Seinfeld: Classic or Dud

literally everything puddy ever says is amazing.

“sure thing, joe mayo.”

I involuntarily shush everyone around me if I hear "Desperado"

Absolutely one of the best exchanges in the history of the show. I crack up every time. From “The Parking Garage”:

ELAINE: “And now he's gone. I'm sure he's looking for the car. Five minutes, that's all. I just want to find him.”

MAN #1: “I can't do it.”

ELAINE: “But why? Why can't you do it?”

MAN #1: “… I can't.”

ELAINE: “No, see that's not a reason you can't. You just don't want to.”

MAN #1: “… That's right.”

ELAINE: “But why? Why don't you want to?”

MAN #1: “I don't know.”

ELAINE: “But wouldn't you get any satisfaction out of helping someone out?”

MAN #1: “No, I wouldn't.”

It feels pointless to write it out here because so much of the brilliance is in the delivery.

Favourite Puddy: "That's right."

(Hearing it in context helps.)

I’ve spent many moments on this earth idly wondering if I could pull off puddy’s 8 ball jacket

Glad Flopson cited Elaine's manic luggage-packing up there, possibly mycfavourite scene in the series.

And then she shows up at Jerry's place, hair in face, to give a stirring account of how she *almost* got him there in time: "Gentlemen, I assure you--" What's the rest?

"Mr Kramer, he's an innocent primate."
"Well so am I!"

I’d forgotten what a jackass Jerry is in this show/ The insincerity in every moment is breathtaking, it just oozes from every pore.

that’s a shame

mocking, mocking, mocking! all they do is MOCK!

I’m not saying that’s a negative, mind.

i'm just quoting the series finale lol

been rewatching a few episodes and god damn Jerry is somehow even a worse actor than I remembered

He's not a good actor but he's also not trying to "act" really. Jason and Julia are trying to be believable, even in ridiculous situations but Jerry is always showing an awareness that he's a character in a scripted show.

aren’t we all, really

i watched a couple of episodes the other night

at one point george says he’s driven women to lesbianism and the crowd WHOOPS and gasps like this is a super edgy thing to say. it was awkward to experience

fell in love w elaine all over again. the camera loves her face. she shows up and everything just lights up.

I had an epiphany last night that Seinfeld did to the sitcom what Letterman did to the late night talk show.

The Seinfeld Theme Mixed With A Hit Song From Every Year Seinfeld Was On TV
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OY9axZBUUlo

lol, that's really well-executed

one of my favorite videos is the composer of that theme (Jonathan Wolff) talking about how it came together and why it's different from episode to episode; long story short he's trying to match Jerry's stand-up rhythms. I'm surprised it goes so well with apparently everything

Wow it really is

xp

xpost tbf they do a lot of either resequencing the slap-bass notes, or performing/programming their own... so that it's not the Seinfeld theme so much as its arrangement/tempo.

That video with the composer completely blew my mind when I saw it. I would have sworn up and down it was the same recording every ep, I cant believe I never previously noticed that they're all completely different & unique.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_S1Bmh3QSK4

Smart move to ixnay the attingscay after 1 episode

Someone sent me this pic.twitter.com/dSzRVdlDJM

— Greb Comics (@GrebComics) October 8, 2022

"George Costanza dates a Pan-Africanist"

had to write this out, it's been bugging me for 24 hours now pic.twitter.com/OgW6mXCVp4

— j_shwahh_2 (@j_shwahh_2) January 6, 2023

was not aware they at eat Tom's Diner!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom%27s_Restaurant

The gym had Seinfeld playing while I was on the treadmill this afternoon; subtitles, no sound. It was the Soup Nazi episode. They had a certain level of genius on that show in terms of how economical it was. Within the first two-and-a-half, three minutes, they've introduced Schmoopy, the Soup Nazi, and the armoire--two of the most famous subplots ever, and a third that's pretty great too. They even manage to work in Bania for a few seconds.

https://i.imgur.com/LresnfU.jpg

I won't play the relevant clip, which probably doesn't date especially well, but when they were doing roll call for the McCarthy vote, "Cartwright?" made me laugh.

Too bad there wasn't a Congressman Constanza to ask if they said his name.

Seinfeld hints at redoing of finale (I tried to post link to Guardian article but ilx didn't like the link)

“I think the thing about finales is everybody writes their own finale in their head, whereas if they just tune in during the week to a normal show, they’re surprised by what’s going on. They haven’t written it beforehand, they don’t know what the show is,”

For me that wasn't the issue. The issue was that the finale just wasn't funny at all.

redoing? like re-editing?

From the article:

In response to a question from an audience member during his standup show at the Wang Theatre in Boston on Saturday, the comedian teased that a re-envisioned finale may be in the works.

Seinfeld was asked whether he liked the TV sitcom’s finale. “Well, I have a little secret for you about the ending. But I can’t really tell it because it is a secret,” he responded.

“Here’s what I’ll tell you, OK, but you can’t tell anybody. Something is going to happen that has to do with that ending. Hasn’t happened yet,” Seinfeld said to loud gasps and applause.

Ahh maybe they shot a couple of different endings

or maybe they get released from |redacted|

Probably a Super Bowl commercial.

lol yeah duh

xpost

Upon release from jail, they run into the Close Talker, and trying to escape him, are all hit by a bus.

Cue George in his dying moments, hearing himself in his head singing "Believe it or not, George isn't alive"

what would be a funny ending for that show. not defending the ending, just saying i'm sure there are "takes" out there

It’s an inspired idea for a finale tbh, the last scene is p much perfect. The ep itself is one of the worst of the run only cause it has barely any jokes in it, just a load of flatly executed callbacks

yeah maybe they needed one with jokes

went back and looked at some of the episodes from the last season. they had the frogger episode, and the Wizard organizer one, but also the, yeck, Puerto Rican parade one

Didnt they already do this on season 5 or 6 of Curb?

Serenity Now!

I really liked the last season of Seinfeld. if anything I wish they'd gotten weirder with it. but yeah the last 2 episodes were awful, maybe the 2 worst of the series. I agree with wins the idea behind the finale is good and I guess it's understandable - expected, even - to bring back a bunch of old characters...but there just aren't any jokes in it

I liked the audio over the end credits, where Jerry is doing hacky standup in jail.

Also liked the shirt button call back, to a bit that was in the first episode, and when George starts in on it in the last ep Jerry goes "Ehh, we've done this ..." or similar. I must have seen the first episode fairly recently before watching the last one, or I wouldn't have remembered.

A finale of callbacks is fine in theory, but it didn't help that NBC ran a one-hour clip show right before the finale, which had many of those same characters. After that, the also-extended finale felt real tiresome

Apparently it was only 45 minutes but got extended to an hour in syndication haha

The extended callback/non-jokeiness finale seemed heavy-handed in informing the viewer, like, hey, "the heroes of this show are actually terrible people! Do you see?!" If that was novel at the time, it hasn't aged well.