TV Gods: Show We Don't Watch -- Comedy A-M

Shows We Don't Watch (and Why)

Comedy

30 Rock

Apollo: This isn’t my kind of humor. It seems very intelligently written, and I have no problem with it winning lots of rewards and having tons of fans. Just don’t ask me to watch it. I'm also somewhat bitter that it was at least tangentially responsible for “that other behind-the-scenes-of-a-sketch-comedy-show” show Studio 60, which I really loved, being cancelled.

American Dad

Dionysos: American Dad started off as Family Guy II, with no real difference between the shows. That was fine with me, because funny is funny. However, it irritated Zeus to no end, and he wouldn't let me watch it for a while. Thankfully, Stan Smith and his family have established themselves as distinct from the Griffins. And, dare we say, became a better show than Family Guy. Maybe it’s because Dad hasn’t been on as long, so it hasn’t gotten as tired, maybe it’s because the characters are more likeable (sure, Stan may be a paranoid parody-Conservative jackass, but he’s also a stand-up guy), maybe it’s because the storylines tend to have a little more direction (because Stan’s CIA job creates plots), hard to say. But though Zeus still won't let me watch either show every week, but when he lets me, I choose American Dad over Family Guy nine times out of ten.

Aqua Teen Hunger Force

Apollo: Proof positive that Mortals are different from Gods, because we just don’t get this show. In fact, this is true of virtually all of Adult Swim’s bizarre cartoons (though The Venture Bros., slightly more normal, is one of our favorite shows ever). Avoid ATHF if you want your comedy to make sense.

Dionysos: I give ATHF a full thumbs up!



Apollo: I rest my case.

Boston Legal

Zeus: I find it amazing that aging mortal William Shatner still has a career -- and the staff of Boston Legal know it, as he’s cast as the aging lawyer who used to be great, and everyone is surprised he’s still alive. James Spader and Shatner play off each other very well, and the rest of the cast is funny if unremarkable. The show itself is “dramedy,” with the same mix of straight law drama and slightly surreal comedy that made David E. Kelley’s previous show Ally McBeal famous. Boston Legal isn’t as good as McBeal was in its heyday, but Spader and Shatner are far less irritating than Calista Flockhart.

Breaking Bad

Hermes: We’ve heard good things about Bad, but we’re a little gun-shy about drug comedies since Weeds inspired Dionysos (and Pan) to go on a six-month bender.

Corner Gas

Dionysos: It's boring. I hate it. I won't allow it in my house.




Apollo: Dionysos can be a little irrational. Let me fill you in. This is the Canadian sitcom—in fact, we’ve heard that creator Brent Butt (we know) ups the “Canadian-ness” as much as possible to keep it distinct from its American colleagues (and keep the Canadian government’s Canadian Programming funding). Corner Gas is very mellow, quirky but not to a degree that might alienate anyone, and completely inoffensive. It is pretty clever, the cast is very funny, and we’re fans of the fact that it’s single-camera without a laugh track, but the Gas gang isn’t going to push any boundaries.

Curb Your Enthusiasm

Apollo: Modern audiences have become enamored of a phenomenon I call “squirm humor,” wherein the characters find themselves in embarrassing situations from which they cannot escape. Squirm humor is, according to me, the originator of drama, not actually funny, just -- well, squirmy. Larry David’s Curb is a proponent of squirm humor, but it also pushes all kinds of boundaries. If you like The Office, Seinfeld, and such, you should enjoy Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Dionysos: I, on the other hand, love squirm humor, and hate Curb -- it’s too pretentious.

Entourage

Apollo: This is another really smart show that is completely the wrong sense of humor for me. I have nothing intelligent to say about it.

Family Guy

Dionysos: We (by which I mean mostly me) have always hated the characters on Family Guy. We (by which I mean everyone who’s not Hades) have never been able to really enjoy a show where we hate the main character. Peter Griffin has no redeeming qualities whatsoever: he’s an idiotic, prejudiced, blowhard, and a jerk in every way that Homer Simpson isn’t. And then Lois and Meg are dull, Chris has one joke and a really annoying voice, Brian is only funny interacting with Stewie, and Stewie is underutilized (plus having devolved from an evil genius to the gay stereotype other gay stereotypes point at and say “at least we’re not that bad”). Hermes, Apollo, and I used to watch the show because it broke all the rules, took risks no one else would, and the quality of the jokes pushed beyond the piss-poor characterization. Now, the rule-breaking has apparently been codified into a new set of rules: Every three minutes, random flashback apropos of nothing; ensure nobody learns any lessons, ever; and whenever the show is running short, fill it with REALLY overly long jokes (anyone remember about a minute of Peter hurting his knee? Yeah, they do that all the time now). We say tip your hat to the show Family Guy used to be, and go watch The Venture Bros.

Flight of the Conchords

Dionysos: Get on some mild-altering substance before you watch Conchords, and you will love it.

Frisky Dingo

Dionysos: This show may or may not still exist -- it’s “on hiatus” from Adult Swim. A standard blink-and-you’ll-miss-it 15-minute Adult Swim cartoon, Dingo has a style that gives surreal a bad name. Poorly animated (on purpose, as is standard procedure for most Adult Swim shows), Dingo follows the super-villain Killface, who’s bad at his job, and his nemesis Xander Crews/Awesome-X, who’s even worse. However, there are very little actual super-heroics going on, as many episodes go on truly bizarre tangents, such as Killface and Xander working in a sweatshop making Awesome-X action figures. A little more sensible than most Adult Swim fare, but it’s an acquired taste at best. I vote for watching it, but Apollo hates it with the passion of a thousand suns.

King of the Hill

Athena: I have always said that the only reason King of the Hill was animated was because creator Mike Judge was used to animation after Beavis and Butt-Head. In the same way as Malcolm in the Middle was a cartoon that happens to be live-action, Hill is a a live-action show that happens to be a cartoon. Nothing occurs that couldn’t happen on an ordinary show, and it’s actually a remarkably ordinary world compared to a number of live sitcoms. But I digress. Hill has been an underappreciated workhorse of the sitcom world for thirteen seasons. It is a bit mundane for our own tastes, but undeniably smart and enjoyable. Unfortunately, the much flashier Simpsons and Family Guy have outshone it, and 2008-2009 will be Hill’s last season. Shed a tear and wait breathlessly for what Mike Judge will make next.

Little Mosque on the Prairie

Hermes: A Canadian sitcom focusing on an Islamic community in Saskatchewan. Religious persecution is a little beyond our ken, so we stay away.

Metalocalypse

Hephaestos: You would think I would like heavy metal. I don’t.

Monk

Zeus: A mortal crime show I can actually stand due to its fascinating lead character, Monk has been doing the same thing for eight years now. Admittedly, it’s very good at this thing: Monk runs across the hackneyed mystery of the week. He provides both tremendous humor and even greater pathos as the pathetic OCD-ridden shell of a man who is Adrian Monk. I try to ignore the stupid mystery which is not the reason I watch this show, and I am sorely tempted to fast-forward through the summation to the funny and heartwarming/breaking end to the emotional subplot which is why I watch the show. The problem is that Monk never tries anything new. A recent episode featured Monk regressing to a happier time, providing much laughter as he acted about five years old. Then he “recovered,” and all I could think at the end of the episode was “Oh, great. He gets to go back to his miserable life? LOOK AT HOW SAD HE IS!!!!!! I WILL SMITE YOU, HACK WRITERS!!!!!!”

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