"It Ain't Easy Being Bright"
What was the best sitcom of the 2000s? Annyong, Mr.F?!?! The answer is obvious. It is the show that for three years was as "stable as a table" in its humor, turned "illusions" (not tricks) all the time, and was as straight as Tobias for 53 episodes. Now, it is time I "lay my sweet crown upon her head."
So, sit back, grab a bucket of candy beans, bite into a sweet Bluth Frozen Banana, make a trip to Tiny-Town, hire a surrogate to attend meetings for you, put up your hair, and your glasses, act frightened by acting like an angry old coot, visit Dorothy in prison, pick up Stan Sitwell's "Just Woke Up" hair, put "Annhog" in the trunk, do a chicken dance, pop in your copy of "Franklin Comes Alive" [I can keep this going longer...], look for "Hermano", deal some seals, buy some diamond cream, watch out for a "looseseal", be aware of hop-on's, get a margarita made in your mouth at Senor Tadpoles, never be seen nor heard at the Milford Academy, and of course, "Always Leave a Note."
So, sit back, grab a bucket of candy beans, bite into a sweet Bluth Frozen Banana, make a trip to Tiny-Town, hire a surrogate to attend meetings for you, put up your hair, and your glasses, act frightened by acting like an angry old coot, visit Dorothy in prison, pick up Stan Sitwell's "Just Woke Up" hair, put "Annhog" in the trunk, do a chicken dance, pop in your copy of "Franklin Comes Alive" [I can keep this going longer...], look for "Hermano", deal some seals, buy some diamond cream, watch out for a "looseseal", be aware of hop-on's, get a margarita made in your mouth at Senor Tadpoles, never be seen nor heard at the Milford Academy, and of course, "Always Leave a Note."
There were shows that were more popular. Hell, there were shows that were exponentially more popular, more watched and more profitable. No sitcom will ever reach the 20 million viewers plateau like Friends and Seinfeld did, but some got to double digits (Two and a Half Men, The Office, How I Met Your Mother, The Big Bang Theory). Arrested Development rarely cracked five million. Arrested Development's viewership was so bad that FOX cut the second season from 22 episodes to 18, and then not only cut the 3rd season to 13 episodes, but presented the last four in a 2-hour block running against the opening of the 2006 Winter Olympic Games, basically as filler. None of that matters. It doesn't matter that the show lasted three seasons, two of which were truncated, and was unceremoniously ushered out while everyone was watching something else. No, what matters was that no comedy was better written, better acted, better produced, and purely just better than Arrested Development. It is the best sitcom of the 2000s, and it is not really all that close.
One of the show's more famous gags, the Chicken Dance was a running joke to perfection
In fact, I am truthfully happy that Arrested Development ended after three seasons and 53 episodes, because its short life-span never gave it the chance to grow stale. The biggest problem any sitcom has is that the longer it goes, the more old it gets. Nostalgia is TV's biggest enemy, as what happened in Season 1 or Season 2 of a series always seems better than what happens in Season 6 and 7. Of course, usually that is the case because the show runs out of great ideas (Seinfeld, to a point), or every character becomes a pointed caricature of themselves (Friends). Arrested Development never got the chance, and although I think if anyone could have kept new ideas going for eight seasons, Mitch Hurwitz and the Arrested Development guys were it. Each episode was brilliant. Each episode was funny, and not just ha-ha funny, but funny to a deeper level, something never really seen in comedy. It was smart funny, it was layered funny, it was the focused man's funny.
The reason Arrested Development is so great is because there is just so much to love. The cast goes nine deep, legitimately. There's the patriarchal sarcasm of George Bluth (who the actor, Jeffrey Tambor, doubled with his hippie twin brother Oscar), the even bitterer sarcasm of mother Lucille Bluth (one of the funniest female characters in the history of television, based on pure humor), the deadpan humor of Michael Bluth, the timing and delivery based humor of magician GOB, the just silly humor of socialite Linsday, the double-entendre genius of Tobias, the awkward humor of Buster, and the two kids, who are as funny as everyone else. There were nine lead roles, and all were written well and acted well. No show ever starred more people, and shows who had far fewer main characters didn't even share the humor as well among all of them. For example, for all that Modern Family has done right in its year and a half on TV, the one thing it is starting to struggle with is splitting airtime between 10 characters. It already seems to rotate the spotlight between houses each week. Arrested Development had the problem, but had a solution. It almost is unthinkable how amazing Arrested Development was at incorporating nine characters and never making it seem like there were too many. It is hard to have a favorite character. Their all tied, because they were all brilliant.
He wasn't the best character, but he may have been the funniest
Then there are the jokes (and more jokes, and jokes). The sheer volume and depth of the jokes enhances the show as a whole, as it makes Arrested Development among the most rewatchable shows ever. Every time you watch an episode, one more joke will show up, something you never noticed before. Whether it be that in the episode "Spring Breakout" Tobias is always shown coming out of a fireplace, or that in "Notapusy", when Rita falls over, she covers up part of the banner "Wee Britain" revealing "Wee Brain", or the amazing amount of references foreshadowing the impending loss of Buster's arm. No line was read without a meaning attached. There was no wasted time in any of the episodes. There were episodes of Friends that did not have many jokes. There were strings of episodes in the Office's later seasons that were not funny. There wasn't a string of five minutes in any episode of Arrested Development that did not contain a joke. If you think there were, rewatch it. You will find one, guaranteed.
Herein lied the biggest problem with Arrested Development. It was too broad. The viewer had to search to uncover all the jokes. With the vast amount of callbacks (like the cornballer, or Kitty being "horrible, disgusting thing", or Senor Tadpoles) Arrested Development was not a show that someone could enter during the middle of Season 2 and understand what was going on. No, it required time and attention, but for the one's that did, or the ones that wanted too, the reward was the greatest package of "funny" in sitcoms in the decade.
Herein lied the biggest problem with Arrested Development. It was too broad. The viewer had to search to uncover all the jokes. With the vast amount of callbacks (like the cornballer, or Kitty being "horrible, disgusting thing", or Senor Tadpoles) Arrested Development was not a show that someone could enter during the middle of Season 2 and understand what was going on. No, it required time and attention, but for the one's that did, or the ones that wanted too, the reward was the greatest package of "funny" in sitcoms in the decade.
Didn't think that clip was all that funny? The joke lies in the numbers.
Arrested Development was never going to be as mainstream as a show that never tried to bring things from its past, or one that highlighted its jokes with sex, or laughtracks. No, it was a show that was loyal to its viewers, viewers that wanted to not only laugh, but think as well. The Arrested Development viewer was a treasure hunter, and each episode was an old, buried ship that required multiple dives to find it all. Arrested Development did not try to reinvent the format of a sitcom, like The Office (a show that has forever been overrated, both in its humor and in its originality). It was a show that took a traditional sitcom format (a dysfunctional family), and added enhancers all over the place. There was nothing that Arrested Development did not want to tackle, whether it be the (rampant) incest, or its own unsuccessful run on television (just watch the episodes Save Our Bluth's and watch self-aware humor at its best), or even the prison system.
Annyong's best moment. This one is a little soft, so turn the volume up.
However, this underscores the a truth rarely talked about when discussing Arrested Development: not only is it the smartest funniest show, it is the funniest show in the normal sense as well. Even the obvious humor is the best of the decade, whether it be Lindsay and Lucille's fight at Klimpy's, or Tobias becoming Dorothy, and singing "Somewhere over the Rainbow, there's another Rainbow" or even the surrogate. Arrested Development was even the king of straight in-your-face comedy, being able to get a laugh at will when necessary. Arrested Development's humor was 75% hidden, or presented through double meanings, or wordplay, or timing, or callbacks, but that other 25% of just situational humor was still as good as it gets.
One of the funniest moments in the show, that gave us "Tiny Town" and the epic line "God Knows They're squinters"
Arrested Development may or may not come back as a movie in the next couple of years (I, for one, don't want it too, as it could ruin what was a perfect show), but it still lives on. The internet has spurred the popularity of the show far further than television ever did. It probably has more short clips than any other show on Youtube. Seemingly 40% of all blog usernames are some variation of an Arrested Development joke. Loyal viewers can have a conversation of just alternating lines from the show for hours on end without stopping (that is a good thing, in a way). Arrested Development is probably the most popular show to last less than five seasons ever, and it merits that accomplishment. It also probably holds the record for the difference between the buzz it generated, and the actual viewers. But this is not a contest of viewership, or even overall popularity. A sitcom's main goal is to be funny, to entertain, and Arrested Development did that better than any show since Seinfeld. Every episode was a 30 minute collection of absolute brilliance in writing and acting. The show didn't do anything new, but just pushed the medium as far as it could go currently. Arrested Development has been off the air for almost five years now, and it is still as relevant as it was the day it left air, and it will continue to be for years. Arrested Development, in all its glory, was the best sitcom of the 2000s, and at 53 episodes, is the most watchable sitcom, and its brilliance lies in the fact that it is the most rewatchable as well.
The ones that just missed the cut (these are all shows that I have seen every episode of, and I think are right up there.... I have never seen Community, or Parks, or Flight of the Choncords, and Curb seems way too much like Seinfeld to merit a spot).
- Chappelle's Show
It overtook Saturday Night Live as the best sketch comedy of the decade, and like Arrested Development, was weirdly better served by lasting for such a short period of time. The show probably wasn't as consistently good as it is remembered as being (it did have its down episodes), but at its best, Chappele's Show was the funniest thing on television, and did more to tear down racial barriers than anything else on TV in the 2000s. The most memorable thing it did was probably give Rick James something to be remembered for by a whole new generation, but it also put one of the best comedians of our time into a new spotlight. When Dave Chappelle mysteriously walked away from 50 million to end the show after two seasons, a lot of people thought he was crazy. Chappelle later said that he walked away because he thought people were starting to laugh at him, and not with him. The show was its best when the viewer could laugh along with Dave, laugh along at the incredible density of our culture, so Chappelle's Show might have ended at the perfect time.
Two of my favorite clips for Chappelle's Show, showing Dave at his best. First putting the term "Rick James, Bitch" into comic history, and then pulling his best political act yet.
The ones that just missed the cut (these are all shows that I have seen every episode of, and I think are right up there.... I have never seen Community, or Parks, or Flight of the Choncords, and Curb seems way too much like Seinfeld to merit a spot).
- Chappelle's Show
It overtook Saturday Night Live as the best sketch comedy of the decade, and like Arrested Development, was weirdly better served by lasting for such a short period of time. The show probably wasn't as consistently good as it is remembered as being (it did have its down episodes), but at its best, Chappele's Show was the funniest thing on television, and did more to tear down racial barriers than anything else on TV in the 2000s. The most memorable thing it did was probably give Rick James something to be remembered for by a whole new generation, but it also put one of the best comedians of our time into a new spotlight. When Dave Chappelle mysteriously walked away from 50 million to end the show after two seasons, a lot of people thought he was crazy. Chappelle later said that he walked away because he thought people were starting to laugh at him, and not with him. The show was its best when the viewer could laugh along with Dave, laugh along at the incredible density of our culture, so Chappelle's Show might have ended at the perfect time.
Two of my favorite clips for Chappelle's Show, showing Dave at his best. First putting the term "Rick James, Bitch" into comic history, and then pulling his best political act yet.
- It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
The best Seinfeld since Seinfeld, Always Sunny (as it is more affectionately called) had the luxury of being able to swear, but had the ills of being relegated to FX (not noted for their comedies). Still running as strong as ever six years later, "The Gang" is about where it started: a self-absorbed, petty, vindictive bunch that is as funny as anything currently on television. The addition of Danny DeVito in Season 2 hasn't been perfect, but it is hard to envision the show without it. The fact that the first Season was only seven episodes long now makes the pre-DeVito era seem strange. The writing of the show is great, and Dee has been able to become the 2000s answer to Elaine, showing again that the best way to write a woman is write her as a pseudo-man (unless you are Arrested Development, and you have Lucille). Of course, the show has started to push the boundaries of what it was starting with the musical episode that ended Season 4, but the show is still as relevant as ever, mainly because the characters haven't changed. Weirdly, the actual actors' appearance never seems to change either.
Nothing really embodies the show more than Day Man and Night Man.
- How I Met Your Mother
No show combined, and possibly still combines, emotion and comedy like How I Met Your Mother. That is why we fell in love with the five late-20-year-olds from New York. Of course, Barney had become the best-written sidekick until the team made him into too big of a major player, and the actual story of meeting the mother might be lost at times, but that doesn't make it any less good at pulling our emotional heartstrings right after pulling our legs. Also, few shows have done a better job of expanding its media base. How I Met Your Mother is the leader in the clubhouse of using the internet (not as many recently, but HIMYM has created eight different websites on the show that they later created on the real internet, like "ihatetedmosby.com, or "barneysvideoresume.com". They have also perfected using music. They had the musical crescendo of "Nothing Suits Me Like a Suit" to end their 100th episode, and also great character of Robin Sparkles. At its best, no traditional sitcom was more creative, and none could make you tear up laughing and crying at the same time the way How I Met Your Mother could.
Barney's best moments.... and then arguably the show's best (at least in showing off its uniqueness)
'Till Next Time.
