Misfits Mourn Peep Show’s Lovably Loathsome Passing

So that’s it then. After nine series of devious plotting, sexual frustration and biting insults, Peep Show has permanently shambled off our screens, taking with it Mark Corrigan and Jeremy Usborne, two of television’s greatest social outcasts. Since 2003 the El Dude Brothers’ sugar-coated misanthropy asked us to invest in two lovably dislikeable thirty somethings sustained by a mutual hatred and envy of one another: social misfits, overjoyed that there were two people more dysfunctional than them, duly obliged. As Series 9 sputtered into view, fans pondered the unthinkable: Jez and Mark could leave our screens happy. A finale with a happy Mark and Jez was not only a cruel way to treat the viewer, but an oxymoron in light of the overwhelming farce that sustained the most memorable plotlines. Unsurprisingly, we got a bittersweet finale to the best Peep Show series since Series 6.

Familiarly spiteful musings induce cringing and weeping from the start. I hold Peep Show solely responsible for making me flinch during conversations from worry that my thoughts were audible. It’s a brilliant device embodying our post-privacy era in which the thirst for knowledge has spawned a million amateur investigators of the inane. Mark and Jeremy remain the only characters whose twistedly humorous thoughts we can hear, which raises questions about why Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong never delved into the minds of other characters. That we never had an audience with the drug-ravaged thought-vomit of Super Hans, or Simon as he is known, is a tragedy. One can only shudder at the thought of the recurring Dali-esque firestorm to which we could’ve been privy. Regardless, Peep Show’s inimitable point-of-view format stamped repeatedly on the acting rulebook and facilitated the mixture of unvarnished thoughts and perverse dialogue, immortalising it in British sitcom history.

Problematically however, previous series’ regurgitated themes with mixed fortunes, and the same has happened again, an indication that it’s the right time to end. In the same way Pixar sequels bellow unoriginality, the high number of returning characters suggests Bain and Armstrong fell back on old rivalries and romances because every narrative avenue had been exhausted. Let us begin with arch-titweasel Jeff’s comeback, which was, to put it caustically, entirely pointless. His trajectory began at admirably detestable and crashed at pitiful. At his best he is the perfect repository for hate, but his cameo was clearly crowbarred in to meet a quota for returning hate figures. Johnson, likewise, is fleetingly scathing and nothing more: think and you’ll miss his sneering takedowns. A sizeable portion of his soul died when JLB Credit dissolved, rendering him inessential thereafter.

Bain and Armstrong excel at incorporating characters for a brief period, making them central to the action then writing them out, leaving us to speculate about what happened to them. Female returnees fit into events far more smoothly than their male counterparts. Dobby is a brief albeit colourful flicker in episode one before disappearing inconspicuously. Making her the centrepiece of Series 8 to leaving almost without a trace is a brilliant tactic which leaves an indelible impact. Like Nancy and Big Suze before her, it feels like she’s broken up with the viewer, and if one is as maudlin and analytical as yours truly, you can only take her absence personally.

Self-effacing April makes a surprising return, serving as a teasing symbol of contentment that’s eluded Mark. She is Mark’s female reflection, equal parts bookish and cautiously decadent. Both struggle to reconcile their lack of self-esteem with tempered lust for anarchy, but simultaneously cultivate each other’s recklessness and self-doubt. They make the perfect crutch for one another, but Jez remains Mark’s prized buttress. Episode 3 in which Mark stages an assault against digestive systems worldwide with a blasphemous hybrid involving lettuce and beans shows that no matter how much he thinks he’s cleverer than Jez, Mark’s enjoyably silly side is honed thanks to his flatmate with little resistance. Tim Key’s inability to settle with Mark makes perfect sense: there is a reason why a very low number of friendships ignite due to a mutual love of William Morris. Still, his ‘evacuation’ from the flat must go down as the series’ greatest moment.

Peep Show’s place in the British sitcom canon was secured long before its end, but now is certainly the right time to finish. Arguably there was nowhere to go after Mark’s marriage to Sophie collapsed, and Jez would always flit from stranger’s bed to unfulfilling job indiscriminately, leaving Bain and Armstrong with a paucity of room for creative manoeuvre. Unlike once triumphant series’ of the past such as Only Fools and Horses, Bain and Armstrong have pressed full stop at the right time, preserving the programme’s dignity. In preceding interviews, Robert Webb and David Mitchell agreed they’re now too old to be in a programme about young men, with which I wholeheartedly agree. Peep Show passed the ‘it wasn’t as good as it used to be’ mark a while ago due to recycled plot devices and themes but even the most lukewarm episode surpasses feeble competitors for laughs and witty references with outrageous ease.

As the final shot scrutinises two professionally inept Londoners in their recognisably drab flat, we leave with a sense of satisfaction that their misery was our happiness. There is one quibble for which I will never forgive Bain and Armstrong: we never saw the mysterious Pedge, the man who owns a house boat, works in HMV and gave his wife an aggressive yeast infection after having sex with a prostitute on his stag do.