Post by Perfect Pseudonym on Sept 22, 2022 9:24:49 GMT
Have you ever thought about examples of otherwise unconnected TV shows/films that could exist in the same universe as each other?
Just me then.
There are a couple that do spring to mind.
Yes (Prime) Minister & The Thick Of It. Which is a fairly obvious one. Armando Ianucci has even admitted that he was inspired to make TTOI after championing YM/YPM’s case in a Greatest Sitcom thing a couple of years before.
But I like to think that in his own head, TTOI continues to exist in the same universe as its mentor. So the Department of Social Affairs is basically what the Department of Administrative Affairs evolved into, and that occasional off-camera reminiscences of Sir Humphrey and Jim Hacker could well be happening. And that somewhere in the higher echelons of the Civil Service, the much respected Lord Woolley is still in attendance as a reassuring senior figure.
Thankfully that has always remained just for the imagination, and there was never any known intention to bring on the then still alive Derek Fowlds out for a quick cameo.
And then there’s On The Buses and the early-millennium sitcom Coupling. Bear with me on this!
Now, whatever was going on Ianucci’s head, I’m quite confident that this pairing was never even at the furthest foreback of Stephen Moffat’s mind. But he did choose to give the surname Harper to Sally, one of the lead female characters.
So I just thought it would be great if she was somehow related to Jack. Certainly not as a daughter, as she would have been old enough to have figured in On The Buses, and her character doesn’t seem to be one born from a one-night stand. Possibly niece, but I don’t think it was ever explored in OTB if Jack had any siblings, which he may well have had.
I settled on her being the grand-daughter of Jack’s father’s brother. I don’t know what that makes her to Jack, but it does give a reasonably plausible distance to be not from the same obvious background as Jack and yet still be related. Interestingly, her character is revealed to be something of a Labour supporter (albeit the New variety presumably), which does hint at an earthy working class tradition to her overall family background, even if she doesn’t quite show it.
What’s important to maintain this same universe is that there are no re-used actors between the two shows, which is indeed the case. With one very delightful exception.
The veteran actress Katharine Page turns up at a funeral in an early episode of Coupling, and proceeds to freak out the scared of getting old Sally. Her younger self was in the Foggy Night episode of OTB, as the only non-main cast member also stuck on the bus to get a line. She had a character name in Coupling, but in OTB she was just “woman passenger”, so as far as I’m concerned, she is the same person. Trapped on a bus with Jack in the early-70s, and scaring the bejesus out of his slightly distant relative in the early noughties!
Anyone else with any same-universe theories?
Just me then.
There are a couple that do spring to mind.
Yes (Prime) Minister & The Thick Of It. Which is a fairly obvious one. Armando Ianucci has even admitted that he was inspired to make TTOI after championing YM/YPM’s case in a Greatest Sitcom thing a couple of years before.
But I like to think that in his own head, TTOI continues to exist in the same universe as its mentor. So the Department of Social Affairs is basically what the Department of Administrative Affairs evolved into, and that occasional off-camera reminiscences of Sir Humphrey and Jim Hacker could well be happening. And that somewhere in the higher echelons of the Civil Service, the much respected Lord Woolley is still in attendance as a reassuring senior figure.
Thankfully that has always remained just for the imagination, and there was never any known intention to bring on the then still alive Derek Fowlds out for a quick cameo.
And then there’s On The Buses and the early-millennium sitcom Coupling. Bear with me on this!
Now, whatever was going on Ianucci’s head, I’m quite confident that this pairing was never even at the furthest foreback of Stephen Moffat’s mind. But he did choose to give the surname Harper to Sally, one of the lead female characters.
So I just thought it would be great if she was somehow related to Jack. Certainly not as a daughter, as she would have been old enough to have figured in On The Buses, and her character doesn’t seem to be one born from a one-night stand. Possibly niece, but I don’t think it was ever explored in OTB if Jack had any siblings, which he may well have had.
I settled on her being the grand-daughter of Jack’s father’s brother. I don’t know what that makes her to Jack, but it does give a reasonably plausible distance to be not from the same obvious background as Jack and yet still be related. Interestingly, her character is revealed to be something of a Labour supporter (albeit the New variety presumably), which does hint at an earthy working class tradition to her overall family background, even if she doesn’t quite show it.
What’s important to maintain this same universe is that there are no re-used actors between the two shows, which is indeed the case. With one very delightful exception.
The veteran actress Katharine Page turns up at a funeral in an early episode of Coupling, and proceeds to freak out the scared of getting old Sally. Her younger self was in the Foggy Night episode of OTB, as the only non-main cast member also stuck on the bus to get a line. She had a character name in Coupling, but in OTB she was just “woman passenger”, so as far as I’m concerned, she is the same person. Trapped on a bus with Jack in the early-70s, and scaring the bejesus out of his slightly distant relative in the early noughties!
Anyone else with any same-universe theories?
