See, this is what I’m talking about! Tonight’s 30 Rock was hilarious, as it always is, and even featured the real-life mayor of the great city of New York Michael R. Bloomberg but seriously, what the hell was Tim Conway doing there? His story had absolutely nothing to do with anything! Why even have it? Blarg, indeed!
Really?
30 Rock might be the smartest and funniest comedy currently on television. It’s certainly in the top three. That being said, can we really heap upon it praise after praise when it consistently delivers the most uninspired B-stories this side of Full House. For as sharp as this show’s writing can be, I simply don’t understand why every episode tends to have a secondary arc (usually involving Pete) rife with cliché. I mean, really? Pete get’s his hand stuck in a vending machine?
This has made me realize that 30 Rock is perhaps too tight for its own good. Take away these completely idiotic and disjointed B-stories and do you know what you’re left with? A fifteen minute show. They might as well cut it down and just put it on after Aqua Teen on Adult Swim (making it without a doubt the most expensive 15 minutes on television).
Though perhaps the lameness of these stories is the joke. Maybe they’re a parody of the type of sitcom fare that usually gets an audience to respond. That has to be the case, right? A show this funny wouldn’t produce material so tepid otherwise, right?
One-Armed Mermaid That’s Part Unicorn with Bigfoot
Woah, a new episode of 30 Rock! Who knew? Being fairly preoccupied this month I had just assumed that the show ran out of new episodes when The Office dried up the week after the strike started. Needless to say it was a pip to see a fresh episode waiting for me on the DVR Thursday night. That the episode also happened to be laugh-out-loud funny was an added bonus. Funny aside, I did have some problems with the episode which I will detail after the jump…
Better to burn out or to fade away?
This thing is killing me. We all knew the writers’ strike was going to be a major inconvenience, but I never suspected it would have the effect it’s currently having on my psyche. Ever since the writers took to the picket line three weeks ago, television has kind of sucked, and not just because my beloved late-night shows immediately went into reruns. Despite the fact that we’ve still been getting new scripted episodes these past few weeks, the strike has, in a way, highlighted just how solidly mediocre this fall has been. The new series, while marked by very few cancellations (honestly, who would have thought Cavemen would still be airing new episodes three weeks into November?), have generated no significant hits (with the exception of Samantha Who?, but it’s hard to say if it is the show that is successful or its Dancing With the Stars lead-in) while our favorite returning series from years past have either been wildly inconsistent (How I Met Your Mother), shockingly awful (Weeds) or just kind of a mess (Friday Night Lights). To top it all off the two series that have been consistantly good and occasionally great in The Office and 30 Rock are the first to run out of episodes. The whole mess can put your average television viewer into something of an existential conundrum: if interesting stories can vanish as quickly as they appear, what’s the point of it all? More after the jump…
“You can’t fire the wind.”
NBC, home of quality network programming and the world’s absolute worst promotions department, reached into their bag of not-so-magical tricks once again and this time pulled out “Green Week,” an idiotic excuse to jump on the buzzword bandwagon and pretend the network which airs high-school-magic-show Phenomenon is actually concerned with the ecological fate of the earth and not, y’know, the numbers for 18-34 year old albino, latin females. God bless, 30 Rock for taking the whole network down a peg or two while simulatenously delivering one of the funniest half-hours of television this fall. More after the jump…
Page-Off!!
Easily the funniest episode of the season, even if most of what I’m basing this on is the following statement from Jack Donaghy after awarding Liz the GE Followship Award…
“When I think of the Liz Lemon I met just one year ago — so resistant to cross promotion, product integration and adverlingus — it pleases me how well she’s learned to follow.”
Yes, you’ve heard it hear first, “adverlingus” is officially the funniest word since truthiness. I like to think of it as a combination of Bee Movie TV Juniors and those annoying mid-episode recappers that have been airing during Friday Night Lights. More after the jump…
A good cameo.
Between reading endless banner ads telling me everything from NBC.com having full-length episodes to the synergenic news that Alec Baldwin was going to be appearing on the next episode of Inside The Actor’s Studio on Bravo there was a pretty great episode of 30 Rock right there on the screen beneath all of the nonsense. While the first episode this season suffered from forcing Jerry Seinfeld into the plot and the second episode just never seemed to gel, this week things played out exactly as we had come to expect from 30 Rock. More on the funny after the jump…
You know that guy at the rock show, the one that’s maybe pushing 40 and has lost a good deal of his hair? He’s a good guy. He likes to rock, and rocking out is all that matters at a rock show. The problem is he also wants to be cool, and sometimes rocking out isn’t cool — which is what makes it cool in the first place (rock and roll is very complicated). But see, coolness is and will always be based on the degree of effort put into being cool. Think about it. All of the coolest people you know, or even don’t know but know of, those people don’t try to be cool, they just are cool. And you know some people who are kind of cool, but seem to want to be cool perhaps more than they really need, and it’s a shame because they could have been so much cooler if they just quit focusing their attention so much on the coolness of those around them. More after the jump…
It’s called SYNERGY!
My favorite moment in Thursday’s 30 Rock season premiere was when a member of Tracy Jordan’s entourage told Liz Lemon that when it comes to transvestite prostitutes Tracy “doesn’t try to mess with them, he just tries to get them into computer-school.” This made me laugh really hard, and thus kicked off what I hope to be another sharp, joke-packed season. More after the jump…
Whoo! We did it! We did it!
As the 2006/2007 TV season winds to a close, it’s kind of interesting/sobering to look at the network schedule and see which of those “highly toted” new shows from last fall actually made it all the way. Even more interesting is to try to figure out which of those shows impressed people enough to get second seasons.
According to my count the following were clearly strong enough (or at least received well enough by critics) to make it from the fall to the spring mostly intact: Jericho, Shark, Ugly Betty, Heroes, 30 Rock, Friday Night Lights, ‘Til Death and The Game. Of those, you can really only grant the distinction of being a “hit new show” to Heroes, Ugly Betty and Shark — all of which are expected to return next fall.
Also interesting is that Heroes is the only true serial (perhaps Ugly Betty to a lesser degree) that caught viewer’s attention this year despite “the serialized drama” being the hot genre going into the fall of 2006 (The Nine, Six Degrees, Other Number Based Drama anyone?). Apparently people who are not myself only have so much tolerance for interweaving storylines.
As for those shows that didn’t make it out alive, they’re numbers are too plentiful to count. Not like we’re really missing anything too significant. Outside of Friday Night Lights, which made it from start to finish despite still being on the bubble for a season two, there really weren’t that many new shows this season that broke any significant ground artistically. Are there people out there still wiping away tears because Kidnapped didn’t make it past its fourth week? Probably, but we didn’t really want to be friends with those people anyway, did we? Look, at least they’re got a DVD release, which is more than I can say for fans of Andy Richter Controls the Universe.
Oh, I was at a costume party…
Last night 30 Rock ended a pretty terrific season with a kind of so-so episode. It was the first time Tina Fey had penned an episode since the fall. This may or may not have been why the episode wasn’t as relentless as it had been. Once the writing staff started to take over for Ms. Fey this season, it seemed like the jokes-per-minutes ratio started to go through the roof. This isn’t a knock against her writing, just that when you’re used to laughing A LOT and then only laugh SOME, you walk away feeling a little let down.
Chris Parnell had all of the best lines this week as Dr. Spaceman (Spa-CHE-mon), but the other go-to characters Jack and Tracy were both out of their element (literally) and just couldn’t deliver the goods.
What I did appreciate was that the episode didn’t feel the need to throw in a lot of season finale nonsense despite the show learning early on that it was getting a second season. In fact there were no cliffhangers at all. Liz broke up with Floyd in a very ho-hum sort of way. Jack broke it off with Phoebe as something of an afterthought, and Tracy Jordan made it back to 30 Rock in time for his weekly pre-show rant (Tonight I think it’s going to be about immigration!).
This leads us to the Alec Baldwin news, which I’ll get to right after the jump…
“Well played, Garkel.”
Look, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to get through this blog post. Cleveland is just beckoning to me! I absolutely must go.
Though as I think about it, I wonder if my inevitable trip to The Forest City will be as spendiperous (not a word) as Liz Lemon’s because I suspect I won’t be followed by that kick ass Cleveland song (presumably recorded by the Cleveland Tourism Board) that was playing under her and Floyd’s montage throughout the city.
Alas.
Though this Cleveland business does bring up an interesting issue: is Jason Sudeikis leaving the show, because he’s way better on 30 Rock than he is on SNL, and he and Tina Fey have really great chemistry. Did that last sentence start leaning a little too fan-girly toward the end? Hmm.
Elsewhere in the episode I liked the Tracy Jordan/Dave Chappelle “Black Crusaders” plotline, which I suspect will run through the rest of the season.
Also appreciated: any additional references to Phoebe’s “hollow bones.” Good stuff.
Anyone game for a midnight screening of ”Moonquest: Quest for the Moon”?
Like this week’s Office, 30 Rock was good, but paled in comparison to last week’s extravaganza of comedic joy. Still, there were laughs to be had. My personal fav’s being Jack’s new lady friend (yes, I remember you!) who suffers from “Avian Bone Disease” and shudders with pain at the slightest touch.
Perhaps most of my disappointment lies with the trailer for Tracy Jordan’s “Jefferson” which never reached the levels of absurdity I was hoping that it would (outside of the line, “From Source Awards Presenter…”).
Anyone else think Jason Sudeikis is a way better on this show than he is on SNL?
“Oh what’s that? MC Lite just murdered Danny Bonaduce?! Oh, thanks phone!”
You absolutely have to love the “gravely-voice-off” between Alec Baldwin and G.O.B. Will Arnett. It’s also hard not to love (or at least appreciate) any network comedy that ends an episode will the allusion to Manhattan buildings exploding — and still makes it funny.
30 Rock is on a roll (get it! Rock and roll! Bwahahahah!!… … yeah), which is saying something since it hadn’t aired in over a month. Last night’s episode had the perfect split of Jack’s megalomania (fireworks shaped like cowboy hats), Tracy Jordan’s insanity (”Thomas Jefferson: you are the father!”), Kenneth’s naiveté (gay bait for Devon Banks) and Liz Lemon’s neurosis (”…and I lied. I have had five donuts today).
In a way I think the real secret to this show (or any good show with a large cast) is dividing up the screen time equally. In the case of 30 Rock, Jack, Liz, Tracy and Kenneth come off as having no greater importance than any other. It keeps each of the characters present in the show and guarantees that their time on screen is used as efficiently as possible. It hard to keep characters fresh if one eats up most of the face time.
In a small victory for comedy fans and television fans alike, NBC decided to do the right thing and gave 30 Rock a second season.
This pleases me greatly as 30 Rock has slowly became one of (if not the) funniest shows on television. It also proves that a show with absolutely horrible ratings can be given a second chance in this crazy business of show, making me think (perhaps wrongly) that Friday Night Lights might be returning come fall — but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
30 Rock is back on Thursday after a brief Andy Barker P.I. fueled hiatus with a “super-sized” episode. It airs from 8:40pm-9:20pm ET.
