Multiple Plots
I know someone else has mentioned it, but this really brought home for me that maybe the difference between BBT now and BBT in the first two seasons is the use of two plots per episode. Most of the first two seasons' episodes only had one story, like EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND and some of the pre-'80s…

One of the writers on the show this season is Don Reo, who signed on after his year turning 'TIL DEATH into just the kind of meta-freak-show you're describing (as chronicled by Todd at this site). They should just turn the show over to Reo and turn him loose. They won't. But they should.

Let's all just go back to "I don't watch TV, it's all trash." Simple, easy and recognizable as snobbery by every demographic.

I'd assume that the Old People Shows of the future will be slightly hopped-up versions of the kinds of shows that are popular with young viewers today. We'll all be mocked by hip comedians for watching our fake documentary comedies with meta-jokes, and for demanding that everybody be morally ambiguous and dealing…

That's the other thing about TDVS: it's one of those shows, like I LOVE LUCY, where virtually every sitcom of every kind has done a similar plot at some time or another — either unconsciously or on purpose.

The staging probably makes a difference. I read THE SUNSHINE BOYS (the play) before I saw the film, and the doctor sketch reads pretty funny on the page. I haven't seen it in the theatre but I suspect it plays better there too. The film didn't find an approach that splits the difference between "this is a corny old…

I think at the time multi-camera was pretty expensive to do; single-camera shows were not as expensive as they later became (they were shot with a super-fast production schedule much like "Larry Sanders" later would be), while to have an audience in the studio cost extra money, and shooting in the evening cost extra…

In-Universe Jokes
Great point about the show sounding like the way actual funny people talk. One thing that is surprisingly rare on sitcoms is people making jokes that are actually considered jokes by the people they're talking to, which other characters actually laugh at. If you compare - just because it's another…

I agree that comedy can be analyzed seriously, but I do think there needs to be an understanding that certain things are going to be contrived for the sake of the story, and that realism isn't important. Then again the same is true of drama.

long time coming
This show apparently replaced everybody from its original cast except Biggs. (Lizzy Caplan did the original pilot as a replacement for someone else, and then Caplan didn't want to do the series so Greer replaced her.) I'm not sure why CBS was so determined to get it to air, through one re-shoot and…

I think Amy's suddenly come into her own in the last couple of episodes, as Bialik has become more comfortable (she's acting more like herself instead of Sheldon) and the writers have become a little clearer that she's more interested in acquiring social skills than Sheldon is.

A different show every week
The striking thing about "Taxi" is that, as I think the Charles brothers said once, it was a totally different show depending on which characters were starring that week. Latka episodes are tonally different from Jim episodes and even Bobby episodes have their own style (though they're…

Luckily, Latka (or Vic Ferrari as he had become in that scene) was listening to Elvis C. on headphones, so there was no music to remove.

It was very much a time slot hit — it was a hit the first two seasons when it was after "Three's Company," and then ABC moved it to anchor its own night and it wasn't able to really hold its own. Similarly its contemporary, WKRP in Cincinnati, was only really a hit when it was after M*A*S*H. The early '80s weren't a…

Chronology correction: Babbitt wrote the unproduced musical ("Fabulous Voyage") in the late '40s, and took Sondheim on as a music student in the early '50s.

He Loved Broadway Too
When he took Stephen Sondheim on as a music student, Babbitt was going back and forth between serious music and trying to break in as a Broadway musical theatre composer a la Bernstein — he apparently wrote a musical about Helen of Troy that he wanted Mary Martin to star in. Martin did SOUTH…

I think that's Glenn Kenny's blog, minus the Animaniacs defending.

Ooh, ooh, I want to hear from Limerick Me next.

And then the network Standards & Practices will fix the problem by adding "in my opinion" to every statement (perhaps shortened to "IMO" because of the short running times he's always complaining about). Then he'll complain about his lame new catchphrase and how a good show would use it more sparingly.

But no one's written an outline for the opera episode yet, or the one where Jaime brags about meeting the descendants of the guy who used to write Archie comics, or the one about arguing Chuck Jones vs. Bob Clampett with special guest Canadian John Kricfalusi. So many running gags, so few episodes before early…