An unhinged Anglo-Irish sitcom by Graham Linehan and Arthur Mathews, about a tiny parish on a miserable little island off the coast of Ireland where the Catholic Church has sent three of its most embarrassing members: the embezzler Father Ted Crilly, the idiotic manchild Father Dougal McGuire, and the drunken, violent, foul-mouthed skirt-chaser Father Jack Hackett. Their housekeeper is Mrs. Doyle, who is really dedicated to serving tea. The majority of episodes involved Ted's efforts to either get away from the island or make a nice pile of cash, neither of which he ever succeeded in doing.A cult hit in Britain and Ireland, the writers never planned to continue it beyond its third season. Star Dermot Morgan (who played Ted) died one day after finishing filming of the final episode, resulting in the common misconception that the show was cancelled because of this.Flame wars can break out over whether the show should be considered Irish (its writers, cast, settings and exterior locations were all Irish) or British (it was produced by a British company for a British TV channel). Came eleventh in Britain's Best Sitcom. It is very popular in Ireland, regularly repeated on Irish television, and lines from the show are quoted about as often as Brits quote Python.
This show provides examples of:
Accidental Pervert: Jack on one occasion since he was sleepwalking at the time.
Brennan: What would the following describe to you; Jack, sleepwalking and bollock naked?
Buzz Cagney has a gruff, 1930s Chicago tough guy accent.
As part of the Film NoirShout Out in A Christmassy Ted, Todd Unctious discusses Ted with an old classmate of his from St Colm's. True to the genre homaged, the drunken priest has a stereotypical Westerny, Nevada huckster accent.
Dougal: "Wait, I'm not so sure about this, Ted. It is a big step, and where are we going to get the guns?"
Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: "Cigarettes and Alcohol and Rollerblading", although equally a reference to Brit Pop band Oasis's single "Cigarettes and Alcohol".
"She was on her way to the shop the other day, and a man came over to her, and killed her, and stole her pen!"
Artistic License - Geography: When Bishop Brennan indicates an island off the coast of Suriname on a globe, he points to somewhere in the centre of the USA.
Bishop Brennan is very punctilious about the correct way to address a Bishop: "Don't call me Len, you little prick."
Never, ever, ever come between Jack Hackett and alcohol.
Even Jack is terrified of Ted when the latter is drunk.
Be Yourself: Ted makes the terrible mistake of giving this advice to Dougal.
Big Entrance: Bishop Brennan makes an unforgettable entrance running towards the camera screaming with his 10ft-wide cloak billowing behind him once he figures out that Ted really did kick him up the arse.
Blatant Lies: Everywhere. "The money was just resting in my account," is a notable one, but a particular gem comes from a phone call between Ted and Brennan.
Amazingly, the brick itself is both literal and figurative, as well as being a Chekhov's Brick in that it returns again for a less humorous purpose and yet again for a humorous one.
Britcom: There is a lot of debate over whether it counts as a Britcom or not - the show was a sitcom made for British TV by a British production company but almost everything else about it (writers, actors, setting) is Irish.
To the point where Ted has to make him a chart of things that do not exist. Entries include: Darth Vader, Magnum, P.I. and "non-Catholic Gods."
Captain Obvious, Don't Explain the Joke: Ted explaining why Dougal's comments are stupid. Arguably a case of Rule of Funny; Dermot Morgan usually managed to wring some laughs out of the situation with his exasperated reactions to what Dougal was saying.
Comically Missing the Point: Ted realises the babies entered into Craggy Island's Beautiful Baby contest all have suspiciously similar hairstyles to Pat Mustard. Dougal's first thought is that the babies are all copying his style.
In the same episode, Ted presents Pat's manager with photographic evidence of Pat's indiscretions. Pat's manager responds by telling Ted how much he's willing to pay for the dirty photos.
Compressed Vice: Dougal's passion for rollerblading is not mentioned outside of the episode "Cigarettes and Alcohol and Rollerblading"; Linehan and Mathews simply thought it would be a funny "vice" for Dougal to have to give up for Lent while Ted gave up smoking and Jack gave up drinking.
Creator Cameo: Both Arthur Matthews and Graham Linehan played various parts throughout the series,
Curtain Camouflage: An episode where Ted and Dougal play hide and seek in a very small caravan.*
That's a "trailer" or "mobile home" to North Americans.
Father Ted also hides behind a curtain when on the phone with a tv producer to hide from Father Jack in "Good Luck, Father Ted".
Damned by Faint Praise: "I'd say Father that you might be the second best priest in the country!"
Dawson Casting: Reversed with Pauline McLynn, who was 33 when the show started. She almost didn't get the part, because she was too pretty◊ for Mrs. Doyle.
After getting kicked by Ted in the episode Kicking Bishop Brennan Up the Arse, Bishop Brennan remains in a state of shocked disbelief for the time it takes him to fly to Rome for an audience with the Pope, at which point he finally snaps out of it with a roar of "He did kick me up the arse!". And then shoves His Holiness out of the way and rushes back to Ireland.
After destroying a car that was sent to be raffled off, Ted is completely calm at first, then abruptly starts freaking out in the middle of the night.
Alan:Well, it's been an easy decision. There's one out-and-out winner; and, rather than waste time with the speech, I'll get on with the job of announcing the winner, who, today, has come first in this competition to see who the winner is in the King of the Sheep competition that we have all come to today, wondering who indeed will it be who wins the prize of King of the Sheep. The winner of this year's King of the Sheep competition is...
Ted:Stop! This contest is a sham, and a fraud, and a... sham!
Ted: [holding up a toy Cow] Concentrate Dougal. These... are small. The ones out there... are far away. Small. Far away. [Dougal shakes his head in bewilderment]
Organiser: Which one of you is Ted, and which is Dougal? Dougal: I'm Ted, and he's Dougal. Ted: What? No, no, I'm Dougal, he's Ted.
Dull Surprise: Father Stone. He even underreacts after being struck by lightning. This is intentional.
The priest with the boring voice in "A Christmassy Ted". Actually comes in useful to distract shoppers so that the priests can escape the lingerie section.
Early Installment Weirdness: Graham Linehan calls himself out on this in the scripts book, noting that the first episode they wrote - "Grant Unto Him Eternal Rest", which aired as the finale of season 1 - has some rather weird out-of-character moments, like Ted reciting poetry and Ted and Dougal seemingly plotting to kill Jack at the end. The earliest episodes also feature a brighter parochial house, and a slightly cleaner Father Jack.
Easy Evangelism: Somehow, Dougal unintentionally talks a bishop into abandoning religion. In a single (offscreen) conversation. Then again, the bishop was already having a crisis of faith.
John and Mary O'Leary, a couple who run the general store on the island, hate each other and are always encountered just as they perpetrate some violence on each other, and then immediately act as if nothing is wrong.
The Exit Is That Way: A particularly unusual variant occurs with Father Dougal: he walks the wrong side of an open door, missing an exit that is right in front of him.
In the Christmas Special when Ted, Dougal and several other priests try to sneak out of a lingerie section of a store that they accidentally wandered into so that it won't cause a public scandal, they hijack a P.A system so they can say the store is closing to lure out the shoppers...however when they start wandering around aimlessly...
Ted: (Hijacks P.A) NOT THAT WAY FOR FECKS SAKE, THE OTHER WAY!!!
Exposition Diagram: Parodied and subverted in "Speed 3". The priests attempting to help Dougal out are drawing up various diagrams of plans to help out. After Ted has a Eureka Moment and scribbles his plan on the board, it's revealed that all he's done is write "We put the brick on the accelerator".
Fan Convention: The annual Ted Fest. Distinguished from other Cons by actually taking place on a tiny island off the Irish coast (Inishmore); features a Lovely Girls contest, 5-a-side football, talent show, and drunk students yelling catchphrases ad nauseam.
Film Noir: Part of "A Christmassy Ted", when Father Todd Unctious states his motivations.
Flanderization: Averted with Dougal, whose idiocy was played down less as the series went on with him at times proving smarter than Ted.
But played straight with Ted's smoking - at first it's something he's occasionally seen doing, but late in Series 2 it turns out that five minutes without a cigarette causes him to break out in a sweat and become unable to think about anything else.
Also done with Mrs Doyle and her tea-making habits. In Series 1 she makes tea for Ted, Dougal and Jack quite often. In Series 2 she offers them a cup nearly every time she appears and it's revealed she stays awake all night with a fresh cup of tea for each of them just in case they should need it. Then in the Christmas special she freaks out at the new tea machine because she can't cope with the idea never making tea for them, and ends up destroying it to prevent this.
Four Temperament Ensemble: Combo Ensemble—Ted is sanguine/choleric, Jack is choleric/melancholic, Mrs. Doyle is melancholic/phlegmatic, and Dougal is phlegmatic/sanguine.
Genius Ditz: While mostly a ditz, Dougal often shows signs of intelligence and excellent character judgements
Genre Savvy: Ted himself. One example from "Kicking Bishop Brennan Up The Arse", after Dougal assures a nervous Ted that Bishop Brennan, who hates Craggy Island, will most likely never have a reason to come back. The phone at once begins to ring.
Ted:(picks up phone) "Hello Bishop Brennan."
Cleverly parodied in "Speed 3", when the priests somehow realise that the answer to Dougal's life-threatening situation lies in the plot of an action film, but keep guessing the wrong one, first discussing The Towering Inferno and then watching The Poseidon Adventure ("Gene Hackman plays a priest in it!") in its entirety.
Geographic Flexibility: The only constant of Craggy Island's geography is that it has no west side - it just kind of broke off during a storm and drifted away. In some episodes it is incredibly tiny; in others it can contain an entire Chinatown that Ted has somehow never heard of. Whether the island is in the Republic of Ireland or Northern Ireland varies whenever comedically convenient - it is a nuclear waste dumping ground for the British government and the British Army and the IRA feature (very briefly) in one episode, but in others it is explicitly named as part of Ireland and whenever the police appear they are clearly the Garda Síochána rather than the RUC.
Global Ignorance: In relation to the Geographic Flexibility above, when someone asks how to get to Craggy Island it's revealed that the island doesn't appear on any maps and the only way to know when you are near it is when you see British ships dumping nuclear waste. The general rule is that if you are going away from it you are heading in the right direction.
Father Ted: We wouldn't be on maps now Terry, we're not exactly New York!
The make-up work on Father Jack, including white and grey blue Mismatched Eyes, crusty lips, strange ruddy spots, stringy hair, and a perpetual snarl makes him quite possibly the ugliest thing to ever appear on TV. Frank Kelly has said that people wouldn't talk to him with his makeup on, and Farscape actually based an alien priest on his appearance in the episode 'A Prefect Murder', of which a picture can be found here.
Pauline McLynn nearly didn't get the part of Mrs Doyle, because they felt she was too pretty. She turned up to a later audition with a terrible case of the flu, and the rest is history.
Go Mad from the Revelation: After Jack sobers up for the first time in twelve years and Ted and Dougal re-introduce themselves:
"Priests? DON'T TELL ME I'M STILL ON THAT FECKING ISLAND!"
Heroic BSOD: Played for laughs (naturally) in the "Flight of Terror", when Father Ted climbs outside the aeroplane mid-flight to fix a cable. He's fine until the crisis is over...
Ted: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! What am I doing on this fecking wheel? AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!
He's next seen in the parochial house sitting room, still clinging to the wheel.
Humiliating Wager: The titular character was famously made to kick Bishop Brennon up the arse as the forfeit for a lost football match between elderly priests (technically Ted's team won the match, but he was disqualified for cheating).
Hypocritical Humour: Mrs Doyle hates the language in modern novels, in fact she hates it so much that she spends five minutes using all of the language that she hates.
Mrs Doyle: "Ride me sideways" was another one!
That line was actually ad-libbed by Pauline McLynn and caused Dermot Morgan to break up. If you watch closely you can see that the scene is cut just as he is about to laugh out loud.
I Am Not Spock: Severely affects the entire cast. If you were an extra in this show that's all you're ever going to be. Graham Norton averts it by simply carrying his persona to the talk-show circuit. Some of the cast who are in stand-up avert it (such as Ed Byrne), although Ardal O'Hanlon may not be so lucky.
That said, there are far worse shows to be forever tied to.
This got so bad that Pauline McLynn (Mrs Doyle) refused to appear in the documentary about the show.
I Need to Go Iron My Dog: Done many times. In the second episode, used repeatedly to try to get away from the painfully boring Father Stone.
In "A Christmassy Ted", the priests try to wriggle their way out of watching a televised Mass through this. One of them says they have to console a death row inmate.
Incredibly Lame Pun: Usually played for laughs, but one notable groaner is this:
Father Dougal: Remember when he was drunk, and he went off with Sister Roberta?
Innocent Innuendo: "Oh, Pat was wondering if he could put his massive tool in my box?"
Insane Troll Logic: In "Think Fast, Father Ted", they damage a car they're about to raffle off. Dougal thinks that cheating in the raffle to get the money back would be morally wrong. Ted convinces Dougal otherwise with this brilliant deduction:
Father Ted: Dougal, seriously, listen: if Bishop Brennan finds out we wrecked the car, he will kill us. And murder is a terrible, terrible sin, Dougal. So, by committing this little sin, we'll actually be saving a bishop's soul.
Iron Buttmonkey: Father Larry Duff, who seems to at best have terrible luck, and at worst suffers horrific injuries, almost every single time Ted calls him.
I Was Having Such a Nice Dream: Used in "A Christmassy Ted". Ted's dreaming about taking Peter Clifford's place in Ballykissangel and has just started kissing Assumpta when he's rudely awoken by Dougal.
Dougal: TED! TED! Would you like a peanut?
I Will Only Slow You Down: Part of the war movie parody in the Christmas special, after a priest is hit in the eye by a snapping bra strap.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Ted zigzags around this trope. There are times when he displays real kindness and humanity (Talking a priest out of suicide) only for an ulterior motive to be revealed (The priest owed him money). That said, he does seem to care about Jack and Dougal and even possess genuine faith (He's noticeably horrified when Dougal expresses disbelief).
Just Plane Wrong: In "Flight Into Terror", the plane is a BAe 146 viewed from the outside, but the interior is of a much larger wide-body aircraft. Of course, the interior of a BAe 146 isn't nearly big enough for a soundstage.
Kavorka Man: Pat Mustard, the disgustingly sleazy milkman who somehow manages to seduce every woman on his route. And have children with a lot of likenesses to him with them.
Lampshade Hanging: Father Jack frequently exits from the living room by screaming and jumping through the window. This gets lampshaded in the Christmas special, where he attempts to do so only to bounce back from the glass. Ted remarks to the room "We thought he was jumping through the old window a bit too often... That's why we had the plexiglass put in"
Ted: I am fearless. Like that film with Jeff Bridges.
Dougal: I haven't seen that one.
Ted: Not a lot of people have, Dougal, so it's probably a bad reference.
Large Ham: Bishop Brennan has to be in RRRRROME tomorrow to meet with the holy father!
Ted when he gets angry or excited.
One of the priests stuck in the lingerie section in the Christmas special has an exciting dramatic voice played for laughs.
Father Reilly:[loudly]Ted! Were you asking for a dramatic, exciting voice!? Father Fitzgerald:No. He said boring. He wanted a boring voice. Father Reilly:In that case, you must excuse me for my impetuous interruption!
Everyone. Every extra, every one-scene character, will act as though they are chewing 900lbs of pork. The world of Father Ted is a quintessential World of Ham.
Man Child: Father Dougal. Eoin Mc Love manages to be an even bigger one.
The Masochism Tango: John and Mary try to keep up a Happily Marriedfaçade in front of the priests but the rest of the time it's blindingly obvious that they completely and utterly loathe each other. The first time they're introduced, Mary's put John in hospital with a knife wound.
May-December Romance: Sixty-something year old Pat Mustard and many of the women on Craggy Island whom he had affairs with on his milk rounds, and who subsequently became pregnant with his children. As they were able to have children, they were presumably much younger than Pat Mustard.
Mean Character, Nice Actor: Suffice it to say, when Ted envisions Jack as a friendly, nice-looking old man in a rocking chair singing "In Apple Blossom Time", it was still Frank Kelly.
Meat O Vision: Used in the episode "Cigarettes and Alcohol and Rollerblading". The priests try to give up their vices for Lent, but soon go into withdrawal and hallucinate one another as the objects of their addiction (giant talking cigarettes or pints of Guinness) speaking gibberish.
When Mrs. Doyle has a night out, Ted and Dougal manage to start a fire in their attempt to make a cup of tea, and run around in a blind panic.
Also used to remove the zombie-horde of old women looking for Eoin Mc Love.
Mrs. Doyle: Stop! Stop! Ladies! It's after seven o'clock. I think your husbands might be wondering where their breakfasts are!
Father Ted: Mrs. Doyle's right! Remember last year, Mrs. Dunn, when your husband tried to wash a cup, and burned the house down. And Mrs. Collins, when Mr. Collins tried to make the bed on his own...*dramatic pause*...and lost a leg.
Brennan: People are coming all the way from Gdansk to see the film!
Mundane Made Awesome: Ted leading a group of priests lost in a store's lingerie department to safety to avoid a possible scandal is treated as war-movie parody of a unit stuck deep in enemy territory.
Nightmare Fuel: In-universe, Dougal thinks The Love Bug was so scary, he had to sleep in Ted's bed that night.
Dougal: C'mon, Ted: a Volkswagen with a mind of its own. That's pretty scary.
No Celebrities Were Harmed: Henry Sellars = Henry Kelly, Eoin McLove = Daniel O'Donnell, Niamh Connolly = Sinéad O'Connor, Bishop Brennan = Bishop Éamon Casey (who also had a secret son; condoms were briefly nicknamed "Just In Caseys").
No Indoor Voice: Father Jack "FECK! DRINK! ARSE! GIRLS!" Hackett.
Noodle Incident: The "Blackrock incident" that got Dougal sent to Craggy Island.
Bishop Brennan: The amount of lives irreparably damaged...
Another one was the "Sealink incident," which we are told involved Dougal and the controls of a Sealink ferry, although Noel Furlong tactfully shushes Dougal before he can give too many details.
Yet another one, in "Cigarettes and Alcohol and Rollerblading"—where they seem determined to push this trope to its breaking point:
Father Ted: Dougal, Dougal, do you remember Sister Assumpta?
Dougal: Er, no.
Father Ted: She was here last year! And then we stayed with her in the convent, back in Kildare. Do you remember it? Ah, you do! And then you were hit by the car when you went down to the shops for the paper. You must remember all that? And then you won a hundred pounds with your lottery card? Ah, you must remember it, Dougal!
[Dougal shakes his head]
Sr. Assumpta: And weren't you accidentally arrested for shoplifting? I remember we had to go down to the police station to get you!... And the police station went on fire? And you had to be rescued by helicopter?
Father Ted: Do you remember? You can't remember any of that? The helicopter! When you fell out of the helicopter! Over the zoo! Do you remember the tigers?
[Dougal shakes his head some more]
Father Ted: You don't remember? You were wearing your blue jumper.
Dougal:Ah, Sister Assumpta!
And, of course, the Lourdes incident involving Ted, a trip to Las Vegas and a sick child whose money he allegedly took. All we know is that the money was just resting in his account.
Not to mention how Jack got to Craggy Island: the infamous "Wedding in Athlone". Nobody tells what happened, but Brennan mentions "the strings I had to pull to stop the Vatican getting involved."
No Name Given: Mrs. Doyle. Whenever anyone says her first name, it's drowned out by a conveniently timed stock sound effect.
No Periods, Period: Averted. "Go away, I don't want to catch the menopause."
"Still it must be fun though... not the... y'know... but... well... having boyfriends when you're a man and the general rough and tumble of homosexual activity"
Zig-Zagged: The Only Sane Mantle is passed around like a ball. It is normally held by Ted, however, if the circumstances are sufficiently amusing, it will pass to Mrs. Doyle, Dougal, Bishop Brennan, an Islander, and even Jack in one episode. Visitors to the island are almost always portrayed this way. The general rule for determining the OSM is: it is Ted, unless there is a visitor to the Island present, unlessit suits the comedy to have nobody display any kind of sanity at all.
Only Shop In Town: The shop run by John and Mary seems to be the only one on Craggy Island.
Out-of-Character Moment: "Sheep" reveals that Jack turns into a cheerful, free-spirit whenever it's Autumn. Ted laments that it doesn't last long.
Overly Narrow Superlative: It's amazing how simply changing a word of any ordinary bit of hyperbole to "priest" has this effect. "The most sarcastic man in Ireland" wouldn't cause you to bat an eyelid, but "the most sarcastic priest in Ireland"...
Pac Man Fever: Dougal and Damo are seen playing Street Fighter 2 (fairly current at the time), but with Atari style joysticks.
Parachute in a Tree: In one episode, during a flight emergency, Jack takes the plane's two parachutes and attaches the second one to the drinks trolley. As the credits roll, we see Jack and the trolley both stuck in the tree, with Jack vainly trying to reach it.
Pardon My Klingon "Feck" to non irish viewers. Feck is a mild curse in Ireland. Interestingly enough, the word has its own history completely unrelated to the err..other F word, although it is commonly used as a milder version of it.
Pass the Popcorn: In "Night of the Nearly Dead", hordes of middle-aged women have descended on the Parochial House to see crooner Eoin McLove, and have punched through the front door to grab him after he retreats back into the house. Ted, Dougal, and McLove's manager Patsy are trying to break the women's grip on McLove, while Jack... fetches a chair and a drink and sits back to watch.
Patriotic Fervour: Jack's insistence on standing for the French national anthem is exploited when Ted needs to find a way to stop him crushing another priest by sitting on him.
Pet the Dog: Jack leaving his fortune to Ted and Dougal in his will... as long as they spend the night next to his body when he dies.
Though Ted is occasionally shown to say Mass (including once on a mobile altar being towed by a tractor), and once talks about a confession he took, Dougal and Jack are never seen doing any priestly things. Justified by Dougal's status as The Ditz and Jack as The Alcoholic - you wouldn't want them doing any work either. The implication is that all three of them have been Reassigned to Antarctica.
Jack is, theoretically, a retired priest, and Ted and Dougal are, theoretically, his caretakers. In practice, Craggy Island is a place where particularly unpleasant priests are sent to rot with keepers selected from otherwise undesirables. Leads to We Want Our Jerk Back when Jack gets too sick for Ted and Dougal to look after any more, and a much younger (and even less pleasant) priest is sent to Craggy Island for them to keep.
Lampshaded when Dougal becomes a milkman and Ted is unable to think of any parish duty that would prevent him from doing so.
Dougal: Ooh, I'd love to be a milkman for a bit. There's feck all to do around here...
It's pretty clear, though, that all three priests know very little about Catholicism. Jack is permanently drunk, Dougal is the resident ditz and even Ted forgets that the church traditionally has condemned homosexuality, has papal infallibility and even says that God is the most forgiving "of all gods".
Ted doesn't agree with many aspects of religion and even implies he's only a priest because it was traditional in his family for the least intelligent brother to become a priest. He also says 'the pope says things he doesn't really mean'.
The Pratfall: Mrs. Doyle wins a date for tea with her idol, TV heartthrob Eoin McLove. When she meets him, she begins shaking uncontrollably, then goes rigid as a board and falls right over on her arse.
The show largely substitutes the dialectal (and much softer) 'Feck' in place of the F-Bomb, but one memorable instant occurs in "Chirpy Burpy Cheap Sheep", uttered by show creator Graham Linehan.
Reassigned to Antarctica: Seems to be the point of the Craggy Isle parish - Ted for misappropriating funds, Dougal for the "Blackrock Incident", Jack for a sexual dalliance with a nun (and the "Wedding in Athlone").
Reckless Gun Usage: John in one scene, after the island is gripped by hysteria after a whistle is stolen, mentions that he keeps his shotgun cocked and armed so he can get the drop on him. He then demonstrates poor trigger discipline, waves it around like a Majorette's baton, and points it at Ted, whilst slamming it down on the counter at the same time.
Dougal figures that Ted Kicking Bishop Brennan Up The Arse is so ridiculous, Brennan himself wouldn't believe it. Sure enough, Bishop Brennan gets kicked up the arse and it only occurs to him that this is what happened when he's having an audience with the Pope, upon which he runs full pelt back to Ireland, where Ted is able to convince him that Ted kicking the Bishop up the arse is too ridiculous to have actually happened, which the bishop believes.... until he sees a giant photograph of the act.
Father Todd Unctious, and how he infiltrates the trio's house comes down to this.
Reset Button: Unusually played at the beginning of an episode rather than at the end. The episode 'A Christmassy Ted' referred to all charges against Ted over the 'Lourdes thing' dropped (the original offence which got him sent to Craggy Island). The first episode of the next series showed him at his luxurious new parish...before an auditor discovers irregularities in the parish accounts sending him right back to Craggy Island.
Rule of Funny: As per Graham Linehan's over-the-top Signature Style. He's stated in interview that when everyone knows how farce comedy works and everything is running on the Rule of Funny anyway, attempting to make the scenarios at all "realistic" is just patronising and detracts from the potential humour. Hence things like the perfectly square bit of dirt, which he could have come up with a credulity-stretching Hand Wave for, but why bother? Without one, the setup for the joke is a surreal sight gag in itself.
Running Gag: Too many to list. But one particular example is Ted calling Father Larry Duff on his mobile just when he's doing something important and messing him up because of it. On one occasion he fell of a cliff while trying to find his phone, for example. Another time he lost a ten thousand pound contest which required intense concentration.
Mrs Doyle's constant tea offering is one of the most famous running gags. Her dedication to tea making is frankly disturbing. She asks over and over and over. Once, she asked via a very large series of written signs when the music was up too loud to talk. Another time when Ted came downstairs in the middle of the night, she was standing perfectly still next to the door holding a tray of tea, six inches from Ted's face when he turned the light on. She also offered tea to a man who had just explained he was deathly allergic to it, although he left before she could really press him.
People on Craggy Island sure do jump out of windows a lot...
John and Mary, the 'loving couple' that keep trying to kill each other.
Sarcasm-Blind: Mrs Doyle & Dougal both struggle with the concept.
Say My Name: Bishop Brennan does this when he's in pure rage mode, after realising that Ted really did kick him up the arse.
CRILLY!!
Scatting: The priests' performance of "La Marseillaise" in "A Christmassy Ted" is an incoherent mumble with no distinct words, English or French. (Although the mouth movements of at least one priest do roughly correspond with the French words.)
Scooby-Doo Hoax: The mysterious sheep-eating beast, described by Dougal as follows:
Incidentally, four-arsed creations became a recurring theme on South Park some years later.
Separated by a Common Language: In "Cigarettes And Alcohol And Rollerblading", the phrase that forms (in Ted's mind at least) from John's cigarette smoke takes on a whole new meaning if you're American.
Serious Business: "There's nothing at all stupid about the All-Priests Over-75's Five-a-Side Football Championship Match! Against Rugged Island." (Or the All Priests Stars in Their Eyes Lookalike Competition, for that matter.)
The theft of a whistle prompting Craggy Island's one policeman to start doing helicopter sweeps and the Islanders to start locking themselves in the basement in case they're brutally murdered.
According to Ted, only Priests' Socks are actually black. All other "black" socks are just really, really, really, really, really, REALLY dark blue.
Shout Out: The mad woman shouting "Feckin' Greeks!" looks (and flails) just like Maria von Trapp singing "I Have Confidence".
In Series 3, the farmer who hires two idiots to frighten his sheep, so that he can stage its recovery and win the competition - and therefore a lot of money - with it, is called Fargo. Doubles as Foreshadowing for The Reveal.
Snipe Hunt: In the All-Priests Over-75s football match, Ted gives Dougal the task of guarding the corner flags against theft. This becomes relevant when Dick Byrne sends the equally-inept Cyril to steal one as a souvenir.
Springtime for Hitler: "My Lovely Horse" gets chosen as the Irish entry for the Eurovision Song Contest so that Ireland will lose and will not have to incur the cost of hosting the Contest another year. Averted, in that the plan succeeds spectacularly.
Spot of Tea: While tea drinking is generally associated with the English, the Republic of Ireland are just about equally notorious. Ireland's obession with tea is represented by Mrs. Doyle. "Tea, father?" "Oh, you will, you will, you will."
Stay in the Kitchen: Ted and Dougal and even Mrs. Doyle towards Laura Sweeny, unable to believe that she was Jack's solicitor.
Head Milkman: You'd better get going. Milk goes sour you know - unless it's UHT milk, but there's no demand for that because it's shite.
Strange Minds Think Alike: Weird example in "Speed 3" when Ted's think-tank team of priests seem to independently work out that the episode is a Whole Plot Reference to an action film and the answer must lie in such a film, yet constantly pick the wrong ones which bear no relevance to the crisis, such as The Towering Inferno.
Strawman Political: Played for laughs with Bishop Brennan who is designed to represent the worst aspects of the Catholic Church in Ireland. He is rude, a bully, a hypocrite (He lives in glamourous surroundings and a woman in a hottub while the priests barely scrape by) and has a secret child living in America.
Streisand Effect (In-Universe): The church's protests at "The Passion of St. Tibulus" result only in the film's overwhelming popularity.
Tempting Fate: In the Christmas Special, Ted announces that he is looking forward to "A nice quiet Christmas with no unusual incidents or strange people turning up. That would suit me down to the ground."
Also in "The Mainland" when Ted suggests he say "I don't believe it" to Richard Wilson. According to Dougal, "Serious Ted, that is a fantastic idea. This is one of those times when I'm absolute one hundred million per cent sure that you'd be doing the right thing. I can safely say you definitely, definitely won't regret doing that!"
The Thing That Would Not Leave: Father Stone's fondness for staying for days or weeks on end, bringing long, awkward pauses with him.
Throw It In: When describing the Beast of Craggy Island, one of Dougal's lines was meant to reveal that "instead of a mouth, it's got two faces." Ardal O'Hanlon didn't think this was funny, and when filming was taking place, decided to change the line to "instead of a mouth, it's got four arses," getting an uproarious reaction from the audience which immediately convinced the producers that the altered line should be left in.
"'Ride me sideways' was another one!" was an Ad Lib by Pauline McLynn — you can see Dermot Morgan trying not to laugh.
Throw the Dog a Bone: "Competition Time" is the one episode where Ted and Co. are better off than when it began.
Similarly, one of Larry Duff's appearances leads to a completely different priest being horrifically injured/killed rather than him.
Trope Codifier: Father Ted builds on earlier more mainstream TV sitcoms about priests, religion, and religious hierarchy, taking the themes and settings of earlier shows like Bless Me Father and Oh Brother! and taking them Up to Eleven and beyond. Without Derek Nimmo's relatively innocuous portrayal of a Church of England vicar in an otherwise anodyne sixties sitcom, there might have been no "Father Ted".
The Troubles: Averted. Admirably for a show with this setting and one that was made when it was, the Troubles practically never feature. The only times they are even mentioned is on the front page of a copy of the Irish Independent Ted is seen reading in one episode, and in a brief scene where Fr. Larry Duff is late for a picnic with Ted because the priest who was driving them over had been stockpiling machine guns for the Provos.
Too Soon: The original script for the final episode, "Going to America", ended with Father Ted contemplating suicide. However, when Dermot Morgan died the day after filming was completed, that ending was quickly replaced with a montage of scenes from previous episodes.
T-Word Euphemism: In one episode, Mrs Doyle has been reading the works of a lady novelist staying at the parochial house and is shocked by the language. She refers to "the F-word", but this being Father Ted has to clarify "The bad F-word. Not feck. Worse than feck."
The Unfettered: Father Jack is completely unafraid to say what little he has on his mind.
Unreveal: Mrs Doyle's first name is never mentioned, except for two occasions in "The Mainland", when an alarm bell and a dropped tray prevent the viewer from hearing it.
The scripts book reveals that her name is Joan, but that the writers decided never to mention it in the series in order to add an element of mystery to it.
Also, Mrs. Doyle very nearly talks about her husband in one episode, before abruptly cutting herself off.
"Feck". (Not invented by the series, commonly used in Ireland)
In one episode Ted goes to a park in which one is forbidden from swearing. He's called a "fupping backstard" and a "pedrophile", among other things.
Unwitting Pawn: Ted and Dougal become this for Irish Eurosong selectors in "A Song For Europe".
We Want Our Jerk Back: At first Ted and Dougal are thrilled when Jack gets a contagious disease and has to be sent away. Then it turns out his replacement takes Jack's Jerkass qualities Up to Eleven until they're driven to kidnap him back.
X Must Not Win: In the episode Cigarettes and Alcohol and Rollerblading, after being goaded into giving up something for Lent by Father Dick Byrne, Ted gives Dougal a lecture on the importance of Lent, something far more important than the sacrifices made by Jesus as the latter points out, but beating Dick Byrne at his bet.
You Look Familiar: Irish comedian Jon Kenny played a cinema owner in "The Passion of St Tibulus" and a Eurosong MC in "Song for Europe" (in the latter role, he was filling in for Steve Coogan who pulled out at the last minute).
Pauline McLynn played Mrs Doyle in every episode, but as she only had a few lines in "Flight Into Terror" they also let her play one of the nuns throwing paper at Ted.
Zombie Apocalypse: Spoofed in the main plot of "Night of the Nearly Dead", in which hordes of elderly women descend upon the parochial house to get a glimpse of singer Eoin McLove.
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