BY ALEX ISRAEL

In print | Published September 10, 2009

This summer, I came to the realization that working from nine to five, Monday through Friday, is referred to as the “daily grind” for a reason. Even though I was working at an internship that I loved, with people I enjoyed, doing work that I felt was important, I still had a hard time adjusting to a schedule that didn’t allow for afternoon naps and FailBlog breaks. I was filled with nostalgia for the time, only a few months earlier, when my days started at 11 a.m. and my afternoons were filled with macaroni and cheese and Comedy Central.

This nostalgia was a contributing factor to my newfound, yet deep and abiding, love for the short-lived British sitcom “Spaced.” The show was created by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright, the geniuses behind “Shaun of the Dead” and “Hot Fuzz,” two of my favorite movies of all time. Pegg and Jessica Hynes (who played Shaun’s female counterpart, Yvonne, in “Shaun of the Dead”) star as Tim Bisley and Daisy Steiner, two post-adolescent slackers who pretend to be a couple in order to rent a flat whose advertisement proclaims it to be for “professional couples” only.

Not to say that Tim and Daisy lead anything resembling a professional lifestyle. Tim, an aspiring comic-book artist, is the second-in-command (under a man who goes by Bilbo) at a comic book store called Fantasy Bazaar. Daisy is a freelance writer who manages to write all of three articles over the course of the show’s two seasons. Most of the duo’s time is spent drinking, smoking pot, playing videogames and making “Star Wars” and “Lord of the Rings” references. In other words, it was heaven, at least to the exhausted commuter I had become.

This isn’t to say that I approve of Daisy and Tim’s lifestyle. On the contrary, I have ambitions beyond getting wasted and occasionally going out to a club or a piece of avant-garde theater. However, I occasionally enjoy indulging in a fantasy in which I have no responsibilities beyond going to the grocery store to replenish my supply of cereal and iced tea. Or, even better, sending my roommate to replenish supplies.

Of course, this vision of post-adolescent slackerdom has plenty of things going for it besides the lifestyle. The writing, like that of “Shaun” and “Fuzz,” is razor-sharp and filled with brilliant lunacy, a characteristic that brings the show closer to the absurdist aesthetic of such classic stoner films as “The Big Lebowski” and “Clerks.” The incessant pop-culture references, delivered at a breathless pace, bring the show even closer to Kevin Smith’s slacker masterpiece, although I don’t think that Dante and Randal ever had to rescue their dog from an evil vivisectionist, who was subsequently torn apart by a wild hound trained to attack rich people. (If you think that this is brilliant, you should really watch “Spaced.” If you don’t, go back to your room and keep watching “The Real Housewives of Atlanta,” because I have no more use for you.)

The vivisection incident was a particularly memorable one because it involved all of the show’s major characters. On their quest to rescue Colin, Daisy’s dog, Tim and Daisy recruit Tim’s best friend, gun nut Mike (Nick Frost, a Pegg and Wright stalwart who played Ed in “Shaun” and Danny in “Fuzz”); Daisy’s aspiring fashion-designer friend Twist (Katy Carmichael); and the downstairs neighbor, Brian (Mark Heap), a rather tormented painter. The only character who doesn’t make an appearance on the rescue mission is Marsha (Julia Deakin), Tim and Daisy’s alcoholic landlady. As becomes clear by the end of the series, this group of people has formed themselves into a (twisted and dysfunctional) family, a group of people who manage to be there for one another even when they can barely hold their own lives together. This gives the series a similar tone to both “Shaun of the Dead” and, to a lesser extent, “Hot Fuzz”: no matter how much you may laugh at the character’s inadequacies, at their petty struggles and occasional downright stupidity, you feel for them, and you might even want to be them. Well, maybe not all the time, but at least for a few days as a break from being a working stiff.

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