The Ricky Gervais Show: Difference between revisions

* [[Chew Toy]]: Stephen. While Karl is the butt of the show's jokes, Steve tends to be the butt of the world's. He believes that tallness should be considered a disability because of all the insults he gets and the expensive things he has to buy because of his tallness (like he can't fit into small cars, has to buy things from expensive Big And Tall stores). His story about Carnival in Rio is epic (basically, despite the reputation of Brazil's women as being sex fiends, he couldn't get a single woman to pay attention to him, and STILL can't), along with the story about how he was not allowed in a night club because he didn't bring any women with him.

** One woman said that she was "frightened" by a picture of him on a subway because he looked absolutely gargantuan compared to everyone else.

** There's also Miss Piggy - a spouse-abusing thief who tries to steal biscuits and, when accused, talks in a mirror, as well as 'Benny', a friend of Karl's father, who owned - ''and 'thumped' ''- a monkey.

* [[Cloudcuckoolander]]: Karl Pilkington. His grip on reality is openly questioned by Ricky and Stephen, but they wouldn't have him any other way.

* [[Eccentric Townsfolk]]: Karl's stories about his childhood feature a lot of these.

* [[The Eeyore]]: Karl. Ricky often gets angry at him for complaining so much when, as Ricky sees it, he has close to no problems or responsibilities.

** Karl's story about Ollie the Chimp [[wikipedia:Oliver (chimpanzee)|actually had some factual basis]], but of course he buried it in nonsense.

** Similarly with his story about [http://monkeydaynews.blogspot.com/2005/02/third-woman-sues-over-kokos-breast.html the women who left their job ] because they wouldn't let [[wikipedia:Koko (gorilla)#Sexual harassment|the ape play with their breasts.]]

* [[Grand Theft Me]]: The plot twist of "The Love of Two Brains."

* [[The Grinch]]: Karl doesn't enjoy Christmas. He claims it's because it's always the same every year and that he doesn't get a choice to celebrate it or not. Steve and Ricky claim it's because [[The Eeyore|he's just a 'miserable bastard']] [[Wangst|who's always complaining.]]

* [[Historical Hilarity]]: Any time there's a discussion of human history, this turns up. Usually made even funnier by anything Karl says. Essentially the whole point of their "Guide to..." series.

* [[The Hyena]]: Ricky, usually when Karl says something.

* [[Life of the Party]]: Repeat contributor Paul "[[Insistent Terminology|The Party Animal]]" Parker. Stephen and Ricky are convinced that it's an [[Informed Ability]].

* [[Literal Change of Heart]]: Played with when Karl mistakenly thinks it's possible to replace a heart with a pacemaker.

* [[Lost Episode]]: The first 8 or so episodes from XFM Series 1 (2001- 2002), which featured Karl's first appearances, are missing from the XFM archives and are not in circulation anywhere. Likewise, apart from a few compilation tapes and two full episodes, most of the original 1998 series has vanished into the ether.

* [[Ludd Was Right]]: Karl's stance on most new technology: for example, dismissing travelers who use sat-navs <ref>Referred to a GPS across the pond</ref> as "lazy." This does not go unchallenged by Steve and Ricky who imagine Karl giving a hard time to Columbus for using a compass or -- a ''boat.''

** Karl mentioned he once thought he looked like the alien from the 'Boswell alien incident.' It took almost 2 minutes of laughter to tell Karl it's Roswell, New Mexico.

** [[Clive Owen|Clive Warren!]]

* [[Mistaken for Gay]]: Ricky and Stephen seem to be convinced Karl is at least bisexual, and will frequently make jokes about it to him. Not that he does much to defend himself, but you can tell he gets flustered when the subject comes up and will try to drop it as quickly as he can. Any time Karl mentions meeting an attractive male or a gay person, Ricky and Stephen will NOT let it go.

** "[[Memetic Mutation|I could eat a knob at night.]]"

* [[Mood Whiplash]]: Season 3 opens with arguably the best episode the show's ever done, but shortly after the episode aired, Karl passed a kidney stone. The second episode is significantly more somber, but it does get better as they go on.

** Karl's hilarious stories involving his brother tend to end with him mentioning him being in prison or not having seen him in years. As Ricky put it:

* [[Near-Death Experience]]: In the third season of podcasts, Karl tends to act as if the surgery to remove his kidney stones was one of these. Ricky tends to disagree and be less-than-impressed with his complaining on the subject as a result.

** They once dedicated an entire segment of the radio show to Karl's stories about his "near-death experiences" as a kid. The first involved choking on a Mr. Freeze pop (which he credits with giving him a sense of a new lease on life, as a result of which he went to school for three whole days in a row); the second was a snowy day when his mother didn't think it was safe to go out, so he had to sneak out to do his paper route in time to get back and watch ''[[The Pink Panther]]'', and he got caught in an upstairs window and almost fell; and the third was during the martial-arts craze in the eighties when he tried to "kick his height," but froze at the apex of the kick to try to get his father's attention, lost his balance and hit his head on the ground. There was also the story about the time he ate too many cream cakes and had a bad stomachache. His mother called the doctor, who sarcastically said he didn't have long to live, which his mother believed until Karl's dad came home and phoned the doctor to check. Ricky tactfully suggests that in another family, they might have realized the doctor was joking.

* [[One-Hour Work Week]] / [[The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything|The Producer Who Doesn't Do Anything]]: To hear Ricky and Steve tell it, Karl has a large amount of holidays and free time and does only the bare minimum required for his job. And he does ''that'' very reluctantly.

** In episode four of the third season of podcasts, Ricky and Steve essentially spend several minutes at the beginning chewing Karl out for how lazy he is, [[No Sympathy|particularly after recovering from the removal of his kidney stones]]. Karl tries to defend himself that he needs to have free time to have things to put in the diary that Ricky and Steve make him do, only for Steve to point out that the podcast is [[One-Hour Work Week|literally the only thing Karl has to do at that point]], and that by going from his diary all he seems to do is have breakfast in a cafe and play with insects anyway.

'''Ricky:''' You wouldn't be attracting female attention in the first place.<br />

'''Steve:''' Rick, if I ''had'' been, [[Stop The Presses|I would have phoned the [''Daily Mail'' newspaper] ''myself'']]. Point A. I seem to distinctly remember talking to one of my mates the whole night and we were discussing the fact that we were too shy to talk to girls. So ''wrong there''. }}

** Don't get Karl started on people living in glass houses.

** Karl doesn't understand analogies at all. When outright asked for the definition of "analogy," he responded "A short story, told quickly." Apparently confusing it with the word "anecdote."

* [[The Social Darwinist]]: Karl seems to have this sort of mindset, such as when he describes his Auntie Nora as "a weak person" who's been "allowed" to live longer than she should have.

* [[Spin-Off]]: ''[[An Idiot Abroad]]'', a mock travelogue where Ricky and Steve send Karl around the world to see the seven wonders, and it's sequel, where he does amazing and impressive things (that ''other people'' want to do, not him; but he gets to choose) to check off a bucket list.

* [[The Stoic]]: Karl. The most he changes facial expression is raised eyebrows. He practically always has the same pouty facial expression.

* [[Stupid Crooks]]: Ricky is scammed out of a quarter-million pounds by a fraudulent bank transfer for purchasing gold. The crooks (needing to impersonate him) show up with a fake passport using a cutout of [[The Office|David Brent]] as the picture.

* [[Stupid Statement Dance Mix]]: "I could eat a knob at night."

* [[Take Our Word for It]]: Karl's descriptions of Suzanne is the prime example, especially as she is [[The Unseen]] to everybody (she wishes for her face not to be in the public domain and the fansites are respecting that wish).

* [[Technology Marches On]]: One original 1998 series episode had Ricky and Steve run a three-in-a-row track set primarily for listeners to record onto a compilation cassette. Needless to say that the on-set Youtube and digital media devices now make this really funny to listen to.