30 Rock

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

Floyd was the best. He used Ghostbusters for evil!

[Czech please! 0]

Both shows are completely outlandish now and have been for some time, but at least 30 Rock is up-front about it and isn't putzing around with the last vestiges of the documentary conceit like The Office is. Both shows have completely unrealistic characters engaging in broad physical schtick, and yet one strikes me as on point and the other as a show that lost its way as it wrote itself into corners and dead-ends. I know I'm gonna take shit for the "Czech hates anything popular" meme that doesn't actually exist, but having to carry the NBC Flagship Sitcom torch has almost certainly had a lot to do with the descent from subtle poignancy and surrealism into fanboyist dramedy and zaniness. Even though The Office has sort of picked up where Arrested Development left off w/r/t popularity and Internet meme propagation, I think 30 Rock better captures the spirit of that show, and has been the funnier of the two shows as The Office has found itself looking for the Friends crowd.

[At Home 0]

Couldn't agree more. The Office is becoming more and more about these supposed complex characters fucking each other with the running gag character throughout. There's no laugh track, but the humor is starting to lose more and more of it's weird charm that it started out with. 30 Rock, on the other hand, continues to be funny night after night, and even though the characters can become pretty formulaic at times, it's no where near the 22-minute prompt that The Office follows.

[bob_barron 0]

Both shows are completely outlandish now and have been for some time, but at least 30 Rock is up-front about it and isn't putzing around with the last vestiges of the documentary conceit like The Office is.

 

30 Rock was funnier when it was more grounded, instead of just being outlandish. Outlandish humour works in some ways, but with 30 Rock, they're just throwing shit at the wall and hope it sticks.

 

The documentary part of the Office is something you sometimes have to suspend disbelief on (they've basically admitted that the reason the documentary hasn't aired is b/c the show would be fucked) but they often acknowledge the camera's presence. (Witness David's look when he realises that Michael brought the camera with him)

 

Also, while The Office is out there at times, they never go as far as 30 Rock does and never make it so it's too unwatchable. Plus, they've gone to great lengths to explain why Michael hasn't been fired and I appreciate it.

 

My two real complaints about The Office are that they get lazy with relationships by having everyone fuck everyone, and they sometimes let Michael's talking head go on for too long.

 

That said, they were perfect on Thursday with Michael's behaviour. Yes, he was being a douchebag but everyone told him to shut the fuck up and it was explained in a talking head. And he redeemed himself at the end with Wallace.

 

Also, The Office's dramatic moments are perfect. They do a great job of telling a story, and 30 Rock has never been able to touch that. Look at all the failed 30 Rock storylines I listed. While the show is funny, they've never been able to capture those moments like Casino Night, or the awkwardness of Phyllis' wedding and the dinner party, or that great scene of Jim consoling Dwight and then walking in and kissing Pam.

 

30 Rock some weeks is 22 minutes of someone trying too hard and falling flat.

 

but having to carry the NBC Flagship Sitcom torch has almost certainly had a lot to do with the descent from subtle poignancy and surrealism into fanboyist dramedy and zaniness.

 

Completely disagree on all levels. The Office had many dramatic moments in Season 2 when no one is watching. They stumbled a bit in Season 3 when they shipped Jim to Stamford, but once they brought him back and resolved that storyline, things got much better.

 

The zaniness was always there. Look at Diversity Day, or Sexual Harassment, Office Olympics, or any of the zany antics in the workplace episode.

 

Even though The Office has sort of picked up where Arrested Development left off w/r/t popularity and Internet meme propagation

 

Czech, just because Byron does it, doesn't mean we're going to start doing with regard to as w/r/t.

 

I think 30 Rock better captures the spirit of that show, and has been the funnier of the two shows as The Office has found itself looking for the Friends crowd.

 

30 Rock ATTEMPTS to be Arrested Development, but can never really pull it off. There were some episodes in 2 where you could see they were trying to be Arrested Development with the inserts and callbacks and it just didn't work. How I Met Your Mother is probably the best sitcom for doing inserts.

 

I do agree that will they or won't they aspect of Jam got a little tiring, but they resolved that with the Super Bowl, and I like that they're now just a happy loving couple.

 

There's no laugh track, but the humor is starting to lose more and more of it's weird charm that it started out with.

 

Not true. Look at Thursday's episode, which was 22 minutes of the awkward cringeworthy humour that is one of The Office's hallmarks. Or the week before, with Dwight one-upping Michael. "You're welcome" is funnier than anything on 30 Rock this season.

 

30 Rock, on the other hand, continues to be funny night after night, and even though the characters can become pretty formulaic at times, it's no where near the 22-minute prompt that The Office follows.

 

It's worse. I will credit 30 Rock for showing improvement, but I think they think the show is funnier than it really is. Jane Krakowski is just bad, she should've been dumped after Season 1. They need to use the writers more, and not waste Alec Baldwin's time with relationship arcs.

[Czech please! 0]

I and others have been w/r/ting for at least four years.

[bob_barron 0]

I didn't start noticing it until Byron did it. It's one of those little things that bother me, b/c I'm like that.

 

Carry on though.

[Czech please! 0]

what made 'the office' different was that it was obvious how much it would suck to work there.

This is totally gone! I'd love to work at Dunder Mifflin now. It'd be like working in a sitcom.

[bob_barron 0]

This is totally gone! I'd love to work at Dunder Mifflin now. It'd be like working in a sitcom.

 

You'd work for a boss that's insane and a drag to work for. Aside from Jim and Pam, your co-workers really aren't that fun to be around. Plus, the company is losing money and you always have to face the prospect of losing your job.

 

The it's a drag to work there aspect was really only prevalent in the pilot when Jim said he'd throw himself in front of a moving train if that was his career

[godthedog 0]

barron and czech are more alike than either is willing to admit. but only in being willing to argue point-by-point for their unpopular opinions. which is a good thing. i appreciate the existence of both.

[At Home 0]

There's no laugh track, but the humor is starting to lose more and more of it's weird charm that it started out with.

 

Not true. Look at Thursday's episode, which was 22 minutes of the awkward cringeworthy humour that is one of The Office's hallmarks. Or the week before, with Dwight one-upping Michael. "You're welcome" is funnier than anything on 30 Rock this season.

 

30 Rock, on the other hand, continues to be funny night after night, and even though the characters can become pretty formulaic at times, it's no where near the 22-minute prompt that The Office follows.

 

It's worse. I will credit 30 Rock for showing improvement, but I think they think the show is funnier than it really is. Jane Krakowski is just bad, she should've been dumped after Season 1. They need to use the writers more, and not waste Alec Baldwin's time with relationship arcs.

 

This made me laugh. It's like you just wanted to make points and quoted me to make it seem that you were actually responding to something. You even say "22 minutes of the awkward, cringeworthy humour that is one of The Office's hallmarks" (way to plagiarize every review of The Office ever) right before I say that The Office writes every script using Mad Libs. The last response doesn't even address what I said above.

 

"30 Rock can get kind of formulaic at times, but nowhere near The Office."

"I don't like the characters on 30 Rock."

 

C'mon man.

[bob_barron 0]

No idea what you're talking about pbone.

 

 

You said that the Office is starting to lose its weird charm, while I pointed out that the most recent episode was the Office's weird charm in a nutshell.

 

In the other response, I said that 30 Rock is worse than The Office and voiced my complaints with the way they handle two of the characters.

 

If you don't have a point to make, that's okay, but I absolutely addresed what you had to say.

[The Ghost of bps21 0]

There was no "weird" charm to the office. It was a simple thing of watching quirky people do a boring job and rooting for the 2 normal ones to end up together.

 

Now it's a show of ridiculous over the top charicatures of people not doing any kind of work whatsoever and the people who you wanted to see get together make the most boring worst couple ever.

[bob_barron 0]

I think the British one had more of the weird charm. The American one isn't as bleak, and is more upbeat.

 

I still like Jam. I admit the breakup teases got old, but I think they've now established that they're a couple in love, and that's that. Sometimes it's nice to see people happy.

[The Ghost of bps21 0]

I don't blame them for going in a different direction. The British version totalled less than one american season from start to finish...which is why it worked. But the American one has gone WAYYY to far with the characters. Michael used to be an oddly likeable unlikeable...now I just want to fast forward through everything he says...and the Michael-centric episodes are almost unwatchable (Making pants tents in the woods? Fuck that. Although the last episode was better...because Michael was right and was easy to root for). The Jim/Pam thing annoys me because the point of the Office to me was that funny things happened and there was this poor schlub that you really wanted to see happy since he was the one genuinely likeable guy. They didn't replace that with anything when he won (and at times he can get awfully smug which I hate) and I'm left with a collection of characters who I don't particularly want to see good things happen to since they don't evoke any kind of sympathy most of the time.

[HollywoodSpikeJenkins 0]

"Oh my God, you puked! Why wouldn't you warn me? I was staring at your mouth!"

[Czech please! 0]

Kenneth seeing the world as Muppets was worth a belly laugh. "In English, German, and Polish" was good too. The subplot with Dennis was terrible, but I never liked that character much anyway. Funnier than The Office this week, again.

[bob_barron 0]

Kenneth seeing the world as Muppets was worth a belly laugh. "In English, German, and Polish" was good too. The subplot with Dennis was terrible, but I never liked that character much anyway. Funnier than The Office this week, again.

 

I have to watch 30 Rock tomorrow online, and the Office tonight, but I'm sure we'll be debating this again

[treble 0]

It had a few good lines ('I thought this was a job interview!'), but the whole Dennis stuff wasn't any good (except for his vending machine) to begin with and it was topped off with WAY too much Jenna, which is almost never a good idea.

[LaParkaMarka 0]

I thought the episode was pretty good, but that might have been because I watched The Office beforehand. It was worth watching just for everyone as Muppets.

[Mecha Mummy 0]

For some reason I found Kennith's amazing look of bug-eyed glee at seeing muppet Jack even funnier than the visual of muppet Jack itself. I liked the entire episode; for a Dennis episode it was pretty light on actual Dennis (what, three scenes?), and as maybe the only person who really likes Jenna even if a lot of her subplots are weak (werewolf lawyer, that thing last week), I thought she was used well in this one. The Office had more interesting plotting in the end and I was more engaged in what was going on there, but in terms of which show was funnier 30 Rock won this week decisively.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

I need to work the Horsetown / Naysayers line into a conversation.

[bob_barron 0]

Kenneth seeing the world as Muppets was worth a belly laugh. "In English, German, and Polish" was good too. The subplot with Dennis was terrible, but I never liked that character much anyway. Funnier than The Office this week, again.

 

Absolutely not, I completely disagree with you. Some funny moments (Jenna falling, everything Tracy, the deaf person) but The Office was a much stronger episode, especially with the Jerry Maguire homage

[At Home 0]

Kenneth seeing the world as Muppets was worth a belly laugh. "In English, German, and Polish" was good too. The subplot with Dennis was terrible, but I never liked that character much anyway. Funnier than The Office this week, again.

Some funny moments (Jenna falling)

 

Right.

 

I didn't even laugh at The Office this week. Boring episode, and Jim and Pam still remain to be two ridiculously boring characters. The Muppet thing, Naysay, phone sex commercial, deaf person, "I'm going to buy it with money," coffee vending machine in the basement of the K-Mart, just get the key from David, etc, this was a great episode.

[bob_barron 0]

Kenneth seeing the world as Muppets was worth a belly laugh. "In English, German, and Polish" was good too. The subplot with Dennis was terrible, but I never liked that character much anyway. Funnier than The Office this week, again.

Some funny moments (Jenna falling)

 

Right.

 

I didn't even laugh at The Office this week. Boring episode, and Jim and Pam still remain to be two ridiculously boring characters. The Muppet thing, Naysay, phone sex commercial, deaf person, "I'm going to buy it with money," coffee vending machine in the basement of the K-Mart, just get the key from David, etc, this was a great episode.

 

I thought it was a weak episode overall, besides the Tracy Jordan subplot. As others have mentioned, anytime you devote too much time to Dennis and Jenna, it's going to fall flat. Just like Jenna falling! The phone sex commercial didn't really do it for me, except for Frank finding it on youtube so fast. Oh yea, there wasn't enough Frank in this episode.

 

I liked part of it, but like I find with 30 Rock, the sum wasn't as good as the parts.

 

Jim didn't even do anything on The Office this week to warrant criticism. And with Pam, it looks like they're going to do something big with her character, and I'm really excited to see where this goes.

 

You also had really funny moments like Creed and the copier, Kevin and the copier, Charles assigning tasks to Stanley and Kevin, Dwight's Nazism, and the callback to Finch Paper.

 

Jerry Magure is one of my favourite movies, so I loved the last scene being a tribute to it. Michael trying to convince Stanley to join him while in the urinal killed me.

[godthedog 0]

save for the 'jerry maguire' stuff, i'm in complete agreement with barron on this week. '30 rock' looked like it was trying way too hard and although i laughed a lot, it was a hollow, weirded-out kind of laughter. the EXTEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEENDED slow-motion of tracy getting ready for the spaceship, combined with the point-of-view shots, just left this overall bad taste in my mouth. the phone sex commercial went on way too long; a joke like that is good for a one-liner and a cutaway, but it's too thin to be a crucial plotpoint with a lot of screen time.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

I did like Frank pointing out the phone line didn't have enough numbers.

[HollywoodSpikeJenkins 0]

1-900-OKFACE

[Boner Kawanger 0]

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

That, NPH dancing around as a fairy... I don't remember The Street being this weird when I was a kid.