TV Shows - Comedy Shows Recommendation

For those not in the know, which should include pretty much every one of you, I’m Aayush Arya, a nineteen year old student and a freelance author by semi-profession. I currently write for Macworld and Apple Matters and for my own blog, Penned Thoughts. Ashwin and I were acquainted on the Digit forum and have since become good friends, due in no small part to his switching to Macs. On his request, this is my humble contribution to his ongoing series of TV show recommendations.

Now that the customary introductions have been shown the door, let us get on with the juicy recommendations, shall we? All the three shows I’m going to mention here today are from the wonderful genre of comedy. Unlike most other guys, I’m not really interested in action flicks with guns and blood and gore.

I’d much rather plonk myself down on the couch, grab my Apple Remote, hit Front Row and enjoy an hour of mirthful laughter, uninhibited by people jumping off the back of trucks and gunning down anything that comes in their path (though I did enjoy Live Free or Die Hard, but even that was more due to Justin Long’s witty quips than all the outrageous action sequences).

Back to You

Comedy

In the ’90s, the local TV news scene in Pittsburgh was dominated by anchors Chuck Darling and Kelly Carr. Off-screen, Chuck was a bit of a womaniser; Kelly, a bit uptight. As years went on, Chuck was promoted from city to city, but when an embarrassing newscast tirade ends up on the Internet, Chuck finds himself looking for work. When he gets the call to again co-anchor with Kelly, it’s an offer he can’t refuse. Back in Pittsburgh, Chuck is introduced to some new co-workers: Montana Stevens, the sexy, somewhat inept weather anchor, and Ryan Church, the overstressed news director. There are also familiar faces such as Marsh McGinley, the inappropriate sports anchor, and field reporter Gary Crezyzewski. But, mostly, there’s Kelly, now a single mom to 10-year-old Gracie who, unbeknownst to Chuck, is the result of his drunken one-night rendezvous with Kelly when they worked together years ago.

First up is Back to You, which, as you’ve read in the description above, is based on a news channel and the life of its employees. It’s a unique concept that I was immediately drawn to because it promised to be free of the usual clichés associated with the couch comedy genre (or any other genre, for that matter).

It starts with Chuck Darling (played superbly by Kelsey Grammer), the former lead anchor for the channel, returning to reclaim his position after he is kicked out of his more prestigious job with a well known news channel in Los Angeles for accidentally cursing on the show.

The video, like any video that can even remotely command anyone’s interest (like what happens when the iPhone’s stopwatch hits thousand hours), finds its way onto YouTube. That right there was a particularly funny scene, specially the way he tries to recover from it.

Of course, for the small channel in Pittsburgh, it’s great news that Chuck is returning to the show and they run several promos about it. This also results in a longtime employee ending up sour-faced because he’d been doing the menial report all this while hoping to be elevated to the status of lead anchor one day.

Here’s their first conversation from the Pilot episode:
Chuck: Gary Crshevski, my God how are you?
Gary: Great. It’s Crezyzewski.
Chuck: How is that better than what I said?

He is then introduced to the weather-person, Montana Diaz Herrera (you should hear her pronounce her last name):
Montana: Hello. I’m Montana Diaz Herrera.
Chuck: Oh right, you’re the weather-girl, nice to meet you. Or do you prefer weather-woman, I never know which?
Montana: Actually, I prefer meteorologist.
Ryan: But you’re not a meteorologist.
Montana: But I prefer it.

And then, he meets Kelly Carr (Patricia Heaton) and the show kicks off with gusto. The constant bickering between these two, the romantic tension and the witty one-liners make the show a pleasure to watch.

There is no suspense or tension involved anywhere in the show. It’s just a free spirited, laugh-out-loud comedy that doesn’t take itself too seriously, but respects the viewers’ intelligence. There is a minimum of silly jokes and an abundance of good, subtle ones.

The supporting cast is also pretty awesome with Ayda Field, Josh Glad and Ty Burrell enacting their roles with aplomb. The only character I don’t particularly like is the one of Marsh McGinley. It might just be me but I don’t really find his jokes all that funny, though he does come up with some gems every once in a while.

I would give this show a four out of five rating for a good cast, well written dialogues, good story and amazing acting. Definitely recommended.

The Big Bang Theory

Comedy

Meet two brainiacs with a lot to learn. Leonard and Sheldon can tell their quarks from their quantum physics, but have no clue how women add up. Leave it to their pretty new neighbour, just off a messy breakup, to teach them a thing or two in The Big Bang Theory.

This show is full of unpretentiously outrageous dialogues such as these two examples:

“You have about as much chance of going out with Penny as the Hubble Telescope has of finding that at the center of each black hole there’s a little man with a flashlight trying to find the circuit breaker.”

“I just know that moving all day can be stressful and I just thought that good neighbors and some Indian food might be just what you need… plus, curry is a natural laxative and I don’t need to tell you that a clean colon is one less thing to worry about.”

And yet, it never portrays itself as a show ahead of its time with directors and writers who know much more about technology than your average geek does (unlike, for example, Smallville, where Chloe Sullivan can find any information about any person on Earth and break through the most complex of security infrastructures with just a notebook at her disposal).

Even though the show revolves around the lives of two roommates who’re both complete nerds, they never try to impress the powers of technology upon the viewer and that’s what impresses me the most. The core audience for this show knows their Mhz from their FSB and trying to teach them a lesson or two about physics and computers could only lead to disaster, with the viewers nitpicking every aspect of the show.

Instead, what they present before us is a plotless show where the main characters keep spouting utter gibberish in the name of technology and it is evident that the realm of their knowledge only exists within the show. Therefore, the viewer doesn’t feel like his intelligence is being insulted because we’re never expected to believe outrageous stuff that we know isn’t true.

It is an absolutely hilarious show with geeky characters most of us would empathise with, even if we don’t admit it in public. Every episode, so far, has had new material and all of them have been very entertaining. It’s another show I would recommend to anyone wanting to indulge in a little bit of light hearted comedy. It deserves 4/5 stars too.

That ’70s Show

Comedy / Romance

That ’70s Show revolves around the lives of several 17-year-olds living in Point Place, Wisconsin, 1976. The head of the group is Eric Forman (Topher Grace) who lives under the authority of parents Red and Kitty (Kurtwood Smith & Debra Jo Rupp). Living next door is girlfriend Donna Pinciotti (Laura Prepon) and her parents Bob & Midge (Don Stark & Tanya Roberts). The rest of the gang includes Fez (Wilmer Valderrama), a foreign-exchange student who’s soaking up American culture like a sponge, Jackie Burkhart (Mila Kunis), her on-again, off-again boyfriend Michael Kelso (Ashton Kutcher), and Steven Hyde (Danny Masterson), a conspiracy theorist who believes Xerox will take over the world. The gang usually spends their time in Eric’s basement, thinking of their lives, parents, and futures, but they manage to get into funny adventures and mishaps along the way through their teenage lives.

You know how the best course of any meal is reserved for the end? That’s exactly how I feel about That ’70s Show, a romantic comedy from a few decades ago with an absolutely wonderful cast and amazing acting.

First and foremost, I would like to thank Milind, another mutual friend, for pointing me to this show and forcing me to watch it. He would randomly email me every now and then and ask me whether I had started watching it or not. So pestered was I by his constant nagging that I had to give in to his request. And though I did regret it for the first few episodes, I now realise why he was so insistent.

Frankly, this show is in a class of its own. There’s Friends and then there’s That ’70s Show. There isn’t much of a plot here either but the rest of the stuff that matters is all there–awesome dialogue, brilliant direction and execution, talented cast and superb acting–all rolled into one hell of an unstoppably laugh-out-loud comedy.

Here are some appetisers:

Kelso: C’mon Eric, we never ask you for anything.
Eric: You guys ask me for everything.
Kelso: So, what’s one more thing?

Fez: What’s disco?
Hyde: It’s from Hell. And, not the cool part of hell where all the murderers are either, but the lame-ass part where accountants are from.

Hyde: I read somewhere that people in India fast, man. And, that it makes them think better. And, sometimes they can actually think themselves to death, man.
Kelso: I wonder if that’s what I’m doing right now? Sometimes my brain is doing things that I don’t even know about.
Eric: Man, we think of some great stuff down here. But, later on I can never remember it.

Apart from the dialogues, it’s the expressions of the characters and the interaction between them that lends most of the humour to the show. Of particular amusement is the relationship between Eric and his father, Red. The two of them are always at crossroads with each other and their exchanges comprise some of the best moments of the show.

Apart from the unadulterated and all-pervasive comedy, there is also eye candy in the form of Mila Kunis, who plays one of the most annoying onscreen characters ever but is so cute, you wouldn’t want to have it any other way.

I could go on and on but the point is that this is an awesome show. I’m only peeved about the fact that the conversations in certain episodes tend to become way too lewd for my tastes and, in my opinion, just leave a bad aftertaste. They’re like sour raisins in a sumptuous custard. Also, every few minutes, there are some old school graphics and cutscenes inserted in for that 70s effect which they could have done without.

But these quibbles aside, its a first rate comedy that I would highly recommend to everyone above the age of sixteen. Rating: 4.5/5 stars.

There you have it–three of my most favourite TV shows that I can endorse any day of the week, with my eyes shut and all other senses turned off. Some of the other shows I really enjoy(ed) are Friends, Gossip Girl, Heroes, How I Met Your Mother and Smallville. All thoughts and comments are to be directed at the comment strings below. I would love to hear what you guys have to say.

Enjoy.

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