On the last Thursday of November, NBC launched what it called “Comedy Night Done Right.” It rhymes and all, but I’d have preferred it if they called it “Must-See TV” again. Chances are if you lived through the ’90s, you’re familiar with “Must-See TV.” It was that two-hour block each Thursday that notably featured Friends at 8, Seinfeld at 9, and basically crap in between (remember Caroline in the City? Suddenly Susan? Veronica’s Closet? Boston Common? The Single Guy? The list goes on and on). It wasn’t that there weren’t any other good sitcoms on NBC at that time. It’s just that after the Thursday lineup proved so popular, NBC decided to try to have “Must-See TV” basically every night of the week. The result was shows that would’ve fit in well on Thursday nights, like NewsRadio, were kept away, and instead those cushy 8:30 and 9:30 slots were given to lousy shows that ultimately would fail once NBC removed them from those timeslots (and replaced them with still more dreck).
Aside from Tuesday nights (which featured Frasier in the 9 p.m. anchor slot), NBC’s idea to spread the Must-See wealth didn’t really work out. Some minor hits (like the aforementioned NewsRadio, as well as 3rd Rock from the Sun and Just Shoot Me) resulted, but for the most part the strategy kinda fizzled out in the ratings. The original Thursday-night lineup continued to do well through the start of the ’00s. But first Friends and then Will & Grace departed, and by the time W&G exited, CBS, with its one-two punch of Survivor and CSI, had really taken control of Thursdays from 8-10 (at least NBC still had ER). So, that was it for Must-See TV. Until this past November, anyway, when NBC put together a two-hour block consisting of My Name is Earl, The Office, Scrubs and 30 Rock. Finally, after years, and years, NBC had a comedy lineup worthy of the name “Must-See TV.” This was the best Thursday night sitcom lineup on NBC since the mid-80s, when NBC aired The Cosby Show, Family Ties, Cheers and Night Court all back-to-back for a few seasons. And while NBC may not call it “Must-See TV” (and while it may still get beaten by both CBS and ABC in the ratings each week), that doesn’t change the fact it is still two hours of great comedy.
The night kicks off with My Name is Earl, which is in its second season. I very much enjoyed the show’s season, but I have to admit that as the season wore on I wondered if this were the type of show that could last for several years. The concept, in case you don’t know by now, had Earl winning the lottery, putting together a list of all the people he’d done wrong in his life, and each week go to those people and try to make things right. As funny as the episodes could be, you sensed things getting a little formulaic and maybe even a tad predictable. But I’m happy to say that, in the show’s second season, the producers haven’t been afraid to stray from their formula here and there. Two weeks ago, for example, the episode featured the cast sitting around and watching a COPS rerun from 2004. Apparently (at least in the world of the show), COPS came to Camden County (the fictional place where Earl is set) for an episode. The installment featured the memorable cast of supporting characters that have come to populate the show, and, since it was set in 2004, before Earl won the lottery, you got a chance to see him not be such a do-gooder, and instead be up to his small-time (and frankly, rather stupid) crime capers. And last week’s show featured Earl and his brother Randy trying to dig up a box of silverware they had stolen several years before. The episode was hilarious, and featured Earl, Randy, Earl’s ex-wife Joy and Joy’s current husband Crabman each offering their own version of what happened when the silverware was initially stolen. It was quite well done.
So, My Name is Earl is still a lot of fun to watch. Not every show is excellent; I didn’t much care for the hour-long installment a few weeks ago, but then hour-long episodes of traditional half-hour comedies don’t always work (even on Cheers and Seinfeld And while Jason Lee continues to be great in the title role, Jamie Pressly as Joy steals just about every scene she’s in. Aside from being very easy on the eyes, she’s also quite adept at comedy. She’s also got that Southern accent down pat.
After Earl comes the crown jewel of NBC’s lineup, The Office. The Office is now actually in its third season. It debuted as a mid-season replacement in early 2005. It was enjoyable from the start, but it wasn’t until the show’s second season that it really became something special. The writing just continued to get sharper until before long The Office became the best sitcom on TV. And that still holds true today, halfway through the show’s third season. There have perhaps been a couple of sub-par episodes this season (the “Prison Mike” episode from a couple of months back just wasn’t that good; it felt a little like a rehash of the season premiere), but it almost feels wrong to label them as “sub-par,” because even a below-average Office is still better than any other comedy on TV.
What makes the show so great? Well, the characters, for starters. They’re so well-drawn, so realistic, that they’re easy to relate to, easy to care about. (It also helps that the occupants of the Scranton branch of Dunder-Mifflin look the way you’d expect the occupants of an office to look. They don’t look like TV stars; they look like real people.) And the situations the writers put these well-drawn characters in are also so realistic. What made the Pam and Jim saga of season two so engrossing, and so difficult to watch at times, was that it played out so realistically. It didn’t play out the way you’d expect it to on a sitcom. Each week the two would maybe take a tiny step forward, and then maybe one or two steps back, or maybe some weeks there’d be no advancement of their relationship at all. And that’s how life is sometimes. The whole thing just made Pam-and-Jim fascinating to watch, and it’s a fascination that’s continued into this season.
Also, The Office never takes the easy way out, or moves in ways you’d expect sitcoms to move. Last week, Dwight quit Dunder-Mifflin rather than reveal the true reason as to why he went to New York (which was to get Angela’s paperwork dropped off by deadline), which would’ve not only exposed Angela messing up but also would have exposed their secret affair, which Angela is very reluctant to do. A lesser show might have had Angela speak up at the last moment, just as Dwight was about to walk out the door. But on The Office, it wouldn’t have been true to the Angela character to have her do that, so she let him leave. Tough to watch? Perhaps. But character wasn’t sacrificed for the sake of a tidy wrap-up to the episode. And in the episode of two weeks ago, after Pam helped Karen in her relationship with Jim (even though it was evident Pam really, really didn’t want to help at all), there was a scene where Pam broke down in tears on a bench at the office. Dwight comforted her, put her arm around her. While a stupid sitcom might have used this as a stepping stone to a wholly implausible relationship between Pam and Dwight, Dwight instead killed the moment in hilarious Dwight fashion: “Gee, you must be PMS-ing really bad this month, huh?”
And that brings me to the third thing that makes The Office so great. It is just so funny. I laugh so hard, and so long, at this show. It is just marvelously done. I know not everybody reading this has given it a shot. But I encourage you to. You’re really missing out on a sublime piece of comedy.
And now, on to Scrubs. Aside from its season opener that last Thursday in November, I’ve been fairly disappointed with Scrubs this season, and while it pains me to write this, it is the weakest of the four comedies on Thursday night. I loved Scrubs for its first four seasons. I own one of those seasons on DVD, and watch the show in repeats on a near-nightly basis. The show dipped a bit last season, and has just continued to fall this year. Why? Well, I think that perhaps the show has run out of ideas. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. It happens to sitcoms that have been around a long time. Most sitcoms aren’t as good in their sixth year as they were in their first or second seasons. Some are a little bit worse (even classics like I Love Lucy, Cheers and MASH fall in this category), while others (like That ’70s Show) are markedly worse. The writers’ well running dry started to be apparent last season (see the episode that featured an insipid subplot where Ted the lawyer, Janitor, some Janitor’s helper, and Turk form an air band), and it’s become even more obvious this season (last week’s show featured Dr. Cox and Janitor arguing over a hospital suite that had been designed much nicer than the other hospital rooms). True, both the examples I mentioned are subplots, but even the subplots used to be more creative than what they are now. Plus, the producers of Scrubs have evidently just decided babies are the solution to everything. Not only did Turk and Carla just have a baby, Dr. Cox and Jordan are expecting their second, and even J.D.’s girlfriend is about to have his kid. It’s like Scrubs is going for the jump-the-shark hat trick. Let’s just say I don’t see this as being rife with comedy gold.
So, Scrubs is petering out. It happens, I guess. But I read today that Broadcasting & Cable magazine is reporting Scrubs will be back next season for a seventh year. Even if NBC cancels it, ABC is expected to pick it up. I’m not sure how I feel about this. Maybe if they go into the season with their mind made up that it’ll be their last season, and decide to pull out all the stops to make it a great year, season seven could wind up being pretty good. But I highly doubt the producers of the show are purposely making below-average episodes now. Maybe they feel they’re doing a good job; so how much better would things get in season seven? Well, in any event, I’ll continue to watch the show. It’s still one of my all-time favs; this season can’t erase that. Plus, who knows, maybe the show will find its footing again. This week’s episode is a special all-musical installment, and I’m intrigued to see how it turns out.
The final show on NBC’s Thursday night comedy lineup is 30 Rock. I admit, I never watched this show until they moved it to Thursdays (it debuted on Wednesdays in October). After Scrubs made its season premiere on Nov. 30, I figured I’d stick around and give 30 Rock a try. For those who don’t know, it’s a sitcom about behind-the-scenes antics at a fictional Saturday Night Live-type show, and it’s really quite funny. It stars Tina Fey as Liz Lemon, the kind of unlucky-in-life head writer of the show. She’s a very fun, and also sympathetic, character. Alec Baldwin is the exec producer of the show, and he just does a fantastic job with what he does. His delivery of the lines often is hysterical. Having seen him before on SNL, I knew he could do comedy, but I’m surprised at how good he is. Of course, his character is a little over-the-top (in one episode he was wearing a tuxedo, just to wear it; his reasoning for the tux, as he said to Liz: “What are we? Farmers?”), but he’s meant to be that way. It’s nice that you also get the feeling he cares for Liz, in a weird sort-of older brother type of way, although he has strange ways of expressing it sometimes. (“I like you,” he tells Liz in one episode. “You have the boldness of a much younger woman.”)
The supporting cast in 30 Rock, most notably Jane Krakowski and the off-the-wall (and sometimes, climbing-the-wall) crazy Tracy Morgan, is also great. Sometimes the show can be a little uneven, but it hits a lot more often than it misses, and the potential is there for it to be even better. 30 Rock is the lowest-rated of the four Thursday night comedies, but I hope NBC shows faith in it and renews it for next season. It’s earned that shot.
Tags: 30 Rock, Must-See TV, My Name is Earl, NBC, Scrubs, The Office
