NEW & IMPROVED What's on TV, ILX? It's the American Sitcom Tournament Round 1/Group 6

Futurama, The Odd Couple, NewsRadio, Roseanne

I haven't seen much of either Bilko or Futurama, but I've enjoyed the Futurama I've seen more than Bilko.

You're going to make me choose between The Office and NewsRadio?!?!?! What fresh hell is this?!

I'm going to have to seriously give that one some thought. Futurama is an easy one, and the others are pretty easy as well, but man . . .

Futurama, The Odd Couple, The Office, Roseanne

I hate voting for The Office since I go out of my way to NOT watch it anymore, but during its 2nd and 3rd (and maybe even part of its 4th) seasons, it was on fire. NewsRadio was always charming, but never essential.

I used to love Roseanne enough that I'd normally vote in the other three too without much caring who won. But I don't think it has a chance against South Park anyway, so I'll skip this one.

Sgt. Bilko, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Office, South Park

office vs newsradio was really hard. i will vote for anything against futurama

But I don't think it has a chance against South Park anyway

There's a lot of love for Roseanne, I think. But who knows. The Jeffersons lost to the freakin Monkees.

ok i take that back, and my restated version is "i will vote for anything that isnt 2 1/2 men against futurama."

Futurama, The Odd Couple, NewsRadio, Roseanne

been watching Newsradio reruns on the REELZ channel lately and that show is really just perfect

why u haet Futurama so much? xp

NEW & IMPROVED What's on TV, ILX? It's the American Sitcom Tournament Round 1/Group 5

eh i have just never ever seen anything remotely funny to me on futurama - i am consistently baffled when i find out that people actually enjoy it. not at all trying to be challopsy, i have never found the tiniest shred of enjoyment in the show, i find it way shittier and dumber and safer in its targets than the last few seasons of the simpsons, which is saying A LOT.

actually a closer comparison would be that i feel the same way when i see an episode of futurama as i do when i see an episode of American Dad

I never appreciated Futurama during its initial run, but I really got into it through repeats on Comedy Central. And now that it's been brought back, I find the new episodes to not really have lost a step at all.

Futurama, Curb Your Enthusiasm, NewsRadio, South Park for me --

I should save this for the 8th group, but it's bugging me now while I'm watching Friends on TBS. Total piece of pop culture nonsense question but: Did many people find David Schwimmer attractive when Friends was first airing? (I was a little too young to pay attention to the zeitgeist at the time.)

As far as I know, Schwimmer was regarded irl as as big a nerd as he was on the show itself. Funny, talented, but not attractive.

Do u think he was supposed to be good looking within the logic of the show?

I don't really get what point you're driving at. No one one the show was really regarded as UNattractive (except in flashbacks to Fat Monica and Big Nose Rachel), but it was kind of obvious to anyone watching that LeBlanc and Aniston were being pushed as the "hot" ones.

I'm not really driving at a point. I just find it weird how the Ross figure is definitely set up as part of the primary romantic narrative drive in the show (with Rachel, of course), but the actor isn't conventionally attractive and wasn't really found attractive by audiences. He's coded as nerdy, but it's really a very weirdly stylized nerdy -- he's not nerdy like Screech (who would never (or at least rarely) get paired in an important romantic interaction) and not even nerdy like the guys in Big Bang Theory who are definitely outsiders and weird (the unattractive people). It's a little confusing to me what social/cultural ground Ross is supposed to represent (or if I were writing a pitch for TvTropes -- what's the trope genealogy for his character?)

It's kinda uncanny in a similar way I find Judd Nelson uncanny in the Breakfast Club -- clearly supposed to be a thug (in the ways he acts and dresses), but not in the way the theme is generally narratively referenced (he's much more sincere, and affected, than you would imagine that kind of role). Or at least it strikes me in a similar way, obv this is very YMMV stuff

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

pity bump

Futurama, Curb Your Enthusiasm, NewsRadio, Roseanne

^^^
that

so this is basically gonna come down to Arrested Development vs Simpsons and I don't have to click on these anymore?

bumpaloo

If Arrested Development survives long enough to make it to the final, I'll eat my shoe.

FUTURAMA VS BILKO IS TOO RONG

That one was really easy for me, though I must admit only having seen a few episodes of Bilko in passing. I like Phil Silvers, but I like Futurama more.

Futurama, Odd Couple, (never seen either choice but voted Office), South Park

oh man I need to get work done so I really can't get into a Futurama debate but basically jjjusten is megasuperong and also might smell a little like a diaper

thumbs downed that post

i have heard that HI DERE enjoys double features of futurama and the equally hilarious animated space comedy "Tripping the Rift"

I get where you're coming from because I really hated Futurama the first time it was on, but at some point during its resurrection I started watching it again and it's WAY better than what you're describing, in no small part because Billy West is amazing.

xp: oh it is ON now, motherfucker

enjoy your Squidbillies marathon

hahaha

i've got the same story as HI DERE: I hated it initially, then started watching it a few years ago and now... wouldn't miss it for anything. give it another go, jj gg eileeeen.

srsly if the Poppler one doesn't get you, none of them will

also I think they do a very good job of weaving slapstick with sentimentality but you don't really get that unless you buy into the series and follow the longer story arcs

alright fine you jerks. do i just start with a later season or what then

that was a passable bender, jj

actually I'd say start with season 2; a lot of my favorites are there ("The Problem With Popplers", "A Bicyclops Built For Two", "Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love?", "Put Your Head on My Shoulder")

Yeah, but then you miss "A Big Piece of Garbage," "My Three Suns" (<--maybe my favorite ep), "I, Roommate" . . . fuck it, Season One is great, start there.

Maybe I'm just way, way too much of a nerd/dork for my own good, but I loved Futurama from the word "go."

normally I'd agree, but I got into it by seeing a bunch of hilarious season 2 episodes out of order, then a bunch of later more sentimental episodes, then going back and watching from the beginning

Alls I know is now I want to watch "My Three Suns" again. It's got Bender trying to be the ship's cook, Fry almost letting organ sellers take his lungs, the Trisolians, Bender making everyone cry . . . it's like the perfect episode!

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I dig Futurama a lot, but if you think it's better than the Phil Silver's Show then you are a disgusting savage. Sitcoms as we know them wouldn't exist without Bilko!

Too young (born in 1969) to have watched Bilko when it aired originally, and it never was in repeats anywhere that I recall when I was a child. So I just haven't seen enough of it for it to have made an impact. In any case, Futurama is one of my GOAT sitcoms, so.

Futurama - 31
Sgt. Bilko - 11

The Odd Couple - 12
Curb Your Enthusiasm - 30

The Office - 24
NewsRadio - 18

Roseanne - 18
South Park - 24

ROSEANNE GOT ELIMINATED IN THE FIRST ROUND? I HAET U ALL