In between episodes of The Inbetweeners, as I brace myself for yet more vicious teenage humour, making space for my laughter allowance for the week (the average amount of laughter produced by your typical adult peaks at around 17 laughs per day, according to a study by Chuck Gallozzi), I begin to wonder what it is that makes this show's brand of cut-throat comedy so potently attractive to its wholesome fan base.The show itself has earned its deserved acclaim over a relatively swift period of time, with its original viewing audience of 238,000 at the time of the pilot burgeoning exponentially to 2.6m when episode one of the third series aired this year. The show's rank in comparison to other shows broadcast on E4 was #7 at the end of its first season, but is now #1, a position it has strongly defended for the majority of its post-season 1 lifetime.
The reason for its success is as blindingly obvious as the inadequacy of the actual characters in their grim sixth-form existence. The overtly amusing side of adolescence that adorns the Inbetweeners script has proven so compelling, despite its unreserved jarring effect on the nerves of its audience, because it mimics, albeit to the extreme, the lengths to which awkward losers will go to appear marginally acceptable in the social stew of high school life.
To make matters worse – for the fictitious failures, not us spectators to the 21st Century teen tragedy – rather than safely negate the consequences of their clumsy quirks, they continue to further sully their lowly reputations by exercising the right to act like uber idiots. Will, the not-so-charismatic private school reject who, in his own words, "attached himself to a fairly average group", is a master in the art of putting his foot in his mouth, and then sucking on it like it was the sensible thing to do. And Lucifer can skip out on the paperwork and enslave my soul in advance, as I find nothing funnier than watching these walking loofas besmirch their identities like clowns at a fashion show in Milan.
Sometimes, though, you can't help but believe there is a limit to the laughter lambs the scriptwriters can chuck to the slaughter, like when the loveably brain-dead Neil manages to slice his helmet while pissing into an empty soda can. Being a 19-year-old fella myself, I can easily cast my mind back to the unstoppable onslaught of the A-level agenda (now not as harsh as it seemed at the time) and imagine just how any one of the foolish four might feel when dunked into the doldrums following what can only be described as the Jurassic Park of fail.
What permeates the show's script as much, if not more than the deadly doses of soul-destroying embarrassment is the unrelenting sexual tension shared by most virginal blokes. From Simon the drip's inane obsession with the cosmetic Carly Damato to Jay's innocuous yet gratuitous descriptions of sexual encounters he never had, The Inbetweeners draws on the realism of the one-track male instinct to spy, snog and shag and demonstrates it at a level that seems excessive, but is astoundingly true to life, though, we do have our limits.
As much as I'd love to deny it, it's unbelievably accurate how shallow, virile and downright desperate teenage boys are when pitted against each other in the realm of raging hormones and crippling insecurities. The constant competition that governs the group's decisions and often forces them into nail-biting contests to see who can cock up their chances of scoring a shag – or blowjob, depending on how confident they are feeling – is so cringeworthy you'd think the writers had stakes on how close their characters could come to committing real crimes against humanity during their disgraceful antics.
If I had to place a bet on which boy was most likely to get arrested (as none of them have yet, fingers crossed for that twist) for some asinine transgression I'd put my money of it being Simon, 1) because he's the character who has provided the most unflattering nudity, 2) as his friends coldly observe, he acts like a stalker around girls he 'falls in love with' and 3) he's my least favourite character (see reasons above).
What I won't try to deny is the searing strain in my lungs that I suffer from every time I bear witness to the apocalyptically shameful scenarios everyone's favourite inbetweeners stumble into. Surely, if you're a fan of this socially gruesome show, you must be surpassing the statistical limit on laughter – as far as I'm concerned there is no limit! As someone who is personally accustomed to over-analysing my own costly cock ups, I revel in the self-sacrificing humiliation that The Inbetweeners has crafted into a bold comedy equation for the popular punishment of the unpopular ones.
But you have to remember that you're not laughing at them as much as you are laughing with them (even when they've mismanaged a faux pas so badly that none of them are giggling and gasping). We've all exchanged false advice on how to overcome your fears and 'fox up' an incredibly smoking female or crumbled before the barman behind the counter as he devilishly denies you service for being underage. The vital factor to our failure is that we never quit acting like those we wish to be and conversely grow to understand our funny side until we can be comfortable with those niggling imperfections so noticeable in adolescence. Let's just pray Will, Jay, Neil and Simon don't realise this before the third series is up.
Just so you know: it would appear that Blake Harrison, who plays the numpty Neil, is going to appear in an upcoming American sitcom, The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Tom Margaret. The new show, created by David Cross, follows, as the title implies, the distinctly risky career of a small business figure whose surname is Margaret (sound like a traditional British grandma's name? Probably deliberate given the show's London context). I look forward to seeing how Harrison will develop under the guise of his new character, who appears to be more competent-minded than his most famous personality on The Inbetweeners. Let's hope it all goes balls-deep for the guy.
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