Originally posted by The Awesome Berbaslug!!!
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Seinfeld is brilliant.
I never got into Curb your Enthusiasm (I haven't tried hard, mind), because the jokes seemed to be about how Larry is an asshole. That was never really the case with Seinfeld, I thought. Yes they were assholes, but it was a whole world of assholes, and they were assholeish about petty stuff, not big stuff. The jokes were relate-able because we all have those voices of selfishness and laziness in us.
I was never too into Roseanne, but when I did see it, it often had good bits. John Goodman and Laurie Metcalf are just so good.
Cheers had its moments. Lots of them, in fact. Especially one-liners.
But mostly it was just enjoyable to watch a bunch of losers turn themselves into a family. Like the bar on the show, it was just a comfortable place to visit on a Thursday night.
I "got it" a lot more years after it went off the air and I lived in Boston and worked and spent a lot of time in bars.
This was back in the day when we'd all watch TV together, either as a family or with friends or later in the dorms in college. And you had to watch it when it was on. I don't know if Cheers, for example would work as well "binging" or watching bits and pieces onlne.
I never really got into Frazier. The whole Niles-Daphne shit was really tedious.
Wayne's World, like Beavis & Butthead, is also brilliant. It's brilliant because it's dumb and simple. And because the characters are played by 40 year olds. Perhaps you have to have grown up in suburbia listening to shitty classic rock radio to get it. And it was the first thing to really show the comedy potential of Rob Lowe.
I still find myself quoting it a lot. Like when I was in Piccadilly Circus. "What a shitty circus." C'mon, that's gold.
Britons just don't seem to get "dumb humor." I bet you all don't like Animal House or Caddyshack either. And yet, as far as I know, we get most of your humor. So we win. (this might not be true. For example, I've never seen a Carry On film).
But, of course, making that kind of dumb humor work does seem to be a razor's edge, as Mike Myers found out. Each Austin Powers had some good bits, but each was worse than the one before. The jokes about shit and farts were just gross. It's a fine line. And then he made that "Guru" movie that, although I didn't see, is supposed to be awful. Even he says so. And he hasn't had regular work doing comedies since then.
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