Big Bang Theory is..."teh suck"?

I watched a few shows. I didn't like the show very much.

I saw my first episode on Tuesday and sat through the whole thing in stone silence. I wanted to punch my friend in the face for making me watch it.

Crap -- I tuned in to this thread to hear some hot cosmology gossip!

It's quite terrible, actually. Just broad caricatures engaged in standard sitcom situations which were tired over two decades ago. It's just that the writers think if they cloak it in nerd culture, it will seem hip and fresh. They are wrong, however. Of course, it's one of my mom's favorite shows, and she doesn't understand why I don't like it. Chalks it up to my "bad taste," as she does with everything that I like which she doesn't. Sometimes, I wonder if she's right. Then I remember that her DVD collection contains Wild Hogs AND Norbit, and realize that she's oh so wrong.

I love shows with lots of nerdy references if they're actually clever and seem to come from a genuine place, but the geekiness of this show just seems like a superficial put-on - like you say Chris, a contrivance to try to cover up the fact that it's really just another run of the mill shitty sitcom. It's like they took the broad nerd caricatures from a bunch of other crummy sitcoms and put them together in one show. I guess I've never really given it a fair shot as a result, but that's the vibe I get from it the bits and pieces I've seen. Faux-nerdy.

I've had geeky conversations with my geek friends that are way more entertaining than an episode of this crap.

The two times I've watched the show it seemed to end before it should have.

I agree it is a lame comedy, but CBS also airs Two and a Half Men, so the benchmark isn't really all that high on the station. I'm sure there's all sorts of chuckling going on with the older folks tuning in.

The bits of it I've seen lead me to believe it's the American version of Spaced. And I say that with the utmost level of hatred and disrespect possible for my own culture.

A few years back I read something in Premiere right after Kids came out. It said basically that Kids is what the AV nerds think the cool kids do after school. Well, this is probably what a committee thinks the nerds do when they are away from the IT department. Spaced it most definitely isn't.

Still, the blonde is nice and bouncy and I don't mind glancing at it while I do other stuff.

You're telling me that a CBS sitcom is teeming with broad caricatures instead of real characters? The devil you say.

Yeah, also a favorite of my Mom. Seen a few with her. Pretty tired nerdy guy pining over the normal hot girl stuff. And when the nerdiest reference is to string theory, something even my dumb ass can grasp, well that shows you the level of discourse.

Rife with throwaway Star Trek/comic books/standard sci fi-fantasy movie references. But it is made for a broad audience, I don't think they are targeting the actual nerdy type as much as what somebody like my Mom thinks about the nerdy stereotype.

I like this show.

Ah, man, just got on Kirby's shit list right before the draft.

You are right. There are other shows that do nerd and geek culture so much better. Chuck to name one.

I like the show too, makes me laugh. I know a Sheldon, so I usually think it's pretty funny.

Haha, no. I would never question someone's taste because they didn't like a sitcom (well, maybe Seinfeld). Drama --- different story.

Graded on a network sit-com curve this show is exceptional.
I tried a first season disc and haven't felt compelled to see any more. If I were a casual televison viewer I'd probably watch it. But I'm never in front of the tube between 8:00 and 10:00.

Have we already talked about how this is supposed to be all subversive for featuring a guy with aspergers?

Might be palatable if the lead guy didn't sound like Urkel. But probably not.

You know what else is "teh suck"? The use of the word "teh".

Hip to be square, Jake. Hip to be square.

I don't understand why everyone these days assumes that someone who is quirky has a very real disorder like Asperger's syndrome. Not saying it's you assuming that, but whoever is is taking things to an extreme.

To be entirely fair, I've noticed a lot of people pulling the Asperger's card within the past year and a half or so, too.

Is Asperger this generations ADD, ADHD? Something that'll be over diagnosed?

They need like an Aspergian Jesse Jackson or something.

Yep. My little girl is not yet 18 months old and I've already had two people ask if she's been tested for Asperger's. It would be one thing if she showed signs of having a social disorder (overly shy, poor communication skills, beginnings of OCD behaviour, no laughing/smiling) but she's a perfectly normal 18 month old. If anything I'm concerned that she's hopelessly average. Fiftieth percentile across the board, baby!

It's a pretty serious disorder that unfortunately is being used to diagnose "smart nerd" lately.

It's a relatively new diagnosis and the attributes are often found in computer nerds and computer nerds rule the world these days, so i guess that explains it's current "popularity."

Back on topic- That guy totally has aspergers. I wouldn't call it a 100% accurate representation, but you can tell that's what the writers are going for.

The success of this show is all in the casting. Anybody but Parsons as Sheldon and this thing is DOA.

This. So, so this.

I have a friend who's a big fan, and he'd been talking it up ever since it started. Like "You HAVE to watch this" level of fandom. So I did, and my reactions were as quoted above.

My wife is a Psychologist and I had her run me down a list of the defining characteristics of Aspergers after noticing the same thing. 99.5% of the people online claiming to have it...don't.

So for the record, acting like a socially-challenged douche bag does not mean you're autistic. It simply means that you're a socially-challenged douche bag.

It doesn't help that there's been a massive upswing in awareness of Aspergers over the past few years. As a card carrying, statemented, sufferer I find the self diagnosed fuckers to be terrible because it's essentially an excuse for them revel in their douchetasticness whilst the actual sufferers try our hardest to cope with something that can be quite debilitating.

On topic: I don't get the hate or love for the show. It's fairly middle of the road, easy targets, easy humour, but it works as an amusing little something in the background. It's hardly a How I Met Your Mother or Spaced though

This is a show about geniuses written by idiots. What do you expect?

This.

Especially the guest star casting.

I'm a big fan of the show, I enjoy it a lot more then How I Met Your Mother with the sole exception of Slap Bet... that was the best damned comedic half-hour of television this decade.

My girlfriend really enjoys this show but whenever she tries to show me it I just feel a huge sense of meh. Its such a bland show with a silly 90s comedy throwback style and a hack tv writers idea of what makes geeks funny.

This.

To be entirely fair, there have been a number of articles written about whether the character of Sheldon does have Aspberger's, as his behavior goes beyond "smart nerd."

Blasphemous amounts of wrong.

I didn't mean to draw that comparison directly. Just that it seems like everything you'd be afraid a US version would be.

I'm a fan, but its Jim Parsons that carries this. He's brilliant. Its not nearly as smart or funny as HIMYM, which I think is one the best, if not the best, sitcoms in years.

A friend of mine dragged me into his living room, insisting that I had to watch this. We've had enough disagreements in the past that I knew I was in trouble.

Gah. As somebody mentioned above, it's basically a bunch of non-geeks' view of what geeks are really like. It's just irritating.

Huh. Really? I've never been inclined to watch network fare, but considering that I highly respect your opinion when it comes to entertainment this statement has me intrigued about checking the show out.

Because it has a laugh track and is your standard three camera sitcom, How I Met Your Mother gets lumped in with a lot of the CBS comedies that aren't very good. It's a shame, because it's just as funny as The Office or 30 Rock. It lacks the edge of those guys, but it's a sweet, solid, often hilarious show with a pretty remarkable ensemble. Neil Patrick Harris is the obvious MVP and the reason most people started watching, but you stay for the creative ways they find of telling stories and Jason Segel's comedic timing, which is some of the most underrated and gifted funny business on television. It's great.

You said it, Rath. When you consider guys like Segel and Harris and their work in a show like How I Met Your Mother, it makes it very hard to compliment The Big Bang Theory.

HIMYM has some really smart writing. They're really good at continuity and aren't afraid to reference something from an old episode or foreshadow something that will happen in the future. NPH indeed rocks, but Jason Segel is the funniest for me. He's incredible.

It also has a lot of heart and some of the funniest wisdom about dating and being single, like The Hot/Crazy Scale: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zdGBL0PhJE

Or why you call three days later: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8NWDXg266A

Just started watching Season 1 and I gotta agree here. The show is a tad obvious in its caricature, but Sheldon's brutal honesty is fun to watch. Plus Penny is some nice eye-candy who has a penchant for low-cut tops.

EDIT: There's something very "Frasier" about it (albeit younger). Must be the elitism/nerd vibe. Instead of psychology, opera, and wine-tasting, it's physics, comics, and scifi.

I like it. It's grown on me. Since it replaced The Office as the default TBS thing-to-have-on-in-the-background, it's become comfort food.

 

I see a lot of comments above that amount to "My friend/girlfriend/mother dragged me to watch this." That's the problem. It doesn't work with that kind of expectant focus on it. Few things do, really (although the really outstanding things do).

 

Lately its alleged sins have been compounded by its Thursday-night status as the Community-killer, which has earned it undying enmity in the hearts of "either you're with us or you're against us" Community fanboys, who have to turn it into a war. I like both. Big Bang might have the edge in terms of what I often (but not always) want from a sitcom after a day at work, which is comforting background buzz, wallpaper you don't have to pay too much attention to; with Community if you look away for five seconds you miss a quick sight gag that the whole episode builds on.

 

Parsons is gold, but this whole thing is staffed with pros -- Simon Helberg is an underappreciated pinch hitter with crackerjack timing (he should at least get a pass from the hipsters for Dr. Horrible), and his character has actually gained some shading after getting engaged to Bernadette. Actually, bringing in female big brains like her and Mayim Bialik has helped the show immeasurably; there've been entire episodes that focus on them and not the guys, which is cool.

 

A lot of the "they're making fun of geeks" hate has more to do with the earlier episodes, anyway. That and Chuck Lorre is involved and it's your standard three-camera laugh-track show. It's not the best on TV but it's far from the worst.

 

There's a big difference between HIMYM and BBT. One is done by people who are definitely fans of the stuff they reference/parody (The Ghostbusters stuff from last week for example) but also have created a cast of characters that aren't parodies of particular stereotypes. BBT is done by people using geek culture/stereotypes to get cheap laughs, which is usually at the geek's expense.

 

It's a terrible show that continues to be wildly popular. Not surprising since it came from the same guy who put TWO AND A HALF MEN on the air. Jesus.

 

 

 

 

 

 

According to the internet, you know the place for well thought and nuanced discussion, you can't like both BBT and Community, and I love Community.

 

HIMYM is awesome as well!

Segel and NPH almost make me want to watch HIMYM.

 

James Spader almost makes me want to start watching The Office again.

 

Nothing makes me want to watch Big Bang Theory.

Are you allowed to not like BBT because you find that everyone has become irritating beyond belief?

 

Even in the first seasons when I was still watching it, BBT never was more than background buzz while I was doing other stuff with occasional glances to check out the blonde. But then I realized that only I wasn't laughing at all, but when I actually paid attention I actively disliked what I was seeing. And then they did that 'hillarious' "This is our laugh track" photo and I decided that was enough for me.