Be Excellent To Each Other

I imagine Hearthly and Cavey are better catered for by Mrs Browns Boys.

It almost never is.

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radi ... omplaining

Also, as that article has reminded me, both Blackadder and The Young Ones have laugh tracks. Almost all sitcoms before 2000 do.

Sitcoms are rarely ruined by laughter tracks. They're normally ruined by being shite.

But, y'know, humour is subjective and all that.

Ah well lol.
For me it was shit.

And in contrast, there is The Big Bang Theory. I was never a huge fan to begin with, but I started putting Season 9 (after skipping a few out I think) on through Netflix just as background and a few times, I've had to turn it off a few times mid-episode. It now seems to be just a regular sitcom now that it's all couples and they occasionally shoehorn some geek culture in there. However, it's still doing the same old jokes about Raj/India and Howard being Jewish, and for some reason, Stuart has now become the butt of everyone's jokes and seems to be universally looked down upon.

Not that this has much to do with Top Gear.

True. I can accept that Friends had some good writers and some alright jokes but it never had me actually laughing. I saw a few episodes and it made me just about smile once or twice per episode but mostly it made me feel very very bored. I think the laughter track jars when you're not finding it to be the single most hilarious thing you ever witnessed as the audience seemed to be at every single passable joke. Otherwise you don't notice it. Although with Friends I think it wasn't the laughing so much as the whooping or the "awww" noises.

Yes, I think sitcoms also suffer when longer-than-one-episode story arcs get put in, and then the humour drops away as the focus is lost.

Except for Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Because of the implication.

As I've always been a 'Frasier' fan (other than 'Sgt Bilko', the best US sitcom ever), one of my aims this year was to watch the whole of 'Cheers'. I've got to the middle of series five but am struggling as it hasn't aged very well. The scenes with Frasier and Lillith (and also, earlier on, Frasier and Diane) are about the only reason I might continue to slog through it. And you don't need to watch the backstory to watch and enjoy 'Frasier'.

Because rape jokes are funny?

I think this needs all splitting out into its own "Friends was absolute shite" thread.

I found this page helpful for if you don't know what's being talked about here.
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/because-o ... mplication

Thanks for explaining

I have never seen it, but it doesn't sound very funny.

I love Always Sunny in general but it's quite problematic and these scenes make me feel deeply uncomfortable.

Because Dennis is a terrible human being, yet he sees this behaviour as above board. Sensing Mac's discomfort, he tries to make it sound better and reassure him, but then undoes it straight back to square one in tne next breath.

Well, never having watched "Always sunny..." That was quite a useful link, thanks Russ!

At times it is horrendously dark.

You're welcome.

Yep, doesn't mean I have to laugh at rape jokes though, ironic or not.

I don't think anyone has said what you should or should not laugh at, buddy.

You should never, ever watch Two Broke Girls.

I like Two Broke Girls.

What thread is this?

Two Broke Girls , i like that, too.

I *demand* this thread be renamed to A discussion of obsolete, lame American sitcoms and gender issues arising.

I thank you.

Hearthly has already done that to the Walking Dead thread.

Two Broke Girls is painfully unfunny, sorry.

I've never watched It's Always Sunny, but if it's a Mali favourite it must be terrific. Are there any young women learning to dance? Is Julia Stiles in it?

So many times . Add a soupcon of 'unwatchably', and with that, I flounce from the TV and leave you to it.

It's about unremittingly awful people doing terrible things ("Hi, I'm a recovering crackhead. This is my retarded sister that I take care of. I'd like some welfare, please") to each other and Danny Devito is often naked. I have often laughed so hard I thought i would die. The D.E.N.N.I.S System episode was superb.

It's also the longest running comedy TV show in American TV history, which is really unlikely given that it's this highly niche and very, very dark show about thoroughly unlikable people. I think it's very good indeed.

Really? Wow, that doesn't sound right, I would have thought the Simpsons, or SNL, or Cheers, or even Friends, or MASH or something would have been longer.

- Wikipedia

Unless I am missing a joke (never watched an episode, so quite likely if it's an in-joke)

That doesn't sound likely. It's about two waitresses with big boobs.

I can't stop watching it.

Longest running comedy TV show in cable history.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-f ... ing-879880 (I should have written live-action)

I can't stand IAS. Awful people being awful just isn't funny. With most sitcoms you could imagine yourself sat in the pub with the cast enjoying yourself. With IAS I can only imagine enjoying myself if I was bludgeoning them to death with a pool cue.

Talk about being damned by faint praise, huh.



But seriously, this sounds like all new attained heights of awful... real matchsticks-in-eyeballs Clockwork Orange kind of awful.

No, it's hilarious.

It's often not easy watching, but incredibly clever, mostly funny and they still haven't run out of ideas.

And none of them are totally irredeemable.

Charlie Work from the 10th season was as inventive a slice of comedy as I've ever seen.

There are times* when I can identify with Larry David on 'Curb'. I've never identified with the cast of 'Always Sunny' but it's still brilliant.

Also, in all the interviews with Charlie I'be listened to he comes across as a really nice guy in real life.


*most of the time

Ignoring the fact that I got confused between 2BG and IAS, that is quite surprising, but it seems most live action comedies seem to top out 10-11 series. (That seems to be quite a barrier across all types of fictional shows actually)

And he's married to The Waitress!

I would suggest that Two and half men currently has run for longer than IAS, it ran from 22/09/2003 - 19/02/15 (12 seasons/262 episodes) against 04/08/2005 - 09/03/2016 (11 seasons/124 episodes)

That article suggested it had been renewed for further seasons, which will see it break the record, but it hasn't yet.

Only one has big boobs, but they are *very* big.

Mac and Sweet Dee are married too.

Speaking of Always Sunny: https://youtu.be/aCVUsvLOUCk (huge GoT spoilers)

Also Basil Fawlty and Polly Sherman (at the time).