The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret
| The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Genre | Comedy |
| Created by | David Cross |
| Written by |
Shaun Pye David Cross Mark Chappell |
| Directed by |
Anthony & Joe Russo Alex Hardcastle Ben Gregor |
| Starring | |
| Composer(s) | Johnny Marr |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 3 |
| No. of episodes | 18 (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Shaun Pye David Cross Clelia Mountford Mark Chappell |
| Camera setup | Single-camera |
| Running time | 22 minutes |
| Production company(s) | RDF Television IFC Original Productions |
| Release | |
| Original network | IFC |
| Picture format | HDTV 720p |
| Original release | October 1, 2010 – January 14, 2016 |
| External links | |
| Website | |
The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret is a British-American black comedy television series starring David Cross, Sharon Horgan, Blake Harrison, Will Arnett, and Spike Jonze. The series is produced by IFC and RDF Television and premiered on October 1, 2010, on IFC.
The first two seasons of the series tell a single story---that of American office temp worker Todd Margaret (David Cross). After overhearing Todd recite jargon from a self-help CD and confusing it for him being on a call with a customer, ultra-aggressive executive Brent Wilts (Will Arnett) promotes Todd on the spot.
Todd is put in charge of Thunder Muscle, a new energy drink his company is seeking to sell in Great Britain. Todd's company only has one employee, a British person named Dave (Blake Harrison), who offers his full assistance in helping Todd promote and sell the product in the country.
Most of the humor in season 1 and season 2 focuses on Todd Margaret's not being familiar with British culture and customs. His situation is compounded by the fact that Todd is a pathological liar as well as Dave's truly nasty pranks and manipulation of Todd. In every episode of the first two seasons, Todd lies to cover up his ignorance of British culture and customs and lack of experience running a company. This is compounded by Dave's own manipulation of Todd, providing him false information about British culture to constantly humiliate and sabotage Todd, and Todd's infatuation with a local cafe owner Alice Bell (Sharon Horgan). Several of Todd's most damning lies revolve around his desire to impress Alice and manipulate her into a relationship with him.
During season 1, a cold open at the start of each episode depicts Todd before a British court as various charges against him are read out. A subplot involves Todd's supervisor Doug Whitney (Spike Jonze). Upset at having been fired by Brent, he is told that Brent Wilts is not really a company executive and investigates him for fraud. For the bulk of season 1, Brent is shown as a foul-mouthed, abusive superior towards Todd, constantly demanding unrealistic results in terms of time tables for getting Thunder Muscle onto the British marketplace, as well as demanding sales profits from the drink delivered personally to him, to pay for Brent's hookers and gambling addiction. By the end of season 1, it is revealed that Brent is, in truth, a mild-mannered pushover like Todd, promoted by the owner of his and Todd's company (a mysterious individual known as Mountford), and ordered to promote Todd and push him with unachievable expectations that Todd has no hope of meeting, so as to doom him to failure.
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