The Ricky Gervais Show/Headscratchers


 * Steve and Ricky take the piss out of Karl all the time, and he takes it in stride. But whenever he makes a comment about them, they call Dude Not Funny or just get bitchy. It's quite hypocritical.
 * This. Of course the comedy stems from them ripping on Karl, but they really should learn to take insults a little better. Their fans should too, given some of the examples on the main page.
 * Well, in all fairness, usually when Ricky and Steve are poking fun at Karl, they are usually doing it in a good-natured way. And, Karl doesn't seem too bothered by it most of the time. Their tone is more of a "Ah, I'm just messin' with ya" manner of speaking rather than a "Oh, you really are a moron, and I cannot stand you" manner of speaking. Karl, unfortunately, tends to sound more sincere with his insults (Though not necessarily on purpose), and he often unwittingly says or does something Ricky and/or Steve consider pretty offensive while trying to tell a joke. There's a difference between insult comedy and just plain insulting.
 * It also kind of helps that Ricky and Steve know how to tell a joke and Karl, except for rare instances, does not.
 * I wouldn't say "whenever." They take the piss out of each other all the time without incident. I recall specifically several insults about Ricky's weight, or Steve's cheapness and poor luck with women, that didn't result in awkwardness. It's just that sometimes when friends are sitting around jokingly ripping on each other, you touch a live wire. In the Dude Not Funny example on the main page, Karl hadn't known the two that long. As an aside, does anyone know why it was below the belt? Is "invalid" a larger insult in England?
 * Well, calling someone an "Invalid" is the same as calling them a "Moron". Apparently, Stephen Merchant hates being called a 'Moron" as much as Wheatley does.
 * In Britain at least, "invalid" has often been used in the same was as terms like "spastic" or "retarded" often have been -- i.e. as both a less-than-flattering evaluation of the person's mental abilities and the implication that the person is mentally challenged.
 * It's worth noting that most of the time, Ricky and Steve are themselves pretty self-deprecating; Steve, for example, is usually the first to make a joke about his lack of success with women.
 * Is Karl's question of "Does your brain control you, or do you control your brain" really as stupid as Ricky says? Okay, Jerkass Has a Point considering that a person is their brain, but still...
 * I think his point was simply that whether it's the personality that governs the workings of the brain or the workings of the brain that governs the personality, the brain is where it all stems from and happens anyway, and Karl seemed to be approaching it as if his brain was something separate from the rest of him.
 * The HBO show Season 3, Episode 3 "Armed Forces." I've been a religious follower of hte podcast and I've swear I never heard any of it. Are they recording new material for the show, was that cut from previously released material, or did I just miss it?