The Two Ronnies: Series 3

While this season lacks some of the more famous and recognisable sketches in the Two Ronnies canon (for me anyway), in my view this was still an enjoyable watch of old-school comedy.

I'd go as far to say Ronnie Barker was the more talented of the two, especially with the way he messes around with the English language, like in the "Limerick Clinic" sketch, or mixes up sounds into spoonerisms and tongue twisters.

There are some spoof public information films like "How to Get Married" with wonderfully deadpan delivery.
Of course, Ronnie Corbett was a talent too and does work very well with him, often playing the straight man like in a sketch about an Eastern European restaurant (and don't forget his rambling monologues) but Barker also wrote quite a high number of the sketches himself (under the pseudonym Gerald Wiley) and I just think he was funnier.

Its interesting to note that especially in the early seasons like this one, the full Two Ronnies shows were more of a variety show, with the sketches broken up by appearances from music stars of the day (for example in this season, we are treated to The New Seekers in one episode - sadly not the original Seekers), or some other novelty act - and Pan's People do a dance routine.

I felt the parodies of popular shows of the time (Upstairs Downstairs, The Onedin Line etc) outstayed their welcome somewhat. Perhaps this has something to do with not knowing the originals very well as they were before my time and I never saw them. The Star Trek spoof was funny though.

One of my favourite things in the Two Ronnies shows was their finale musical numbers, but they hadn't really become a fixture of the show at this point. There are a couple though, including The Short and Fat Minstrel Show in the final episode - on that note, its perhaps worth mentioning that some of their humour may be a bit un PC for some people, by modern standards but it's still funny, and thank goodness nothing was changed or cut. You have to appreciate the time in which it was made, with differing social attitudes.

I loved the sketch with Ronnie Barker as a last-minute commentator who finds all the different sports clips have got mixed up! Even though he's commentating at speed, somehow it all makes a crazy sort of sense which shows Barker's skill as a comic.

The eight episodes of this series are spread across two discs, but unfortunately there are no extras to speak of.