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US Sitcoms That Don't Deserve Their Own Threads

Started by Small Man Big Horse, March 20, 2017, 05:28:20 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

Johnny Caramel

Parks and Recreations or whatever it was. What a load of bollocks

Edit:

Seinfeld. Total balls.

Friends. Are you off your chump?


There's probably hundreds that I haven't seen.

JimFromTheMoon

Quote from: Sydward Lartle on April 07, 2017, 06:10:02 PM
I'm always the first to admit that I don't really get American television comedy. I'm sure it's well written, snappy, slick, tightly performed and beautifully observed, but I don't think I've seen an episode of anything from across the pond that has raised more than an indulgent titter. Back in the nineties I used to watch Channel Four's perenially underperforming US import Empty Nest (a spinoff from the Golden Girls, I believe) because I fancied Dinah Manoff and Kristy McNichol. Don't think I ever laughed at it, though.

I moved out to Hollywood a few years ago and all I see is billboards and bus adverts for more and more shitty comedy.  America is one of those places that just either doesn't get it at all, or hits it out of the park when it comes to comedy.  Definitely not typical sitcoms, but Arrested Development and It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia are the real stand-out gems of the last decade or so.  They're both very intricate and surreal and cartoony, plus they influenced a lot of shows since.  We don't really have any Partridge-like characters we can continually mine for gold, so you just gotta wait for something cool to pop up. 

Ant Farm Keyboard

Trial & Error doesn't deserve its own thread here, but it got a second season (10 episodes) anyway.

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Ant Farm Keyboard on May 20, 2017, 11:18:31 PM
Trial & Error doesn't deserve its own thread here, but it got a second season (10 episodes) anyway.

I was pleased to see that and next season I will definitely give it it's own thread. Apparently all of the cast are returning apart from Lithgow, so it'll be interesting to see which big name NBC will get to replace him.

Downward Dog began this week, and I quite enjoyed it despite it being very flawed. It stars Fargo's Allison Tolman and is all about her relationship with her dog, who narrates the piece and they often do talking head cutaways to him. I know it sounds ridiculous and awful but I found it bizarrely funny, though I do have a secret love for talking animal shows and the dog in question, Martin, is overly neurotic and possessive in a pleasingly weird way. Plus Maria Bamford provides the voice of the dog's nemesis, a local cat, so I'll be watching for her alone. I can completely understand why some might hate this though, it's definitely an odd show and given it's already weak viewing figures I'd be surprised if it gets a second season.

New Jack

Great News is getting good enough for me to assume it'll be cancelled

Bad Ambassador


New Jack


yesitsme

Quote from: Penfold on April 07, 2017, 09:11:45 PM
I gave up on Modern Family.

Me too, for a while it was excellent, good dialogue, good characters, good situations but now it's just woeful.  Every time I catch it seems it's Halloween, the vicar's coming for tea and no body has any trousers!

I heard Eric Stonestreet talking on a podcast about how they don't know if they're getting another series or not.  I hope they find out soon.

Tell you what show has kept up it's end of the bargain?  The Middle.  It can delve in to late Roseanne mawkishness every now and again but it's generally pretty good with some good lines throughout.  It's a modern day ALF. 

And that's good.

Bad Ambassador

Quote from: yesitsme on May 31, 2017, 09:23:51 AM
I heard Eric Stonestreet talking on a podcast about how they don't know if they're getting another series or not.  I hope they find out soon.

Renewed through to the end of its 10th season in 2019.

yesitsme

Quote from: Bad Ambassador on May 31, 2017, 10:37:41 AM
Renewed through to the end of its 10th season in 2019.

Christ.  Lilly will be 42 by then. 

She'll still be living at home though.

And Claire will be doing something.

And Al Bundy will be dead.

Ant Farm Keyboard

The season 2 of Trial & Error has started. Kristen Chenoweth is the prime suspect. There are a few additions to the cast but neither John Lithgow nor Krista Rodriguez are returning. Which also means more screen time for Jayma Mays, something I won't complain about, as her performance was the highlight of the first season.
So far, it's quite in line with the tone of the first case, with a lot of double entendres, at least one great visual gag about another Annie condition, and a lot of bleeped curse words.

And now, it's time to go here, for the dedicated topic:

https://www.cookdandbombd.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,68150.0.html

Ant Farm Keyboard

I've watched the first two episodes from the third season of Those Who Can't, aka the teachers show with dudes. Season 2, where they had started to find a fine groove, was indeed a long time ago, as the finale aired in December 2016, one month before the show was renewed.

It may not be a surprise if this third season had been buried by the network, as it's being released that late, and on Monday nights. There was very little fanfare for the premiere, which was at least pleasant, in line with previous seasons, also introducing Jerry Minor as the new guidance counsellor and a Frank Grimes figure who has zero tolerance for the gang. However, the second episode, about bullying, is a clunker, despite being written by the new showrunner, Andrew Weinberg (The Late Show with Conan O'Brien, Eagleheart, also an executive producer on season 2 of Future Man). The jokes are tired and predictable by a thousand miles (Abbey takes the head of an anti-bullying committee and becomes, can you guess it?, a bully herself, etc.). Dimwitted coach Fairfax was the best thing in both episodes.
Maria Thayer is now the first name in the credits thanks to a technicality. She was previously the fourth name, and the only lead who didn't appear in the title sequence (that takes place in a men bathroom). So, rather than remaking the titles from scratch, she gets her dedicated shot during a quick montage at the beginning, allowing the rest of the titles to occur like before.

During the long gap between these seasons, show creator Adam Clayton-Holland (Loren) published a memoir. The original pilot shot for Amazon was actually greenlit in the middle of a moment of tragedy for Clayton-Holland, as his younger sister, who was very close to him, committed suicide days before, and he struggled with the aftermath of her loss for years. There was never a glimpse of that in the episodes he wrote or in his performance.

Clownbaby

I keep trying to like Brooklyn Nine Nine more and I do for a while, then I get sick of Andy Samberg again.

I finally caught the Family Guy Simpsons cross over the other night and my god that was shit. I mean I wasn't expecting anything anyway given the current state of both shows (I think Family Guy is actually in much better shape than Simpsons because it has always been crass anyway so the quality drop isn't so steep) but it was such a crap lazy job they did of it KNOWINGLY because they did the whole "acknowledge through a sarcastic long winded joke at the beginning of the episode that you, the writers, know that your idea is shit and a cop out but because you're self-aware and pointed it out that gives you a green card to be as lazy as possible because you've already lampshaded it so that actually means when you're being lazy you're actually being CLEVER and making a comment on how crap it is when long running shows try to do a cross over" thing.

I could buy Peter and Homer hanging out for a while and kind of enjoying eachother's company for a bit because they're fairly alike, and the whole thing of Lisa trying to build up Meg's confidence was very in character, especially when she got jealous of Meg's inexplicable saxophone skills cause Lisa is a very jealous girl whenever someone is on her level at anything, but Stewie being obsessed with Bart didn't work and Lois and Marge didn't have any beef at all which surely they would. I kind of would have liked to see Stewie trying to get Maggie's measure after spotting her doing something non-baby-like and realising she might be a sneaky one like him, and Lois and Marge probably would get on at first until Lois says something very off colour about her own sex life or past but no let's do a 15 minute long Peter-Chicken action fight to fill up an ending but with Peter and Homer instead because we can't think of anything

Sebastian Cobb


Moribunderast

Only two episodes have aired but I'm quite enjoying The Other Two, starring Drew Tarver and Helene York as siblings whose personal failures are amplified by the sudden viral success of their teenage brother. It reminds me of Difficult People, though the tone is nowhere near as cutting. It's great that they avoided the obvious trope of the successful teen being obnoxious - it's much funnier and fresher that he's just super-nice and positive. Ken Marino is stealing the show thus far as the kid's manager.

Worth a look, says I.

Ant Farm Keyboard

Russian Doll, that's just been released on Netflix, is quite great so far (eight half-hour episodes, I'm at the middle). It's Natasha Lyonne trapped in her own Groundhog Day (or Happy Death Day if you're a Millennial), so it's not laugh out comedy, but it takes more resonance (the sinister party she's always brought back to) when you're aware of her past history of addiction.

Mister Six

Quote from: Utter Shit on March 21, 2017, 03:49:36 PM
I'm not sure whether it got a thread on here, but The Good Place was great.

Fun little sitcom by Michael Schur (wrote for Parks & Rec and The Office, occasionally appeared in the latter as Mose) and starring Kristen Bell as a selfish and ignorant woman who dies and is sent to an ultra-exclusive 'heaven' intended for only the good people in society by mistake, the story centering around her attempts to become a good person.
Very glossy and silly, with a great turn from Ted Danson as the well-meaning, bumbling leader of The Good Place.

Was?! It's still going strong! And aye, it's got its own thread.

rasta-spouse


I enjoyed Detroiters S1.

But...S2, aside from the odd super-gag, seemed a bit off. They moved it away from the office and opened it up a bit to other locations...tried to include a family angle perhaps, and it lost something.

Small Man Big Horse

Quote from: Clownbaby on January 25, 2019, 12:06:38 PM
I keep trying to like Brooklyn Nine Nine more and I do for a while, then I get sick of Andy Samberg again.

I really like Brooklyn Nine Nine, and Samberg too, I quit Cuckoo after one episode as he irritated me so much but I'm very fond of him in B99, and in Popstar Never Stop Popping. I'm glad NBC saved B99 from cancellation as well as the episodes have been a lot of fun so far, all bar last week's at least where Chelsea Peretti got her send off. Gina's a character who works well in small doses but by having her in pretty much every scene, and the show trying to convince us how amazing she is, I really struggled with it and if anything it made me glad she's gone now.

Quote from: Moribunderast on February 03, 2019, 10:09:02 AM
Only two episodes have aired but I'm quite enjoying The Other Two, starring Drew Tarver and Helene York as siblings whose personal failures are amplified by the sudden viral success of their teenage brother. It reminds me of Difficult People, though the tone is nowhere near as cutting. It's great that they avoided the obvious trope of the successful teen being obnoxious - it's much funnier and fresher that he's just super-nice and positive. Ken Marino is stealing the show thus far as the kid's manager.

Worth a look, says I.

I've only seen the first episode so far but enjoyed it a fair bit, the characters are certainly appealing and though I'd like it to be a bit more cutting (being a big fan of Difficult People and missing it greatly) I definitely plan to stick with it.

Quote from: Ant Farm Keyboard on February 03, 2019, 05:23:28 PM
Russian Doll, that's just been released on Netflix, is quite great so far (eight half-hour episodes, I'm at the middle). It's Natasha Lyonne trapped in her own Groundhog Day (or Happy Death Day if you're a Millennial), so it's not laugh out comedy, but it takes more resonance (the sinister party she's always brought back to) when you're aware of her past history of addiction.

That's got it's own thread in picture box, though I'm not sure why it's there and not here, but either way I'm enjoying it a lot.

Quote from: Mister Six on February 04, 2019, 05:50:14 AM
Was?! It's still going strong! And aye, it's got its own thread.

That's from 2017, a bleak time when The Good Place wasn't as loved as it is now.

Ant Farm Keyboard

Brooklyn Nine-Nine, for the moment, is still quite impressive, even if they're getting very inconsistent with Rosa on most episodes.

As I had mentioned, I've watched the whole run of Those who Can't, season 3. All episode carry a copyright date of 2017, which means that broadcast was delayed by at least a year. It was also obvious that they had episodes supposed to be season specials and were released out of date, but the most telling clue was that they got T.J. Miller back on one episode, where the rest of the cast had to hit him at some point, but it was a short sequence. They didn't take advantage of how exhilarating it is to get him punched in the face for a while.
It was weaker overall than season 2, but there were a few good ones in the pile, like the one with the other high school where they have mirror universe versions of each of the leads. The one for Billy Shoemaker (Ben Roy, the tattooed ex punk who teaches history) was a particularly inspired choice. The one in the woods or the one where Loren becomes the new librarian and gets the same treatment as Abbey were fine too. Andy Fairbell, the dimwitted gym teacher remained an highlight during all the episodes, it was a good idea to introduce another voice of reason at Smoot's with the guidance counselor (Jerry Minor) who tried to get the gang fired, and Patton Oswalt made a welcome return, but it was in the final stretches of the season.
Anyway, it doesn't matter, as the show was cancelled two weeks ago.

Also on TBS, there's the second season of The Last O.G. (season 1 had a few episodes directed by John Lee, and the show is co-produced by Jordan Peele). It's very noticeable that they have decided to spend more time with Tiffany Haddish, probably as she's much more famous now than at the time she was signed for the pilot, and more famous now than Tracy Jordan. As a result, the plots involving Tray get a little shortened and amount sometimes to little much than a social message in a voiceover. And, as her character was supposed to be the voice of reason, the writers don't always know how to tap into the fountain of crazy and energy she has.

Small Man Big Horse

I'm enjoying Brooklyn Nine Nine a lot still too, and am glad it hasn't suffered in the light of Chelsea Peretti leaving / the move to NBC.

Despite liking Those Who Can't a fair bit I've not yet seen any of season 3, though the summer tv period is almost among us so I hope to catch up soon.

And I only watched the first episode of The Last O.G., is it worth revisiting?