Twees're Good (except they're not)

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
I'm well confused as to what twee is now. Peep Show is twee - really?

The piece is tortuous to read, but I think the basic premise is interesting to think about.

Why is it culturally Marxist (genuine question - amounting to, what is cultural Marxism anyways)?
 
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Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Peep Show is about as un-twee as a programme can get without being a documentary on the Manson family. But I don't think the article was calling it 'twee', just suggesting that Mark is the sort of 'beta male' character who resents 'alphas' their success wid da hunnies and that this - so the author thinks - is a defining characteristic of male tweeness. Or at least, is quite common among the twee community, which is nominally feminist or at any rate decidedly un-macho.

The whole 'alpha/beta' dichotomy is idiotic, it goes without saying, but perhaps enough guys (and women?) buy into it that it's become a sort of self-fulfilling superstition, at least for the people who take it seriously.
 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
I find Peep Show difficult to watch these days. I liked it a lot at one point, but now I'm far more likely to agree with its detractors. Maybe because David Mitchell comes off as such a twat in his newspaper articles, that I'm not sure he's acting as Mark (in the same way that it slowly became clear, in the days before he was ubiquitous that Ricky Gervais was David Brent, more or less) The episode about the cult is still classic, though.
 
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Sectionfive

bandwagon house
The piece has some good if fairly laboured substance. Was just pointing out "twee's claims to political credibility." tbh
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
I find Peep Show difficult to watch these days.

Do I get a slap for saying "That's the point!"?

I think if anything I started to like it even more as it got less realistic and just more and more silly and excruciating. With Mark gradually morphing from likeable loser to being spineless almost to the point of downright evil (the wedding scene? Sophie giving birth? Christ) and Jez becoming by contrast the more morally admirable of the two. That said, I still need to see most of the last series, or maybe two, I forget.

Maybe because David Mitchell comes off as such a twat in his newspaper articles...

Ha, he's exactly the sort of sensible, liberal, why-can't-we-all-just-get-along centrist I could tell you would hate. If St. Peter decides you've been a bad man, your hell will be to have to listen to Mitchell and Charlie Brooker amicably chatting with each other...forever.

You're dead on point about Gervais/Brent, I came to the same conclusion.
 
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Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
^^bloody hell

Seeing the title of this thread now makes me imagine an acoustic cover of 'Ebeneezer Goode' by a group of bearded, check-shirted ninnies in narrow-brimmed hats. With 'E' now signifying 'eggnog' rather than 'ecstasy'.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Gentlemen, the Tweepocalypse is upon us.

bucz.jpg
 

paolo

Mechanical phantoms
Innocent smoothies fall under the heading of 'things that are twee but still awesome' as far as I'm concerned
 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
Their smoothies are nice enough, but Innocent seemed to start that whole sickeningly overly-friendly/'twee' mode of advertising talk, which Pret then latched on to, along with a thousand shampoo advertisers
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Yeah, the advent of Innocent smoothies - sorry, I mean innocent smoothies, wouldn't want to use any of those nasty threatening-looking capital letters - surely marks a sort of Year Zero in the history of twee marketing. I think they must have pioneered the use of obnoxious little arrows, too (see above).

Shampoos and similar are fucking awful too, good call. Have you seen adverts for Aussie shampoo on the tube? Jesus, they're hideous. A giggly, conspiratorial 'BFF' turned into a rectangle of card. My girlfriend used to use this body wash stuff that said on the bottle "Not tested on Lassie, Skippy or Bambi", which made me want to inject a panda with polonium-210. I sometimes wonder if there's a sinister conspiracy to turn the UK's entire female population into simpering imbeciles. (Not that there are no appallingly patronizing adverts aimed at men, of course - e.g. every Lynx advert ever.)

Edit: I don't buy their smoothies but I have to admit to a grudging respect for innocent, I mean bulk-buying fruit that doesn't look nice enough to sell retail, whizzing it into a pulp and then charging a couple of quid for a tiny bottle is a genius business model.
 
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Slothrop

Tight but Polite
Maybe someone on Dissensus should launch a line of smoothies whose branding unflinchingly lays bare the horror and the hypocrisy of 21st century global capitalism? Luka could sell them in his shop.
 
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