"Rick is dead! The People's Poet is dead!" R.I.P. Rik Mayall.

"This house will become a shrine, and punks and skins and rastas will all gather 'round and hold their hands in sorrow for their fallen leader. And all the grown-ups will say, 'But why are the kids crying?' And the kids will say, 'Haven't you heard? Rick is dead! The People's Poet is dead!'"

British TV comedy has lost one of its leading lights today, Rik Mayall, who has died at 56. Mayall's series "The Young Ones" was television's dark Yellow Submarine--unfettered imagination at work, where literally anything could happen at anytime--and Mayall was its rudder. His character, Rick, was the epitome of the worthless, trendy, self-important collegiate "radical" who can't do wrong right. Whether fantasizing about his superhero alter ego, "The People's Poet", or getting pummeled by his roommate Vyvyan's mum, Rick embodied the worst attributes of the pretentious scenesters of his own era and today. Half of the imbeciles wandering around Williamsburg, Brooklyn could be Rick's twins.

His performances were priceless.