GIRLS talk (the Lena Dunham thread)

morning after or 20 years after, only way to discuss sitcoms

i mean unsuitably banal things. i can't really think of a comedic voice before Seinfeld that really focused on such things--though im sure there are precedents.

― ryan, Saturday, July 27, 2013 4:26 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

nah i really think there were plenty of dick van dyke or lucy or honeymooners episodes like this. but cosign that it was a style that really went out of fashion in the 80s, where things were much more explicitly about people and their relationships, etc.

you may be right but I still think Seinfeld takes on things that are more than typical, they're usually essentially boring things.

some particularly seinfeld-ish dick van dyke episode summaries

"With Jerry at a dentist's convention, Rob is forced to see another dentist after breaking his tooth on a chicken bone."

"Rob goes on Ray Murdock's X-Ray where he inadvertently describes Laura as a nut."

"The Petries hire an Italian painter to paint their walls."

"Sally dates a comedian who never paid Rob and Buddy for writing his material. "

"Rob thinks he's just seen the suspects of a recent jewelry store holdup and wrestles with his conscience about informing the police."

"Rob goes to see a psychiatrist to find out if his back pains are psychosomatic."

"Rob and Laura are caught in the middle of a feud between their parents over cemetery plots."

"Sally's secret admirer is a deli owner."

'Rob catches a cold from golfing in damp weather just before a dinner party with Laura's relatives."

"Rob takes on a crooked pillow salesman in court."

"Laura accidentally reveals on television that Alan Brady is bald."

"The freckles on Rob's back appear to form the Liberty Bell, so Millie suggests that he submit it for a column that discusses strange things."

"Rob accuses his friends of stealing his new watch."

(not tryna throw down, just think that its interesting to dig 'em up)

haha i need to watch some of those, they sound good.

a lot of stuff that's "new" is just stuff that we forgot about

"Sally's secret admirer is a deli owner."

i watched this one a few weeks ago FWIW

it's funny, if anything you could combine 3-4 of those plots and come up with a pretty good Seinfeld script--though you'd have to find a way for them all the converge at the end.

I guess you'll get back to "Girls" when a new episode is actually on right this second. Fucking internet.

Contrived silly situations are not new in sitcoms, it was the style which differentiated Seinfeld. And that it was semi-openly Jewish.

'seinfeld' made a big impact on baby dunk due to its wholehearted embrace of promiscuity and rejection of the american adult's duty to marry and have kids (it's one of the queerest shows ever to me) and feels more like 'art' in the modernist novelist sort of way (ie; expressing one person's way of seeing the world) than pretty much any other sitcom i've seen. i still can't really separate my aspirations of big city living from what i imagined real-life Seinfeld characters would live. for a sheltered home-schooled christian adolescent it was a transmission from a bigger, funner, planet, and i'll be forever glad that it was on network tv. if i was 13 now and knew how to bittorrent 'girls' would serve the same purpose.

morbs -- yeah i was thinking the relationship between the dick van dyke show and seinfeld was really a certain strain of jewish humor. carl reiner was behind the former.

its not the contrivedness of the situations, its the mundanity, exacerbated by neurosis. flipped thru some honeymooners episode descriptions otoh and none woulda worked for an A seinfeld plot, but most coulda worked for a B plot with Kramer, which i guess was his joke.

Morbs I'll discuss 'Girls' with you—just finished watching both seasons for first time!

is this thread really going to be about Seinfeld for the entire off-season?

u_u

well you're one ahead of me, and I'm probably done for now. xp

Morbs do you come down more on the "time is a rubber band" or "everybody is a dumb whore" side of the argument?

that must be "season" 2

(sorry ppl, 10 episodes is only a season for wimps)

you must hate british tv then. only six!

He'd hate the first two series of The Thick Of It

HE HATES EVERYTHING THATS HIS THING

i enjoy him anyway. that's my thing

^^Sounds like something Hannah would say about Adam.

in general my fav sitcoms tend to have the fewest number of episodes (blackadder, fawlty, honeymooners).

I Hate My Teenage Daughter...

British is a diff thing. If MTM could crank out 22-26 episodes of Mary and Newhart a year...

i mostly like this show but absolutely no one needs 25 eps of this per season

just bend over and show us how those jeans fit, sweetums

http://ris.fashion.telegraph.co.uk/RichImageService.svc/imagecontent/1/TMG10244556/m/Gap_Fall13_Denim_A_2644558a.jpg

haha morbs I am loving how in love you are with Adam

I can't narrow it down to a dozen filthy things I would do to him

<3

1. "Send him home to mommy and daddy, covered in come"

it's spelled 'cum'

also, what the hell???

the GAP deal or my repurposing of one of his better lines?

ok i didn't realize you were quoting, carry on

hahaha

I was surprised to see him staring down at me from a billboard on Canal Street.

yeah, what a sellout; trading him off my team on madden as soon as i get home

"Wanna watch Bagger Vance?...Wanna watch the Bagger Vance extras?"

I despise the spelling 'cum' and have always refused to use it btw

so have Come

the Bad Brains, not so much

I despise the spelling 'cum' and have always refused to use it btw

― Spot Lange (Jon Lewis), Tuesday, August 20, 2013 6:21 PM (54 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^

hahaha

I was surprised to see him staring down at me from a billboard on Canal Street.

― Miss Arlington twirls for the Coal Heavers (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, August 20, 2013 4:28 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

where? I must investigate

Good in Frances Ha.

乒乓, at the bottom of 6th Ave.

jeez, the first 3 episodes of the second season are pretty sucky.

It gets worse

Yeah thats nothing compared to the last 3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlkN3ShRJtA

That's the promo for Season 3.