TMC
09-01-2023, 05:37 AM
https://franticplanet.wordpress.com/2020/08/05/the-upper-hand/
Clearly, The Upper Hand‘s wonk-ass ratio of airtime to cultural impact is extraordinary, but surely the sheer amount is suggestive of massive success? Not so much. A big part of the prolific output comes from its status as an American import. As a remake of ABC’s Who’s The Boss?, which began six years earlier, ITV had a stack of pre-existing scripts at their disposal, with most of the episodes straight adaptations, allowing them to be pumped out at a much faster rate. As a result, they could bypass the British system, usually stuck on blocks of 6, and air the show in yearly batches of anywhere between 7-19 half-hours, cramming all 94 shows into just 7 series.
Now, when I say nobody remembers The Upper Hand, I’m talking about specifics. Most who lived through it can recall its existence, but all will draw a blank when asked to call upon a line or a moment. This is a world where social vernacular is comprised of pop-culture references, and people communicate almost entirely in gifs or quotes from The Simpsons, Father Ted and Alan Partridge. Did this show truly leave nothing behind? I recently tweeted about the Upper Hand cultural vacuum, and got replies with vague memories of having watched, but nothing anyone could nail down, with repressed images coming in flashes, like alien abductees wincing at the sight of a speculum.
https://franticplanet.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/02.jpg
One viewer recalled a joke about recognising a belt-buckle through a letterbox; another repeated a gag about a purse, but with no further information online, it’s impossible to verify. Someone remembered nothing beyond a single line from the theme tune. Sadly, I had to inform them The Upper Hand‘s theme was instrumental, and the quoted lyrics actually came from Dennis Waterman sitcom On The Up. I was sent a link to an Upper Hand fan account. Registered five years ago, it has yet to make a single tweet. Everyone seemed to agree that Honor Blackman’s granny character liked sex.
Part of the reason I’ve been so fascinated with the 47 hours of ‘scene missing’ is that I’m in the exact same boat. I’d have been ten when The Upper Hand began, which was right in that period when televised comedy mostly consisted of MOR sitcoms about middle-aged tribulations, which, back in four-channel analogue Hell, us late-80’s/early-90’s kids were weirdly entertained by. As a boy, along with the shows we’d be quoting in the playground the next day, like ‘Allo ‘Allo or the stuff in my Past Laugh Regression series, I spent my evenings watching weekly instalments of Fresh Fields, After Henry, Up The Garden Path, and Surgical Spirit — the slow romancing of a ‘feisty’ surgeon and her shy anaesthetist. I’ve a vivid memory of my cousin coming over to play and both of us excitedly sitting down in front of May to December, where widowed solicitor Anton Rogers had taken up a relationship with a younger woman. There’s 39 episodes of that, by the way. The Upper Hand is the epitome of these sitcoms that solely existed within their own time, and like all the other trash on here, the only way to understand it is to watch.
Clearly, The Upper Hand‘s wonk-ass ratio of airtime to cultural impact is extraordinary, but surely the sheer amount is suggestive of massive success? Not so much. A big part of the prolific output comes from its status as an American import. As a remake of ABC’s Who’s The Boss?, which began six years earlier, ITV had a stack of pre-existing scripts at their disposal, with most of the episodes straight adaptations, allowing them to be pumped out at a much faster rate. As a result, they could bypass the British system, usually stuck on blocks of 6, and air the show in yearly batches of anywhere between 7-19 half-hours, cramming all 94 shows into just 7 series.
Now, when I say nobody remembers The Upper Hand, I’m talking about specifics. Most who lived through it can recall its existence, but all will draw a blank when asked to call upon a line or a moment. This is a world where social vernacular is comprised of pop-culture references, and people communicate almost entirely in gifs or quotes from The Simpsons, Father Ted and Alan Partridge. Did this show truly leave nothing behind? I recently tweeted about the Upper Hand cultural vacuum, and got replies with vague memories of having watched, but nothing anyone could nail down, with repressed images coming in flashes, like alien abductees wincing at the sight of a speculum.
https://franticplanet.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/02.jpg
One viewer recalled a joke about recognising a belt-buckle through a letterbox; another repeated a gag about a purse, but with no further information online, it’s impossible to verify. Someone remembered nothing beyond a single line from the theme tune. Sadly, I had to inform them The Upper Hand‘s theme was instrumental, and the quoted lyrics actually came from Dennis Waterman sitcom On The Up. I was sent a link to an Upper Hand fan account. Registered five years ago, it has yet to make a single tweet. Everyone seemed to agree that Honor Blackman’s granny character liked sex.
Part of the reason I’ve been so fascinated with the 47 hours of ‘scene missing’ is that I’m in the exact same boat. I’d have been ten when The Upper Hand began, which was right in that period when televised comedy mostly consisted of MOR sitcoms about middle-aged tribulations, which, back in four-channel analogue Hell, us late-80’s/early-90’s kids were weirdly entertained by. As a boy, along with the shows we’d be quoting in the playground the next day, like ‘Allo ‘Allo or the stuff in my Past Laugh Regression series, I spent my evenings watching weekly instalments of Fresh Fields, After Henry, Up The Garden Path, and Surgical Spirit — the slow romancing of a ‘feisty’ surgeon and her shy anaesthetist. I’ve a vivid memory of my cousin coming over to play and both of us excitedly sitting down in front of May to December, where widowed solicitor Anton Rogers had taken up a relationship with a younger woman. There’s 39 episodes of that, by the way. The Upper Hand is the epitome of these sitcoms that solely existed within their own time, and like all the other trash on here, the only way to understand it is to watch.