Shark Bytes

Never Jumped. I though his wife was cast beautifully. She played it so well. This show had the magic bittersweet quality so many British comedies have (or had nowadays). It also had those fab moments that came from nowhere: Victor shouting "PASTRY" in his sleep, the episode with the human finger among the take-away chips (UGH! what was that? But I couldn't stop laughing) Brit coms are the best. BTW, anyone see "Mulberry?"

this Sitcom, came from a long line of great BBC sitcoms, Victor Meldrew was sometimes to unbelievable, but hey, I think we can all see a Bit of Victor in all of us

Unfortunately, in America, we would never cast people of this age to play in a sitcom...which is why our networks are loaded with crap...we overlook talent in favor of perky boobs.

The whole series was very forced but no doubt amused the "Summer Wine" brigade. The last show was simply depressing .

One of the great British sitcoms and one of the few that NEVER jumped. I can't understand the objections of other people here - if you actually bother to watch the entire series, you would see that the infamous catchphrase is hardly EVER used. As for feeling sorry for Victor - we're SUPPOSED to empathise with him from the beginning. Most British men would secretly LOVE to complain about the petty annoyances in life like Victor does, but unlike Americans they don't have the balls to do so. I would far rather watch this show than the hideous "My Family", which seems to consist of smug posh people spouting painfully contrived one-liners.

One of the best sitcoms of all time. Only episode I would take exception to is the finale where they kill off Victor as I don't think was necessary. My top 3 all-time sitcoms would be Fawlty Towers, Father Ted and OFITG.

Great show, subtle and hilarious. I didn't care for his sarcastic cold and ball busting wife and her big dyke haircut. Bad casting of her character, but she was just backdrop for Victor Meldrew, as life in general was his comic foil. No wonder things didn't work out well for him.

Great show, but to the American who so subtly had a go at the English for killing off Victor in the last episode (i think it was something like 'ha, Death, aren't the British funny!') guess what mate, That wasn't a joke! It was a way of ending a series in a poignant way, to evoke emotions you have towards a man you had previously laughed at, and with (same goes for Blackadder goes forth). It shows that comedy-paradoxically-doesn't always have to be funny. this is something that American comedies, good though many of them are, lacks. So busy are they trying to set up joke after joke, that they never look at the long run, and try to build a plot which can progress throughout the programme, building to one fantastic joke at the end. The Final episode of Cheers was not sidesplittingly funny, but it was a fantastic farewell. Problem was it has been tarnished by the characters returning over the years in Fraiser. the finale to OFITG worked more as a final and irrevocable farewell to a man you came to, maybe not love, but who's presence was always welcome.

There are three great characters on British situation television comedies, imho: Fawlty Towers' Basil Fawlty, Keeping Up Appearances' Hyacinth Bucket and One Foot in the Graves' Victor Meldrew. In an interview, Fawlty Towers star and creator John Cleese once said that he could not understand why so many people actually like the exceedingly officious and supercilious hotel owner, Basil Fawlty, a true snob, Mr. Cleese pointed out in the piece. Patricia Routledge has also commented that she cannot tolerate dealing with pretentious and inconsiderate aristocrat wanna-be's like her character, Hyacinth Bucket, in real life. However, for all of his querulous "kvetching," Victor Meldrew is, at heart, a very decent man, who, as the previous poster pointed out, rails out against some of the inevitable indignities of everyday life, in a most amusing way, of course! Richard Wilson is superb as the curmudgeonly Victor and Annette Crosby is also wonderful as the quiet and gentle (at least up until the disappointing final episode) Margaret Meldrew. It's always great fun to see how Victor plots to get back at the people, who he believes have screwed him one way or another. Victor sorts of reminds me of the late, great American humorist's Jean Shepherd's father (the "old man") in some of Mr. Shepherd's hysterical short stories. I also enjoyed some of the show's supporting characters, such as Victor's neighbors Patrick and Pippa, Mr. Swainey, and Mrs. Warboys. There was one scene in which the haughty Patrick (who absolutely loathed Mr. Meldrew throughout the series) was standing in front of a mirror in his home, complaining about something or other to his long-suffering wife. Pippa took one look at him and said, "You know who you're starting to sound just like, don't you?" With that, Patrick looks back at his reflection in the mirror and is shocked to see his youthful, thirty-something countenance suddenly morph into Victor Meldrew's old and crabbed mug! Very funny stuff, indeed! A wonderful program, that, regrettably, jumped the shark with the final episode dealing with Mr. Meldrew's untimely death, a real downer, I'm sorry to say.

As good as it was, OFITG jumped the shark for me when I found myself sympathising with, rather than laughing at, Victor Meldrew. Although he was portrayed as a miserable b****** I felt that many of the things that he railed against, e.g. yobbish behaviour, lack of consideration for others, shoddy service, bureaucratic indifference etc. were things that I felt he had every right to get angry about; in fact, if anything, I actually admired him for having the guts to stand up and be counted. Unfortunately, this would inevitably backfire on him as those he confronted would take their revenge; in other words, the b******s usually won. The worst example of this came in the Christmas special "One Foot in the Algarve", in which in one scene Victor was trying to relax on the beach, but was being picked on by a drunken lager lout. This culminated in said lout getting into a Range Rover and ramming Victor's hire car. The TV audience seemed to find the idea of an old man being bullied by a yob hilarious; I didn't.

I thought the Christmas 1995 episode where the audience were misled into believing that Victor had died would have been a good final episode. But we then got two further Christmas specials and one more series. Usually when this happens the later episodes stink, but these were good episodes. What spoilt the final episode was the BBC making no secret of the fact that Victor was going to be killed off. The last episode begins with Margaret talking to some solicitors representing a yob trying to sue Victor. She says that firstly it took them long enough to get a case together, secondly it was not an unprovoked attack, and thirdly they are going to have great difficulty suing her husband as he's been dead for several months. Imagine the impact that would have made if we didn't know he was going to be killed.

Very funny show, but the finale stunk. It was more like an episode of Ruth Rendell mysteries than a traditional 'One foot in the grave'. I saw no reason why they had to kill off Victor Meldrew. Couldn't they have just finished the series on a humorous note, like many other programmes have done? In fact, overall the final series was pretty bad in comparison to the previous 5 seasons, with the exception of a couple of episodes. However, we must remember the great, earlier episodes, not the crappy ones. My favourite is the one where Victor gets buried up to his neck in his backyard. Hilarious! Also, the character of Patrick (the next door neighbour who hates Victor) is very funny. That's all from me, bye! Oh, and before I go, I DON'T BELIEVE IT!

One Foot in the Grave was funny, but it really could be quite nasty, especially for Americans. It was quite dark, like the episode where the Meldrew's house burns down. Ha, Ha, Ha! The humor that comes about is afterwards, when he gets a new home, and has a housewarming party. He can't figure out why no one has showed, until he realizes they showed up at the wrong house (his written number one looks like a seven). I have never seen the last episode, by I heard that he dies. Aren't the British funny!!!! He died, ha, ha, ha!

This was a brilliant show, exquisitely acted and cleverly written. Richard Wilson gives quite possibly THE best performance in sitcom history, as aging curmudgeon Victor Meldrew. Annette Crosbie, as his long-suffering wife, Margaret, plays straight to Wilson, and does so admirably. It is her performance which saves the otherwise disturbing final episode (her realization, that Victor at least TRIED to make things better, is very touching.) Would that there were more series of this calibre on TV.

I have to agree with the voter who said Day One. These two performers ARE good actors but even Olivier and Katharine Hepburn couldn't have saved THIS wet smack of a show! He's always griping and causing trouble for them and she's always moaning about past trouble's he's caused and the best thing you can say about her is that you feel sorry for her- but otherwise NEITHER of the characters are the least bit simpatico. Neither of them show the tiniest semblance of affection for each other- just grudging tolerance and resignation. It looks like it was put together by scriptwriters seeking to justify why they NEVER visited their aging parents!