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100 Best Sitcoms of All Time According to Rolling Stone

Started by Ignatius_S, May 06, 2021, 09:41:04 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

Gurke and Hare

I'll start.

At number 62, The Thick of It.

QuoteIannucci would export his take-no-prisoners attack on power brokers to the U.S. with Veep, but he'd already perfected the format back home.

At number 44, Veep.

Mobius


zomgmouse

Typical mainstream media, doesn't look good for Corbyn

Video Game Fan 2000

#4
No Hancock. Shocks me how little recognition Hancock gets in the USA considering how much of a forerunner of things like Seinfeld and Larry Sanders it is. I've always suspected Larry David to be a fan, but he's never mentioned it ever as far as I can tell. I can't be the only person who still laughs at Hancock's Half Hour and marvels at how contemporary such an artifact can feel, and how great the persona is - all the "ambitious comedian who considers himself an artist playing sadsack version of himself who considers himself an artiste" content on the list and no Hancock? Really? Becoming more like Hancock as they get better is the sitcom world's version of Carcinisation. Make a playlist of a good episode each of Seinfeld, Sanders, Hancock, Curb, and Hancock wouldn't really stand out other than no swearing and being in black and white.

Low placing for Phil Silvers. And inclusion of spoof shows like Police Squad also a bit egregious. With them and cartoons why not just put Twin Peaks at number one?

Quote from: Mobius on May 06, 2021, 11:51:14 PM
Larry Sanders should be number one

Probably. Though if the Simpsons ended at season ten it would be a different story.

phes


Echo Valley 2-6809

Quote from: Video Game Fan 2000 on May 07, 2021, 12:15:55 AM
No Hancock. Shocks me how little recognition Hancock gets in the USA considering how much of a forerunner of things like Seinfeld and Larry Sanders it is. I've always suspected Larry David to be a fan, but he's never mentioned it ever as far as I can tell. I can't be the only person who still laughs at Hancock's Half Hour and marvels at how contemporary such an artifact can feel, and how great the persona is - all the "ambitious comedian who considers himself an artist playing sadsack version of himself who considers himself an artiste" content on the list and no Hancock? Really? Becoming more like Hancock as they get better is the sitcom world's version of Carcinisation. Make a playlist of a good episode each of Seinfeld, Sanders, Hancock, Curb, and Hancock wouldn't really stand out other than no swearing and being in black and white.

Agreed that Hancock is genius. It would be nice if LD was a fan, but I've no idea if he's an aficionado of British comedy in any way, apart from his acknowledging Gervais by agreeing to meet him for a show and put him in a Curb episode. (I know his favourite sitcom is The Phil Silvers Show - and Bilko, unlike Hancock, was ultimately a winner.) As far as I know Larry David has never visited Britain to promote his shows.

Anyway, Fleabag's the highest-ranked UK sitcom in that list, which is way off. Surprised to see Partridge quite high, and 'This Time...' described as "hilarious".

They're just looking for attention by not ranking Seinfeld as #1.

Jockice


Glebe

Quote from: phes on May 07, 2021, 12:36:32 AMNo Porridge in top 100 sitcoms of all time. S4C

Being Rolling Stone it was naturally going to be a US-centric list... scanning through it, several UK shows do get their due, but yeah, no Porridge is a bit shit, although I imagine it didn't get a whole lot of screenings in the states.

EOLAN

Quote from: Jockice on May 07, 2021, 06:55:03 AM
Derry Girls in there but not The Inbetweeners.

For the British shows; I think a lot of it comes down to what was on Netflix or got a big push from streaming services over in USA. Quite surprised Fawlty Towers was so high up; even though it should be way way higher of course.

Jumblegraws

Quote from: Jockice on May 07, 2021, 06:55:03 AM
Derry Girls in there but not The Inbetweeners.
Good.

I'm impressed they had a fair few sitcoms primarily aimed at kids in there. Good on them for recognising quality writing regardless of target demographic.

Surprised The Addams Family didn't make an appearance. Is it less well-regarded by critics than I thought?

up_the_hampipe

The rankings never really matter in these things, I'd like to know how much thought actually goes into them. It's more just a list of 100 sitcoms that people enjoyed in no particular order, aside from maybe the top 10.

Quote from: Pearly-Dewdrops Drops on May 07, 2021, 03:18:36 AM
They're just looking for attention by not ranking Seinfeld as #1.

I don't think many would argue with that #1, even if it's been shit for 20 years and many people don't often think of it as a "sitcom".

dissolute ocelot

I Love Lucy (#4) is shit. It's hard to compare something that may have been amusing in the 50s with what's funny now, but still. I've never seen All In The Family (#5) and I don't know if many people aged below about 50 have. Hard to know how many points "historical importance" buys you.

Also, I was going to object that Cheers was only a really great sitcom for a small number of years out of its run, but the same is true of The Simpsons.

studpuppet


Jumblegraws

Quote from: dissolute ocelot on May 07, 2021, 11:16:55 AM
Also, I was going to object that Cheers was only a really great sitcom for a small number of years out of its run, but the same is true of The Simpsons.
I thought conventional wisdom was that Cheers was a great sitcom from start to finish?

Brundle-Fly

Is there anything in that list that isn't either American or British?


JamesTC

The Munsters isn't even on there.

List of shitcoms for cunts.

It says the US Office is better than the UK one. If you just read those things to get annoyed, I've saved you five minutes. As someone else said, Veep is higher than the Thick of It. I noticed "Sanford and Son", but didn't spot Steptoe on the list (only skimmed it). To be fair, I've never seen Sanford and Son, maybe it's really good.

I do like the US Office and Veep and they should both be on the list though.

Jumblegraws

Quote from: Brundle-Fly on May 07, 2021, 12:12:36 PM
Is there anything in that list that isn't either American or British?
First thing on the list (Schitt's Creek) is Canadian. Bluey is #96, it's Australian. They're pretty upfront in the intro that they only considered English language sitcoms and that they had a massive bias towards American shows.

Nowhere Man

You know what, I think the inclusion of British shows into such an Americanised list just makes the whole thing far more jarring than if it just stuck to all American things. Plus it's made clear that even a top quality British show like Peep Show would still rank lower than a middling cookie cutter sitcom on account of it all being a big popularity jizzing contest. Not to mention dobbing stuff like Spongebob in there is even more daft (and I love Spongebob).

But this list isn't really meant for non-Yanks is it?




Echo Valley 2-6809

Quote from: Jumblegraws on May 07, 2021, 12:44:35 PM
Bluey is #96, it's Australian.

Had to double-check Bargearse hadn't been turned into a sitcom then.


If I were American born and bred I probably would find my regional reboot of a Britcom more relatable and funny than the original. Certainly with Veep/Thick of It, which relies quite heavily on the audience knowing the real-life political gaffes it's lampooning. I'm sure a lot of Veep goes over my head.

Video Game Fan 2000

#24
Sanford and Son is good, is it not on there? It's not Steptoe but pretty historic stuff. Probably never got as bad as some of the 1970s Steptoe either.

I'd say the difference between Veep and Thick is that in Veep it helps if you know specific scandals and news items, but Thick you don't - but Thick depends more on knowing general personality types of significant political figures, their reputations and their regional/class backgrounds, other than specific things like the outcomes of elections. Whereas in America, the great melting pot, you're not supposed to draw attention to that kind of thing unless you're making a point or someone has a particularly funny accent or is from one of the sassy demographics (now with added neurodiversity)

Quote from: dissolute ocelot on May 07, 2021, 11:16:55 AM
I Love Lucy (#4) is shit.

I kind of get why this is peoples choice for "old thing thats still good", but what confounds me is how its been re-positioned over the years as some sort of early #representationwin. I get that Lucille Ball herself was a pretty bold and fearless person but its weird how I Love Lucy has gone from being shorthand for a certain kind of 1950s american sexism to an example of pop culture innovation.

Famous Mortimer

Quote from: Echo Valley 2-6809 on May 07, 2021, 01:10:43 PM
Had to double-check Bargearse hadn't been turned into a sitcom then.


No Bargearse in the top ten, no interest from me (although I did just discover that Lucky Grills once turned up on an episode of "The Late Show", in character, to complain about his treatment, so this mention has not been entirely wasted).

Video Game Fan 2000

The weird thing about Veep to me is how front and center In The Loop made the wrongness of the fact that American politics seems to be either impossibly brilliant and talented people under 30 or 65 year old oil-crazed military liches. Like the most immediately fucked up thing about watching American news is the contradiction between their fucking gerontocracy going on the same time as the Kidz Bop version of Blair labour party going hell for leather against the MiniPops version of the Monday Club. I thought Anna Chlumsky was good in particular at being part of that world while still seeming like an actual person not just a UK tv caricature of an american careerist blonde.

Whereas in Veep its just treated as normal. The weirdest part is just thrown out of the window to focus on scandals and farce. Young attractive talented people and smart old powerbrokers holding the reigns, thats just how it is. Thick showed the UK political system as irredeemably fucked by reliance on unelected executives and networking, in Veep the system is normal and good just the people are a bit wacky and things get crazy from time to time.  Its expected you'd have to pull your punches in satirising the America state but, as someone who enjoyed Veep, its amazing how toothless it is as a satire. It might as well be a second spin off from the Office.

beanheadmcginty

Considering how broadly they've defined sitcom, they really ought to have The Sopranos on there.

Gulftastic

Quote from: Jumblegraws on May 07, 2021, 11:54:11 AM
I thought conventional wisdom was that Cheers was a great sitcom from start to finish?

As a massive fan of the show, watching it from the day it first aired in the UK, I can say it was a great sitcom for the Diane years, a good sitcom for pretty much the first half of the Rebecca years, then just an OK one for the rest, but I was so invested by then I still loved it.

Quote from: up_the_hampipe on May 07, 2021, 10:26:32 AM
I don't think many would argue with that #1, even if it's been shit for 20 years and many people don't often think of it as a "sitcom".

Seinfeld is several orders of magnitude better than even peak Simpsons.