Red Dwarf is probably the nearest equivalent we
Englisher pigdogs have to
MST3K. It's the show that every geek watched. I remember when I was at school it was
essential viewing for several years, over and above any other comedy show. This was back before BBC repeated things dozens of times a year, of course. The very early episodes are of course cheap and dodgy. They do however set out the show's imaginative premise very well.
By about the fourth series it had really got into its stride, with the crew encountering a new threat every week and dispatching it in imaginative, and - this being a British sitcom - often lavatorial / sexual / violent / puerile ways. (Rimmer : "Why don't we ever meet anyone who's pleased to see us?" Cat : "Why don't we ever meet anyone who can shoot straight?") Some episodes (such as Holoship) have never, to my knowledge, been repeated. One of the best (dramatically, and humourously) episodes was Back to Reality (I think?) where the crew are duped into thinking that they have been playing an immersive video game for the past four years. (This episode marked the first appearance of Duane Dibbley)
The show went downhill slightly with series seven, which had some stand-out episodes and a much larger budget, but did not have the atmosphere or writing of the previous series. And series 8 was completely crap. It seems slightly odd to me that so many people I encounter still count themselves as big Red Dwarf fans, as it never really hit the heights of Fawlty Towers or the like, and has been far outstripped by later sitcoms (although no subsequent series called for special effects so far in advance of the available budget, I'll admit).