Ricky Gervais is a desperate try-hard whose comedy isn’t just horrible, it’s deeply boring

Ricky Gervais has become a dreadful bore who in lieu of jokes now relies on being offensive to make his millions.

It didn’t always used to be like this. With The Office and to a lesser extent Extras, Gervais made brilliant television shows universally adored that weren’t just popular, but part of the cultural zeitgeist.

The Office was more than a show, it was a reference point, with David Brent a character we could all see in others, endlessly quoting or reworking his best lines to mirror the people in our own lives.Brent was offensive, sure, but it came from a desperation to be liked. There was a knowingness to the character, with the regional manager making a racist joke but refusing to repeat it in front of a black colleague. He knew it was wrong. Now Gervais jokes about white people inventing the N-word while stopping for applause.

The self-awareness has gone, and what’s left is a white multi-millionaire lashing out at minorities, having picked his audience. No longer a critical darling, Gervais has pivoted to shock.

Ricky Gervais was very funny, many years ago.

This was made abundantly clear with his new special, in which he mocks refugees coming to Britain on small boats, bravely taking them to task for risking their lives fleeing persecution. He suggested they were all men, and joked about pointing them to Gary Lineker’s house, who of course did actually house refugees.

How clever! How bold! Having skewered Hollywood, finally Gervais is sticking it to those powerful refugees! Whether it's trans people or immigrants, nobody is safe from this master of wry observation.These aren’t what you call jokes, but rather digs, lashing out at those without a voice to hit back. Cruelty works at the Golden Globes, where well-paid hypocrisy is the order of the day, but this is simply bullying, jokes designed to go viral in the darkest recesses of the internet.

Intolerance has a huge market share, and while his standards have plummeted without The Office co-writer Stephen Merchant, his reach has only soared. His jokes now don’t just go viral from his account or Netflix, they’re shared by the far-right campaign group Turning Point, or discussed as the voice of reason on that bastion of truth, GB News.Given how poorly he’s reviewed these days, maybe it’s deliberate, playing to stadiums where aggression is mistaken for wit, rather than write something interesting. When you’ve been unable to do that since 2010, why not put profit over punchlines.

For people of a certain age, Gervais’s work was not just something to be enjoyed, it was part of our friendships. His podcast and The Office were a constant through our adolescent years, but maybe that’s what he’s always been. Immature humour tempered by co-writers, but able to spread unfiltered now none of them are there to make him funny.

Gervais was a wonderful writer, whose stand-up routines were never great, but sought to actually say something, whether on philosophy or animal welfare. Now he’s just another bitter man on the internet, mocking minorities with only the worst people in the world laughing.