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>>>>>Maybe we keep steeling your ideas because they're better than the ones American TV writers can come up with.
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>>>>Maybe so, so why not just leave it at that? By that token they won't come up with any new ideas for the extended season.
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>>>But to the BBC two seasons is 12 episodes! I'm a big Ricky Gervais fan, but the Amercian version of the Office - with almost 70 episodes and counting - is considerably more prolific, every bit as funny, and a pretty good example of a good idea being carried on with respect to the original idea but definitely without relying on recycling the original material.
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>>The Office was meant as a spoof fly-on-the-wall. Gervais realised you can't continue such a scenario indefinitely. I think the US version has digressed from the scenario? BTW, there was a feature-length Xmas special of the Office a few years ago. Did you catch it?
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>The Fly on the Wall thing is used less and less - mostly for the opportunity for a character to break the fourth wall.
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>Saw the UK Office Xmas thing and loved it like I loved the rest. I think Gervais could have done 23 episode seasons and still kept the quality up, though I think the US version has better supporting cast and the direction Steve Carroll has taken the boss gives him more room for more stories.

I guess Gervais saw it as a docu and that's that - not to be redev'd into a sit-com. That way it loses a lot of the cringe factor, pathos and such, eg Brent mugging to camera and doing stuff just cos the camera's there.

Maybe he didn't have the energy to dev 24 episodes as in the USA (and considering that US sit coms are written by huge teams - lots of x-fertilisation of ideas and energy gen'd - in the UK they can't afford big teams and sit-coms are written by indiv's or duos typically).

BTW, did you see his follow-up series - "Extras" (2 seasons)?