The IT Crowd: The Complete Series

Quite simply one of the funniest sitcoms in the history of television, The IT Crowd is still hovering around cult status in America, and this box set of all four seasons and the series finale special may help change that. This is the perfect gift for anybody who’s a fan of the show already, but it will be especially wonderful for fans of British comedy who have not yet been exposed to the brilliance of this series. The full series is available on Netflix, but this set is a physical object that you can wrap, and it has cool bonus features.

In the gleaming high-rise offices of Reynholm Industries, powerful executives oversee billion dollar business deals. But in the dark and shabby basement, the company’s IT Support Team – bitter slacker Roy (Chris O’Dowd), socially inept Moss (Richard Ayoade), and their new boss, computer illiterate Jen (Katherine Parkinson) – rule their own domain of professional irresponsibility, mega-nerd ecstasy, and random acts of personal insanity.

This is the show that The Big Bang Theory wishes it could be. Rather than a hack sitcom filled with one-dimensional characters who represent what stupid people think smart people act like, The IT Crowd is filled with realistic eccentrics who have real geek/nerd cred, instead of just sporting T-shirts based on properties that just happen to be owned by their corporate parent. These very intelligent characters manage to say things that IT people really say, and they are socially awkward without resorting to TBBT’s cheap “every character is Urkle” approach.

And that geek/nerd cred will win extra points if the person you’re giving this to is a fan of indie comics like the ones published by Fantagraphics. The background of the character’s office is splattered with the work of Jim Woodring, Los Bros. Hernadez, Daniel Clowes and more. There are vinyl toys and posters and comics all over the set.

Creator/writer Graham Lineham has created a world where people have absurd reactions to absurd situations in the most hilarious way possible. One episode in particular, “The Work Outing,” ranks as one of the single funniest episodes of any sitcom produced anywhere in the world, ever. The series as a whole is one of the best-written sitcoms, with one of the strongest casts, that I’ve ever seen.

Bonus material includes commentary on select episodes, an interview with Graham Lineham, music videos, alternate versions of the animated opening, deleted scenes, outtakes and more.

The IT Crowd: The Complete Series should be available anywhere that sells video box sets, but your best bet is Amazon, who currently have it for under $36.

Check out a sample, below…