I love TV comedy. For me, there’s nothing better. Good comedy is always, always hard to come by. It’s forever hit and miss, the bad comedy consistently overwhelming the good comedy. The success rate for a comedy of any kind is abysmally low. More fail than succeed. This is nowhere more apparent than on television. But, even so, today’s crop TV comedy is very, very good. The Best Comedy category of the Emmys is, as a result, quite hard to predict this year. The nominees are diverse, both in tone and quality – Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Office, 30 Rock, Entourage and Two and a Half Men. One of these shows will take home a cute little statue this Sunday. Let’s take a gander at who the favorites might be.
Before we get to the amateur handicapping, I think we better get something straight. These nominees are a bunch of BS. In a perfect world, the five Best Comedy nominees would go something like this:
The Office
30 Rock
It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia
How I Met Your Mother
Pushing Daisies
That’s correct – I believe that the academy only got two of the nominees correct. In fact, if they added a sixth nominee (like the Best Drama category did), my choice for the nomination would be Flight of the Conchords. Comedy, to be fair, is incredibly subjective, so I can’t really claim that my choices are definitively better than the academy’s. W.ll, except for one show…
The “What the Hell?” Choice
Two and a Half Men
Two and a Half Men is not a good series. I’m sorry, it’s just not. It’s straight up crappy. I have no idea why it’s the highest rated comedy on television. Kind of like how I have no idea why people like watching the Kardashians act like idiots or Tila Tequila inadvertently mock the human race. Two and Half Men won’t win Best Comedy on Sunday. If it does, I will break every single one of my toes with a ball-peen hammer.
The Long Shot
Entourage
This is one of those “it’s just nice to be nominated” nods. Entourage didn’t have a great season last year. I’m surprised, frankly, that it got nominated at all. It’s all gloss and superficiality. That’s why I like the show. Entourage is wildly inconsistent, which might be why the voters love it – the submitted episodes are quite spectacular. W.en Entourage is good, it’s really good. However, it can’t really compete with the cream of the crop, at least not this year.
The Dark Horse
Curb Your Enthusiasm
I love Larry David, and so do Emmy voters. The series has always been an Emmy favorite. It’s best days are in the past, though, and I don’t think Curb really deserves to win. If there weren’t any clear cut favorites, any shows that were wholly worthy of a Best Comedy win, then Curb might be a great back-up for voters. This year, however, this nomination is basically a lifetime achievement award. I wouldn’t be completely surprised if it won, but the odds are against it.
The Favorites
The Office
The Office hasn’t let up. Its fourth season was every bit as good as any of the previous seasons, arguably better. The series is incredibly consistent, though this might be a bad thing. It’s easy to take The Office for granted. But, we shouldn’t. I think there’s about a fifty-fifty chance The Office wins on Sunday.
30 Rock
30 Rock won the Emmy for Best Comedy last year. The year before, The Office won. It’s a bit of a crapshoot. 30 Rock might have the slight edge. If it wins this year, it might win for the next several years. Although the two series are vastly different, Frasier comes to mind when discussing 30 Rock and awards. 30 Rock is a high-brow, critic friendly series. It has highly regarded cast members and it is a legitimately great show. Personally, I find The Office to be a little better, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love 30 Rock. If either wins, I’ll walk away happy.
-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer
(Image Courtesy of NBC)
Senior Writer, BuddyTV
