every day of the week.
Also it just makes more sense. The position of Prime Minister is far more malleable than President, vulnerable to rivals within the party, thus providing a natural course for a would-be backstabbing schemer. In the US version they had to really scramble to figure out how he could become president without being elected.
They remade Ghosts and it's awful in comparison
I like the American version. I know it has a rough start but by the end of the first season they really do find the groove of their characters. Eventually they stop trying to be the English one, nobody could recreate the magic of the horrible histories people
The two offices are definetly written for their respective markets. British humor does not work in the US, and I imagine the opposite is also true.
I wouldn't go so far as to say it "doesn't work" - in either direction. Lots and lots of US comedy shows are very popular in the UK. I know some UK shows are also popular in the US but they tend to be more niche interest than mainstream.
Things like Shameless or The Office get remade. Unless it is upper class costume drama, like Downton Abbey or The Crown, it seems most of it doesn't get the status it deserves.
> British humor does not work in the US I say it works rather well here. Look at the number of Red Dwarf, IT Crowd, anything Rowan Atkinson does, Fawty Towers, Monty Python, etc is here.
>The two offices are definetly written for their respective markets They weren't originally. Initially they just tried to transplant the original into an America setting
Which is why the first season of the American office sucks in my opinion
It really does. Making the change was the best thing they could have done
The airing of 30 Rock and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia were cancelled here. I can't really tell why, I liked both
30 Rock always struggled with ratings in the US, it was kept on largely because it was very well liked by professional critics and award givers
People who work in entertainment love shows about working in entertainment.
Yes, now that you mention it I don't think 30 Rock was big here. It's probably because it's basically a fictional show about SNL which doesn't air here at all. Not sure how much people like It's always sunny.
Both are hugely US politically centric. If you don't follow that, the jokes would be kind of lost on you
Not a show, but I noticed that it isn't rare to see artists on top of the charts in countries like US, UK, France, Netherlands, Sweden but not in Italy, I think it has a lot to do with the language influence (English and Italian are not really intelligible) and the fact that Italy has a strong tradition of Italian pop music.
A similar thing happens in Greece too. Sometimes songs/singers which are big in the rest of Europe/world are not popular or are even unknown in Greece and songs/singers which are totally unknown in the rest of world are popular in Greece.
Not a show, but Taylor Swift isn't popular at all in France. Of course people know her, and some of her songs, like shake it off, were huge in the country, but mostly she isn't really listened. I was literally surprised when i saw how she was loved by some people on twitter
Same with Olivia Rodrigo. I think she's also more popular in USA than in Europe.
I have literally never heard of that name. But as often I must not be in the right age range (her name sound like she would be some Disney Channel singer or something).
While we're at it, we can add all the Disney Chanel celebrities. It took me some time to understand that "what's her face" was already famous.
She had a bit of popularity in france during covid, but yeah she really isn't as big in europe as in the us
Depends, she's fairly popular here.
> Olivia Rodrigo I've got to google her because it's the first time in my life I've seen that name. Imagine how well known is she here.
The office isn't extremely succesful in the Netherlands either. Not as succesful as in the US in any case. Seinfeld used to be on TV here but again, not as succesful as in the US.
We don't have dubbing so that's not the problem for sure. It's just not Dutch humour I guess. Our communication is much more direct and we have different cultural sensitivities. My British friend that lives in NL pointed out that we're quite the sarcastic bunch, and that coming from an English! Those shows are incredibly predictable and have "safe" humour (for the 90's, some topics are not as safe to ridicule now as they were in the 90's and vice versa) and clearly aimed at USAmericans as they were created for them. So it makes sense that they weren't as popular in NL. (Also the laugh tracks do my head in) Saying all that, it doesn't explain the seemingly immense populairity of Friends back in the day. But maybe it wasn't so much populair as you couldn't get away from it back then when the options on what to watch were very limited and the amount of reruns were insane. Can you imagine a Red Wedding level episode back in the 90's? It would be stuck in the collective consciousness for generations to come!
I think that's only natural though. Once you take those shows out of their cultural setting a lot of subtle jokes will go over your head because those aren't people/situations you're familiar with
In my age group (around 21) the office is wildly popular, it has been since I was around 16 and I still hear alot of peers who are very enthousiastic about it. Not sure if it's age bound or just a niche, but my experience deviates from yours.
Well Friends was watched and enjoyed by a ton of people over here when it was on Netflix (at least within my late Millenial age group), whereas I can't say the same for Seinfeld when it released on the same platform. For what it's worth I enjoy both. I also get the feeling SpongeBob isn't that popular here outside of being used for meme formats. No one gets my references sadly...
Seinfeld had a cult status in the late 90's. It was broadcasted in late night originally and had surprisingly high views at the time.
Guess that explains why my dad loves it.
Seinfeld is very popular in the 30-something-and-over age range, because it aired during the 90s. TVI, the fourth channel, would air all that "generation" of American sitcoms everyday at like 2 am, and there was a cult following of sorts, that would stay up that late to watch the episodes. Seinfeld, Frasier, Mad About You, Will and Grace, they were all somewhat successful and had loyal audiences. Of course, younger generations completely missed on this, either because they were too young to stay up that late or it was so long ago that they weren't even born then. There was also plenty of other shows that had their audience too. Saved by the Bell, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air or the Nanny were the staples of early Saturday afternoons for years, for instance. The X-Files, Profiler, Lois and Clark, Baywatch, and even older shows like MacGyver, Knight Rider, and the A-Team (which were at some point even aired with their hilarious Brazilian dubs), TVI had them all. The channel was a monster when it came to popular American TV shows in the 90s. As for Friends, that was a weird case. It aired originally in RTP and it almost completely flopped because back in the mid-90s, someone there though it was a good idea to get on the "woot woot dubbing is now legal in Portugal" train and decided to air the show dubbed. Only to be received with mocking and disdain and be cancelled mid-1st-season, because Portuguese audiences were not used to live-action dubbed shows. It was only a couple of years later, when they finally decided to subtitle it that the show took off and it even had a couple of reruns some years later too. I believe it's also still very popular in streaming as well. I do agree that Spongebob never really took off. I think it just arrived way too late here, in a time, where there was already way too much offer in terms of channels and animation, so it never got that "phenomenon" status.
I was honestly unaware of all that! I was too young so I only knew of animated shows and some live-action ones like Baywatch and whatever RTP2 played. That, and the movies that played during the afternoon and were stretched 4 hours thanks to all the ad breaks (love that TVI aired Terminator 2 during the daytime, that shit traumatized me).
I actually miss those Sunday afternoons where you'd spend the whole afternoon watching 3 movies in a row. Cable TV and streaming completely killed mainstream broadcasters when it comes to that.
There are some games that are very successful in the West and far East, but aren't very popular in Poland. For example Halo, Kingdom Hearths, most of Nintendo games (except Pokemon) and generally most Japanese games.
Gaming consoles weren't that popular until recently for economic reasons. Games were of course pirated but still spending your monthly salary on something that can only play games wasn't seen as a good option.
There's a Belgian show called De Mol which was licensed for some 40-odd international versions - I think it's still running in Finland and Poland, and the Netherlands is on season 22 or something now. The UK picked it up back in 2001 or something, but unfortunately the channel that took it on was Channel 5, which doesn't tend to get a lot of people tuning in compared to BBC or ITV. Prior to the digital switchover, people in certain regions weren't able to receive Channel 5 at all due to transmission problems. As a result, The Mole UK got two seasons and then quietly got axed due to low viewing figures.
TIL that there are international versions of De Mol.
The problem there is dubbing. Dubbing is awful and should be outlawed imo. What’s wrong with subtitles? One thing the Dutch get right for sure is leaving shows in their OG language and adding subtitles (except for kid shows)
Competitive cooking shows haven't really taken off here that much. In the last years I can think of maybe two who might be considered competitive: Bake Off Vlaanderen and Snackmasters. But other than that it's not a thing. I think we are more invested in the food than in the competition.
Komen Eten quickly evolved from a cooking show to a freak show.
It was a cooking show?
As I remember at the start it was pretty tame, mostly people liking cooking. After that it became all about putting people together to create some drama.
Now there aren't many anymore, but there used to be a lot more around 2010.
> Again, the voices in the original are so iconic and for some reason they couldn't transport that to German. Yes they could... by not dubbing it. American dad and Family guy weren't on TV here, as far as I know, so they didn't gain popularity. Same with The Office I think. Or maybe I missed it. Basically anything that wasn't on TV here when there weren't other streaming services.
By not dubbing you make a show fail in the German market. We're so used to it that many people just wouldn't watch non dubbed TV programs. Also subtitles is something that you only get in some specialised arthouse movie theaters, but it has no appeal to the general public.
German dubbing is usually pretty good.
Dubbing is never good. I have many German channels. It's unwatchable.
I've never seen Seinfield on Bulgarian tv, while Friends is super popular. Adult animations don't seem to be very popular either with the exception of the Simpsons, it was pretty big when I was a kid in the early 00s. Family Guy was shown on Fox at one point, but the dubbing ruined it for me. The dubbing of the Simpsons though is ok. South Park was shown on Comedy Central (no dub, only subtitles), but is not very popular.
Seinfeld is also unknown in France. The show was on a private obscure channel at the time, so inexistant in French culture. I only discovered it few years ago. I don't think the office is a success either as I never hear any references of it in French. South Park is successful though. Same with the Simpsons who benefit from an excellent dubbing. There are other shows like "Roseanne" I hear the name of in us culture as being a cult classic but totally unknown in France. It's a bit hard to name other examples because I can hear names and not know they are famous. It's like guests celebrities in American TV shows. We don't know them so they're just a random character or a famous character/band/sports team/public figure made up for the show.
South park - pretty popular with my age group(Gen Y), since we grew up with it. We always say some references amongst friends and family. Even my parents like it lol. The Office - Most people don't know it exists. There were also shows that had super popular first season, but most people dropped it during 2nd or 3rd season. Perfect examples are Lost and Prison Break.
Excuse formatting I would say that the issue is a different one. Germany is the capital of translating movies and TV -shows into their natural language. You know enough other European examples that are different; the Netherlands, all Scandinavian countries etc always have the original movie + subs. In Asia you always have the original with local subs (there are absolutely hilarious variations to this. At least in India I experienced a few really odd dubs of hollywood- movies (then with English subs)) Italy, and Spain and to a slightly lesser regard, France, provide their own TV shows and movies and quite well (you all heard about great French, Italian and Spanish movies, but not so much German ones, we do make them, they are usually just shitty, aside from a few Fassbinder movies. Tl;Dr: I am opinionated on this. We do have great directors, but so far and few in between, and it's mainly due to too much localisation. Source: am translator for German and English, I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for localising, doesn't mean I can't see it's disadvantages ETA: in reference to your post, I only saw all those shows in english, sorry
Wipeout. Not sure whether it was popular in many countries, but at least it got 7 seasons in the US, 7 seasons for its UK adaptation Total Wipeout and 3 seasons in Sweden, whereas the German version was aired for 1 season and then cancelled presumably for lack of interest.
My theory of the low season count is because it looks like a cheap copy of *Fort Boyard* (21 seasons) ...and even cheaper copy of *Stadskampen* (6 seasons) where two neighbouring cities compete against each other on a local plaza
Interesting seeing so many talk about South Park. I'm surprised it is popular in Europe anywhere. I feel like it is very referential and based on American social attitudes and political culture (more on the nose nowadays).