On Sitcoms

They sure don't make 'em like they used to. But really, were sitcoms ever that great? There's Seinfeld, which is probably the greatest show of all time (I bet if you asked every TV watcher what the best show of all time is, Seinfeld would get a plurality--not a majority, mind you--a plurality). But beyond that, what did we have? Frasier? Mad About You? I never watched these, but that's probably because they were no good. Friends was pretty good. I'm not afraid to say that. It inserted stupid drama (which by the end had gotten Dawson's Creek-esque), but there were some funny characters and jokes in that show.
But if you look at the sitcoms we have now, they are just not that funny. When I think of today's sitcoms, I think of 3 CBS comedies: Two and a Half Men, Big Bang Theory, and How I Met Your Mother. I actually watch the latter two sometimes, and they are mildly entertaining (HIMYM moreso that BBT). But what I've noticed is this: they all seem to follow the simple format of: set up joke, deliver punchline, cue studio audience to laugh, move on to next joke. That's all it is. One character says something, another delivers a line that could be somewhat funny. The jokes are not connected to each other or even the storyline (I just realized Im also describing Family Guy. But that's animation. And in Family Guy, the characters themselves are funny. Not so for the most part in these shows I'm talking about) . In a show like Seinfeld, the jokes themselves have their very own arching plotlines, weaving in and out of the storylines of other characters. Plus they've also got the one-liners, which are also much better executed, and the characters themselves are funny. Friends had these qualities, too, which it does not get that much credit for. In How I Met Your Mother, what character besides Neil Patrick Harris has a funny personality? In Big Bang Theory, they are nerds. Nerds can be funny, but these guys are uber-nerds to the point that it is ridiculous and unrelatable. Two and a Half Men is stupid and just pisses me off. Compare any of these characters to Jerry, George, and Kramer...well, there is no comparison. They are funny pretty much whatever they do or say. Like this exchange:
Jerry: I don't have to be funny, I don't care.
George: You don't?
Jerry: No way! It's completely under my control.
Elaine: No, it's not. You cannot not be funny.
Jerry: Of course I can, am I being funny now?
Elaine (smiling): A little.
Jerry (getting upset): Oh, this is funny? I'm being funny?
Elaine (now laughing): Yeah.
Jerry: George, is this funny?
George: It's funny!

See? It's funny. I think we can blame Ray Romano for this downward trend in funniness. From what I have seen, Everybody Loves Raymond may have led the transition to this new, simple and lame format. Boy was that a lame show. They probably had the lowest joke batting average of anyone. But people watched. So that opened the door for these newer CBS shows.
Maybe I'm thinking about this too narrowly though. While I can't imagine Fox has anything that deviates from this setup-punchline-setup-punchline (see The War at Home), if we go over to NBC, we find 30 Rock, which is good. And if we expand our horizons futher, we get to It's Always Sunny in Philidelphia. There are plenty of people who would put at least one of these shows very high up on the list of funniest tv comedies. While I wouldn't go too far, I will say that these are definitely funny, quality programs. And then there's Curb Your Enthusiam, a modern-day, more vulgar Seinfeld, so of course it's great. Curb is great in that it's got that "The Pledge - The Turn - The Prestige" quality to its jokes that Seinfeld has (if you don't know what I mean, watch The Prestige--great movie). And Friends, 30 Rock, and It's Always Sunny have/had this too, but not to the extent Curb and Seinfeld do.
So when I said at the beginning, "they don't make 'em like they used too", I think I was off. Because I've named 3 funny shows from the present day, and only 2 from the '90s, which is supposed to be the heyday of sitcoms, right? Plus if Arrested Development is a sitcom, that's another funny one (world's biggest understatement) from the present era. Am I missing any from the old days?
Maybe the Situational Comedy is just not that great of a genre. If you think about all the sitcoms that have ever been made, not that many of them are funny. It's like Grunge music. Other than Nirvana and Pearl Jam, what grunge bands were good? Sound Garden? Stone Temple Pilots? No. They sucked. Plus Grunge paved they way for these modern grunge bands like Creed and Puddle of Mudd, who are really totally aweful. On top of all that, I've always thought that Nirvana was overrated. They were the best band in a genre that turned out to be not that great. Kurt Cobain putting that shot gun in his mouth was the best thing that ever happened to Nirvana, and really grunge music in general.