Do all sitcoms suck or is it just me?

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A current show I like is Louie.

As for past ones, "Peep Show" is a great one,
"The Larry Sanders Show"
"Chappelle Show"
"Seinfeld"
Always Sunny in Philadelphia (the middle seasons)
Roseanne



Care for some gopher?
Modern Family for the win! (No fecal humor, no laugh track!)



Never liked sitcoms, pretty much hate them. Somehow though, I can find myself watching King of Queens from time to time. Appearently there is just something about that which I enjoy.

Overall though, I'm not a fan of sitcoms.



Modern Family for the win! (No fecal humor, no laugh track!)
Laugh tracks haven't been used since the 50s or perhaps 60s.

I'm watching Mary Tyler Moore season 3 shot in 1972. On the DVD extras the director did a commentary talking about the live stage where they shot the show. The laughter is real, not out of a machine. It's been decades since the term Laugh Track applied.



Never liked sitcoms, pretty much hate them. Somehow though, I can find myself watching King of Queens from time to time. Appearently there is just something about that which I enjoy.

Overall though, I'm not a fan of sitcoms.
You dont' like sitcoms but enjoy King Of Queens? Yep, I can see that. It's terrible and not at all funny.
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You dont' like sitcoms but enjoy King Of Queens? Yep, I can see that. It's terrible and not at all funny.
It's one of the few that doesn't totally suck actually :P



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I would've thought The King of Queens fit all three of the reasons 90sAce didn't like sitcoms in general, but I guess I can't make that call for sure considering how little of the show I've actually watched.
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on the flip side I've laughed more at scenes in films like Pulp Fiction or the Wolf of Wall Street, which aren't even in the comedy genre.
Actually, both of those films are comedies. They're just dark comedies.

And I like sitcoms if they're done well. Tell me that Cheers wasn't amazing, or M.A.S.H., or Taxi...
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I would've thought The King of Queens fit all three of the reasons 90sAce didn't like sitcoms in general, but I guess I can't make that call for sure considering how little of the show I've actually watched.
Haven't watched a lot of it - the few episodes I've seen were funnier than the majority of the other sitcoms I've seen - as in I actually laughed a few times, which is more than I can usually say..

I mean just try watching "Big Bang theory" or "Friends" with no laugh track on Youtube, and you won't even know where the 'funny' is supposed to be. Don't understand the praise for "Modern Family" either - it's really more of a politically correct wet dream than a real comedy, and about as close to a 'modern family' IRL as Family Guy.

Seinfield's really the only one that managed to get the formula right. (I'm talking about live action sitcoms of course; there are other shows like South Park which are really good if you count that type of show as a "sitcom".)



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Haven't watched a lot of it - the few episodes I've seen were funnier than the majority of the other sitcoms I've seen - as in I actually laughed a few times, which is more than I can usually say..
Aside from the ones you've already mentioned in this post and others, what are some other sitcoms you've watched and formed opinions about?

I mean just try watching "Big Bang theory" or "Friends" with no laugh track on Youtube, and you won't even know where the 'funny' is supposed to be. Don't understand the praise for "Modern Family" either - it's really more of a politically correct wet dream than a real comedy, and about as close to a 'modern family' IRL as Family Guy.
Far be it from me to defend Big Bang Theory or Friends, but Modern Family is a solid enough show and just because it happens to feature a multiracial cast that includes gay characters doesn't automatically make it a "politically correct wet dream". Besides, just it's not even supposed to be a representation of the typical "modern family" so there's no need to treat it like one and compare it to Family Guy (it's not like they have a talking dog, after all).

Seinfield's really the only one that managed to get the formula right. (I'm talking about live action sitcoms of course; there are other shows like South Park which are really good if you count that type of show as a "sitcom".)
Yet Seinfeld still plays into all three of the criticisms you mentioned in the OP - its humour is built on laughing at the main cast because they are all horrible people in their own ways (as are many of the antagonists they encounter from episode to episode). Sure, you could argue that George is frequently the butt of the other characters' jokes and thus we are laughing with them, but the others are not completely blameless and episodes are just as likely to end with them getting some sort of comeuppance as opposed to a victory. George and Jerry are also variations on the "weak man who dates attractive woman" trope you mentioned, because both are severely flawed in that they are severely flawed human beings yet are perfectionists who frequently end up dating attractive women only to break up with them over the pettiest of reasons. If the fact that audiences had to be told not to cheer so loudly and for so long every time Kramer slid into Jerry's apartment is any indication, the laugh tracks on Seinfeld are real and they're spectacular. South Park, well, that can wait for another time.

It's interesting that you cite criteria for why you hate sitcoms in general and the only exceptions seem to feature the same criteria anyway so maybe the problem isn't with sitcoms in general.



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Aside from the ones you've already mentioned in this post and others, what are some other sitcoms you've watched and formed opinions about?
Various others, 2 And A Half Men, some older sitcoms like Married With Children, etc. As a rule the older ones tend to be better.

Far be it from me to defend Big Bang Theory or Friends, but Modern Family is a solid enough show and just because it happens to feature a multiracial cast that includes gay characters doesn't automatically make it a "politically correct wet dream". Besides, just it's not even supposed to be a representation of the typical "modern family" so there's no need to treat it like one and compare it to Family Guy (it's not like they have a talking dog, after all).
Fair enough.

Yet Seinfeld still plays into all three of the criticisms you mentioned in the OP - its humour is built on laughing at the main cast because they are all horrible people in their own ways (as are many of the antagonists they encounter from episode to episode). Sure, you could argue that George is frequently the butt of the other characters' jokes and thus we are laughing with them, but the others are not completely blameless and episodes are just as likely to end with them getting some sort of comeuppance as opposed to a victory. George and Jerry are also variations on the "weak man who dates attractive woman" trope you mentioned, because both are severely flawed in that they are severely flawed human beings yet are perfectionists who frequently end up dating attractive women only to break up with them over the pettiest of reasons. If the fact that audiences had to be told not to cheer so loudly and for so long every time Kramer slid into Jerry's apartment is any indication, the laugh tracks on Seinfeld are real and they're spectacular. South Park, well, that can wait for another time.

It's interesting that you cite criteria for why you hate sitcoms in general and the only exceptions seem to feature the same criteria anyway so maybe the problem isn't with sitcoms in general.
Seinfield did a good enough job with the humor that I can overlook some of the cliches like the "loser dating attractive women"; plus the characters were more original in their dysfunctions, rather than walking stereotypes

Like the Big Bang Theory, who's writers can't even get the 'geek chic' right for example - in one episode I saw a character was complaining about not being able to run Super Mario Bros on an emulator software - I'm not even a hardcore computer geek, and even I'd have no trouble running a game that old on an emulation program. Seinfield on the other hand had memorable characters who weren't just based on an extremely overdone stereotype.



Last sitcom a watched was lucky star (it's more of a sitcom than american animated series like south park and family guy) over a year ago though.

90's Ace maybe doesn't like American sitcoms, maybe you should try watching foreign language sitcoms.

How about Mexican ones like El Chavo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Chavo_del_Ocho)? In Brazil it is venerated as a religion:

It's more venerated among my friends than Seinfeld is venerated by Americans. It's perhaps not quite the most sophisticated type of humor though.

Is this a sitcom?

I like it better than any american sitcom I have watched with one exception. Yeah, my sense of humour is so sophisticated...

Those two make the comedy in American Dad and Family Guy look subtle.



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Various others, 2 And A Half Men, some older sitcoms like Married With Children, etc. As a rule the older ones tend to be better.
Agreed. There have been a few older ones that have been recommended elsewhere in the thread - Fawlty Towers in particular has stood the test of time really well.

Seinfield did a good enough job with the humor that I can overlook some of the cliches like the "loser dating attractive women"; plus the characters were more original in their dysfunctions, rather than walking stereotypes

Like the Big Bang Theory, who's writers can't even get the 'geek chic' right for example - in one episode I saw a character was complaining about not being able to run Super Mario Bros on an emulator software - I'm not even a hardcore computer geek, and even I'd have no trouble running a game that old on an emulation program. Seinfield on the other hand had memorable characters who weren't just based on an extremely overdone stereotype.
Yeah, Seinfeld did have enough interesting variations on the typical sitcom formula that made it a classic. I very occasionally watch an episode of The Big Bang Theory out of morbid curiosity and, though I'd be lying if I said the show hadn't gotten at least one chuckle out of me, I'd definitely agree that the show's humour is by and large very lacking. As if just expecting geek references in and of themselves to be automatically funny, it doesn't help how the show does get a little problematic in how it treats its characters, such as how Sheldon displays multiple signs of having some sort of personality disorder yet the show goes to the effort of proving he's not just to keep milking jokes out of having a socially inept geek who doesn't understand other people's feelings.



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Agreed. There have been a few older ones that have been recommended elsewhere in the thread - Fawlty Towers in particular has stood the test of time really well.



Yeah, Seinfeld did have enough interesting variations on the typical sitcom formula that made it a classic. I very occasionally watch an episode of The Big Bang Theory out of morbid curiosity and, though I'd be lying if I said the show hadn't gotten at least one chuckle out of me, I'd definitely agree that the show's humour is by and large very lacking. As if just expecting geek references in and of themselves to be automatically funny, it doesn't help how the show does get a little problematic in how it treats its characters, such as how Sheldon displays multiple signs of having some sort of personality disorder yet the show goes to the effort of proving he's not just to keep milking jokes out of having a socially inept geek who doesn't understand other people's feelings.
Right on that one - I'm definitely not on the PC end of the spectrum, but the show does portray him as mildly autistic IMO - so it verges on taking pot shots at a mental handicap.

Sure South Park does the same thing, but it's so over-the-top that it's not remotely believable - some dude like Sheldon though isn't extremely far off from an autistic person in real life however.



He is completely far off from an autistic person. Sheldon is Sheldon, he's a fictional character that apparently behaves in a way different from normal persons but also autistic persons as well.