Shark Bytes

I don't really remember much of this show, since it wasn't really given a chance, but I remember feeling sorry for the hapless protagonist.

QLp1NU r u crazzy? I told u! I can't read!

1xAMhM r u crazzy? I told u! I can't read!

RKtch0 r u crazzy? I told u! I can't read!

Get Stressed Eric on DVD!!

h t t p : / / www. petitiononline. com/ eric0607/ petition.html

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This programme, was the higlight of my day, just before the simpsons on bbc2.
Excellent.

WHAT THE HELL IS THIS??

"Stressed Eric" - I'm still incredibly and pleasantly surprised that so many British TV programmes make it onto this list. Anyway, this is in a class of British animation programmes that - regretfully - show just how far we've got to go before we can come up with anything as good as The Simpsons or Family Guy. Every episode of Stressed Eric takes twenty-five laboured minutes to set up and deliver one situation and punchline that you can see from miles away. And all the time you know that "The Simpsons" would effortlessly deliver the same gag and bring it to a punchline - or a "DOH!" - within thirty seconds. This show limps where Homer and family dance, and it shows. It isn't just SE - there's another 25-minute animation called something like "Bob and June", about a dentist and his wife living in suburban London. Again, the frustrating thing is - both these shows have promise, even though it glimmers fitfully and intermittently, and you have to dig through a lot of fluff and crap to find it. British animation desperately needs its Simpsons! (For a bleak, cynical and funny British animation, find something called "Pond Life", featuring the misadventures of Miss Dolly Pond and her horrible family. The production standards are nowhere near that of the Simpsons or even SE - but this show is consistently funny, in a dark and sardonic sort of way.)

Stressed Eric NEVER jumped. Because it only lasted three out of six episodes on NBC, it never got a chance to. But the ones I DID see were hilarious, particularly the hospital episode. "Priority case!" And Eric Feeble's veins choking him at the end of each episode was a classic running gag. The best thing about this short-lived show was the wide range of characters, each with a unique personality. The perfect neighbors (literally NAMED the Perfects), the "arse burger"-obsessed angry boss, the hung over maid, the chatterbox secretary, Eric's son who never speaks but eats everything in sight, and his daughter who is allergic to everything in sight. This show was hilarious and was certainly cancelled too soon. (By the way, NBC also cancelled Sammy and God, The Devil, and Bob, two other primetime animated sitcoms, but neither of those were very good)

I recall an ad in TV Guide for its premiere, touting it as "Spicier Than South Park!" That's a cry for help right there, if you ask me.