Many of the shows mentioned in this thread (of which I have admittedly and proudly seen nearly none), I think are just lame and boring, and barely funny or entertaining, if at all. That’s bad enough.
Everybody Loves Raymond was in a special class by itself. It wasn’t merely lame and boring and barely funny or entertaining, if at all. It was overtly and actively wretched. Watching them sniping non-stop at each other and conducting their entire relationship by trying to read each other’s minds and doing such a negative job of it due to their own insecurities was just sickening to watch.
I lived with my father and his wife for several months about ten years ago while recovering from some medical problems. They watched it, and I saw bits and pieces of some episodes. Every time that happened, I just got sicker. What a nauseating so-called “sitcom”!
I don’t really find any of the standard “one set” sitcoms funny. You know, the sort of sitcom which consists largely or entirely of (usually) an apartment or maybe a bar with a few doors leading off, from which characters come and go like a stage play. The physical format isn’t what I dislike, as such. That just seems to be how they are all set out. They seem to comprise pretty much entirely this:
Character A: “One line zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
Character B: “One line retort zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
Character A: “One line zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
Character B: “One line retort zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
Character C: “Very brief exposition necessary to set up the next run of zingers”
Character A: “One line zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
Character C: “One line retort zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
Character A: “One line zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
Character C: “One line retort zinger!”
[pause, laughter]
It’s just so “one note”. The characters are all shallow at least if not downright unlikable. The plots are barely there. There is no substance, nothing much happens.
I never had the impression that SitC was first and foremost a comedy; more of a romantic dramedy.
I never had the impression that Everybody Loves Raymond was ever really that highly rated, but rather the best of a bad crop at the time. It struck me as one of those journeyman ensemble sitcoms that run for years, but aren’t really all that great- like “The Middle” or “Rules of Engagement”. Maybe that’s the point here- it WAS highly rated (consistently a top 10 show), and was nominated for dozens of Emmy awards.
At least with Seinfeld, Friends, Curb your Enthusiasm, Roseanne, and a bunch of other comedies that were highly rated that I never liked, I knew that they were highly rated.
So by that metric, *Everybody Loves Raymond * has to win- it managed to be a show that seemed to be workmanlike at best, and actively bad at worst, and despite that was somehow rated very highly and got lots of critical acclaim.
I second (umpteenth?) Seinfeld. I’m not one to pooh-pooh what others like, or think they’re wrong for liking it, or think that if I don’t like something it must be objectively bad. But I am truly, completely, thoroughly baffled as to how anyone could like that show. The characters were reprehensible and insufferably obnoxious. I get that that’s supposed to be the joke, but they had zero redeeming qualities or charm; they all needed to die in a cancer fire. And its biggest crime is that it’s painfully unfunny.
Ditto for The Big Bang Theory (a.k.a. The Sheldon Cooper Show). Bog standard lowbrow sitcom fare masquerading as smart and sophisticated. And Sheldon is such a mind-blowing jackass, no one in real life would tolerate his BS for a second.
In that vein, I’m going to nominate The Golden Girls. I’m going to have to turn in my Pink Card, since slavish adoration of this show is a requirement for my kind of folk. I’ll admit that I used to enjoy it as much as any of my brethren. But the Hallmark Channel runs two-hour blocks of it every day, and watching so many episodes in succession has driven home something I never quite noticed before: those women are savagely cruel to each other. They say the most hateful, hurtful, vicious things to each other for no reason whatsoever. It’s actually rather disturbing.
I’d like to defend Seinfeld for a second as I see a lot of people feel its terrible. I get that the type of humor isn’t for everyone so I’m not going to challenge you if you find it unfunny.
Above, I said of “Everybody loves Raymond” that nobody was likable. That’s based on about a dozen or so random episodes I’ve seen throughout the years. To me, every episode was Ray going on about something man-childy, his wife being unsupportive or having to be the “adult” in the situation, Ray whining, his father saying some crazy old man thing, and his mom being passive aggressive towards his wife and insulting her somehow. Somewhere in there his brother Robert comes in and does something stupid. That’s my impression.
I like Seinfeld because its a weird, absurd comedy with situations that are not found in other sitcoms. I love that it has the “no hugging no learning” rule. That’s something that other sitcoms don’t have with their schmaltzy moments where everybody hugs and things are resolved in a half hour or so. Call me crazy, but I think that’s closer to reality, and I’m sick and tired of TV giving us these strange broken people that, at the end of the day, manage to hug it out and love each other. I’m not cynical, I just don’t need that beaten into my head for 99% of sitcoms. So I like Seinfeld because of that.
Yes, the characters are generally unlikable. George is almost a sociopath, Elaine has a mean streak, Jerry is an unfeeling robot, and Kramer is oblivious to the emotions of humans. But the situations they get in is relatable and I think many of us would react similarly in that situation. Most of us are more concerned with our petty social violations or the stuff that happens to us during the day than bigger issues. Seinfeld captures that perfectly. One episode might have Jerry unable to remember a girl’s name and afraid to ask her, or George trying to hide the fact that his parents are crazy from his future in-laws by fishing a marble rye from outside the window. You might not do something crazy like that, but I’m sure you’ve been in situations where you feel you have to socially cover for someone else to avoid embarrassment. Or maybe you and your buddies just sit around talking about a button on your shirt or something trivial like that. This stuff isn’t in other sitcoms, or at least not to the extent that its in Seinfeld, so that’s why so many people find it funny. We don’t have to be Jerry or have him likeable, he just has to have enough qualities we sometimes see in ourselves. Sometimes I can be uncaring or mean, or oblivious. Imagine how funny it would be for someone else watching me stumble through social mores
I don’t get the hate for “Everybody Loves Raymond”. IMO, it’s critically underrrated**, if anything. The combo of Doris Roberts and Peter Boyle were unbeatable. Like Roseanne or Seinfeld, the weakest link is the lead, but they were smart enough to pair them with talented co-stars, in John Goodman, Laurie Metcalf, Jason Alexander, Brad Garrett, etc. From start to finish with ELR, it holds up. The same can’t be said of Seinfeld.