Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister is a British comedy series about the wheeling and dealing of political life.
Although the series is set whitin the British political scene, it deals with political games and clashes between politicans and the civil service that could be found almost everywhere in the world.
The Yes Minister (YM) series started airing in 1980 on BBC 2. It cinsisted of three series, each eith seven episodes. Each episode is about 30 minutes long. The story focuses around three main characters: James (or Jim) Hacker MP, Sir Humphrey Appleby and Bernard Woolley. It starts off with the political party of Jim Hacker that has won the elections and forms a new government. Jim Hacker gets appointed Minister for the Department of Administratice Affairs. At his department he has to work with his Permanent Secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby. The interests of both are of course very different. Jim Hacker has to make sure he remains popular (for votes) and that he carries out cabinet's policies (for the PM). Sir Humphrey however is interested in securing and possibly extending the position of his department in terms of staffing and budget. These interests clash od course on numerous occasions. On some occasions however thein interests coincide and they have to work together. The character of Bernard Woolley is positioned between the other two. Bernard Woolley is Jim Hacker's Principal Private Secretary. Although he is most of the time sympathetic to Jim Hacker's plans, he is also a civil servant and fhas loyalties to the civil service and Sir Humphrey
The YM and YPM series are admired for showing the reality of political life combined with British humor.
My favorite character is Humphrey, but also like Jim and Bernard too
They're great together. Sir Arnold is good too. 
the best quotes are Humphrey's long, complex and confusing sentences.
