The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret: Season 1

I've been sitting on this post for a few days now - truly, guys, this isn't my style! - and I think part of that has to do with my utter inability to figure out what I want to say in this post. For starters, The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret was a two-season British-American twelve-episode series that aired on IFC from 2010 to 2012. I got in on the ground floor here and really enjoyed this show, but I also have no recollection at all of how or where I initially heard about it, and the second season was only just released on DVD, suggesting that very few people ever watched this show and that even fewer will remember it.

Now, normally, here's where I'd make some kind of sales pitch and tell you all to go check this one out. But it's long gone, it doesn't seem to have any cult following on the Internet whatsoever, and it's quite simply a dark, dark comedy that induces winces and cringes more than laughs or repeatable quotes. This isn't for everybody! I'd totally be down to lend you my copy if you're interested (or, better yet, to marathon through the three-hour season with any of you).

As for describing the central premise of the show, I'll let Wikipedia do the talking here.

The series follows an American, Todd Margaret, who takes a job running the London sales team for the energy drink Thunder Muscle. He has no experience with British culture, knows nothing about sales, and has only one employee, Dave.

The show's title is lengthy, but perfectly accurate. Todd Margaret is inept at sales and tone deaf to his environment, but more than anything he is a terrible liar. He tries to impress a crush by pretending he lives in the Palace of Westminster, for instance, assuming that it's just a very fancy apartment suite. Not only is he too stupid to realize what a dumb lie it is, but he assumes his crush - a British woman - will fall for the pointless lie. It's this mentality that puts him in a downward spiral as he gets further and further in over his head. And again, this show is dark as hell. Within a few episodes, beyond losing hundreds of thousands of dollars and routinely embarrassing himself, Todd inadvertently poisons several people, makes a mockery of a solemn holiday parade, and aids a terrorist organization.

The show's got David Cross and Will Arnett, and if you can get past the iffy British production value and a few accents, you may find it as addicting and darkly funny as I did.