I’ve now watched all live action episodes and the Corner Gas movie, and it is definitely entering my sitcom rewatch rotation!
Corner Gas is a Canadian sitcom from 2004-2009, I had never heard of it before and I don’t know if it actually aired in the UK originally. If it did it was probably on a satellite channel we didn’t have! I just came across it browsing Amazon Prime’s Freevee offerings.
I am so glad I gave it a go! It’s absolutely delightful!
The show is set primarily in a gas station and adjacent dinner in a small Saskatchewan prairie town called Dog River. It follows the antics of the small town folk, and its jokes are gentle and clean (just good old family friendly fun!).
It actually reminds me in some ways of Parks and Recreation with the small town setting, the conflict is always minor with the reassurance that everyone always pulls back together in the end. Except CG comes with fabulously dry Canadian humour, and without the relentless Leslie Knope optimism.
It might look dated now – there is an episode where Davis and Hank compete over how small their flip phones are! There is also an episode where Hank starts a blog! – but it’s gentle comedy is also timeless, and that’s part of the charm for me.
The humour is slow and they never leave a joke on the table. It’s the kind of thing that an American production company might have ruined with a laugh track, but mercifully It doesn’t have one! It also steers clear of cringe humour and it never resorts to romance or will-they-won’t-they plots to keep viewers interested.
This is especially surprising given the first episode has pretty city girl Lacey moving to the small town to take over the diner from her deceased aunt. Brent and Lacey might be lightly teased as A Thing in the first series but that story quickly flips to poke fun at Lacey’s arrogant belief that everyone always has a crush on her! Some of my favourite episodes are where they subvert expectations around romance (Hank and Karen’s fishing trip was fabulous)!
The cast and characters are great! I soon fell in love with them all. Davis might be favourite, he is one of the two town cops but he’s very sweet and really just a big kid. Hank is also adorably dumb. Brent’s parents are great too – his father Oscar is completely unhinged while his mother Emma makes a great straight woman!
There are a lot of incredible one liners which I will have to start writing down the next time I watch! A lot of my favourites come out Oscar’s mouth! (“ya Jackass!”)
There is also an animated series I’m going to watch, I’ve seen a few episodes and it was weird at first but I think I’m getting into it. It means they can get a bit crazier with the humour which is fun.
I’ve found the live action is on PlutoTV (which apparently came preloaded on our Samsung TV and the PS5, who knew!) so I can watch a channel of episodes whenever I want for free!
If you want a gentle little sitcom where everything turns out well in the end I highly recommend it. It’s comfort watching in the same way as Star Trek:TNG,* there will be some conflict but you can watch it with the reassurance that everyone will be friends by the credit!
*(With some TNG exceptions!)
I binge watched this a year (maybe less) or so ago and it was really fun! It’s one I’d rewatch again sometime because it just has that easy-to-watch quality with fun characters. 🙂
Yes, someone else that has seen it!
The prairie setting reminds me of Little Mosque on the Prairie, which was also about a Canadian village. It was more like Vicar of Dibley than Parks and Rec, though: its main characters were (mostly) members of a Muslim community in the town of Mercy, who for want of other options rented space in the parish hall of an Anglican church. It aired in the mid-late 2000s, rather like this one, and I love it for its characters. FOr the creators it was also a way to tell stories about Islam in the west trying to find ways to bridge modern western thought and Islamic tradition — by having characters like Rayyan, who called herself a feminist despite being very devout.
That does sound interesting – who doesn’t love The Vicar of Dibley! I detached that a few years ago, it’s still a delight!
I wonder if I can find it on one of the streamers.
It’s funny you comment on this today actually, we just finished the animated series of Corner Gas and are now rewatching the live action again 😂 mostly because I was a few seasons in before my partner decided he was interested in watching it too! (He does this with all the “rubbish” I watch!)