It's no contest

big bang theory is about what dumb people think smart people are like.

bbt is blackface
- Reddit ass comment
I wouldn't say dumb people. It's a caricature, much like Dennis the Menace is a caricature of small children in a quiet, suburban neighborhood. Only Big Bang Theory wasn't based on an existing comic. So more like Friends being an unrealistic caricature of a late-20's/early-30's group of people living n NYC.
Entertainment doesn't always have to be authentic.
- So more like Friends being an unrealistic caricature of a late-20’s/early-30’s group of people living n NYC.
  Actually a pretty good comparison given how awful Friends is.
apologies for the pixels, I stole it from reddit
Yes, it's a horrible caricature, Henry Cavill is basically the template for most geeks these days.

No explanation necessary:

This changes my perspective on the entire show... I'm going to have to watch it again for the 152nd time with this in mind now.
I might require some explanation.
- Autism.
I love this so much.
- This image?
  The show?
  "Yes!" 💯
If he's low masking, how did he just have a chat about that ludicrous display last night?
Id be tempted to swap jen and roy tbh

Because, similar to blackface in its time, people love to point and laugh at exaggerated caricatures of something different from themselves.
And CBS airs lowest common denominator garbage that the masses devour.
- The term you're looking for is minstrel shows https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minstrel_show
  BBT is a minstrel show to humiliate smart people, anti intelligence sentiment is high in America

Except for that one transphobic episode that Graham Linehan has ruined his whole life over instead of going "Yeah, I'm sorry, that was a bit insensitive."

EDIT: since I don't want the top reply not to mention this, fuck IT Crowd creator Graham Linehan for the incalculable damage he's done to innocent trans people. He's a worthless, disgusting bigot.
Honestly, I always found that episode... Weirdly progressive? Even maybe by accident? Consider the following:
The trans woman April is legitimately physically attractive and with a distinctly feminine voice to match.
She's a legitimately very sweet, intelligent, and earnest person.
She tells Douglas upfront in no uncertain terms that she's trans (she phrases this as "I used to be a man", but honestly, considering both 2008 and the fact it was used to setup a joke, I think this isn't too transphobic? A trans person in 2008 might've even said this because there was less of a support network to understand that you always were a woman.)
Douglas gets upset because he thinks he's been tricked, but 1) he absolutely was not, and the episode makes this crystal clear that it's because April made every effort and he's just an absolute dumbass, and 2) Douglas has been portrayed in the show to this point as nothing but a juvenile, overdramatic, chauvanistic sack of shit, and we're clearly not supposed to be rooting for him.
She's a fantastic girlfriend and becomes the love of his life. A big part of this is because she has a duality between traditional femininity and an interest in traditionally masculine activities, but I also don't think this is terrible representation? I have a trans woman friend who carries herself in a traditionally feminine way but hasn't dropped more traditionally masculine activities that she grew up enjoying.
She throws the first hit at the end, but this is after Douglas dumps her on the spot after they've hit it off, had sex, and confessed their love for each other because he was too stupid to listen, he tells her to get lost, he basically calls her gross to her face by talking in a disgusted tone about "that operation you had", and flat-out denies her existence as a woman.
It's made very evident that if Douglas weren't transphobic, he could've lived the rest of his life with a woman who's established to be literally perfect for him.
- 100% agree. It paints trans women favorably and makes Douglas the asshole like he deserves.
- Yeah, it's kind of a Death of the Author moment. Ignore Glinner being a transphobic ogre and it's actually quite good.
- Douglas ruined a great relationship because he just couldn't stop himself being a transphobic bigot. Pity Glinner didn't learn any lessons from his creation.
- I'm a ciswoman and I actually love April's ass-kicking. I'm sure it was meant to be a dig at her femininity but it's the first time in media where I felt like, yes. This is exactly how I want my gender displayed.
  And her actress was gorgeous.
- The fandom has universally decided that douglas did hear her correctly and still did not care and they lived happily ever after
- Wait THAT'S the trans episode that everyone says is super-transphobic? In the context of being released in 2008 it's perfectly fine. There's probably be a few things that should be different if it were made today (and honestly, its been a few years since I've seen it so I might be not remembering some important yikes moment or something) but my takeaway was always that Douglas is still an asshole and April is an amazing woman who can do so much better than him
  Edit to add: Honestly far worse is the Aunt Irma plotline. Most of the jokes are that "haha these guys are acting like girls" and that plot honestly kinda fell flat because of it
Linehan has become much worse since that controversy, he's been on a proper trans hate crusade since like 2019. It wasn't about being insensitive, he's completely deranged and the episode was just an early slip.
- Absolutely. I can't know what has gone wrong inside him, but even if this particular brainworm was eating him up 20 years ago, he could have just said something vaguely apologetic and let it blow over. Instead, he decided a trans hate crusade was more important than his family or his career.
- Wow, I just looked him up on Wikipedia and you’re right. It’s way more than just producing a sitcom episode. Dude is legit on a crusade.
- He doubled down exponentially because he can’t be wrong.
Which episode?
Edit: oof
- Series 3, episode 4, "The Speech". Sadly, it's also the episode where they convince Jen a box with a flashing red light is the Internet, but it has a subplot where Reynholm un-knowingly dates a trans woman. He finds her stereotypically masculine behavior attractive until he finds out she is transgender and a physical fight erupts between them.
  It's not even on the upper end of offensive comedy about trans people, but when the episode was criticized, Linehan doubled down and has kept doubling down harder for 20 straight years, to the point where he now spends all of his time harassing, dead naming and doxing trans women on Twitter. His wife left him, writing jobs dried up, he's just a miserable has-been Twitter checkmark asshole now.
- https://screenrant.com/it-crowd-controversy-graham-linehan-april-transphobic-bad/
The IT Crowd creator has stated he does not believe trans women are women and that transgender rights oppress women.
I wanted to make some quip about it being typical but actually not all men think this way or assume they know what women think. And I’m sure some women think this way. But it also tells me all I need to know about this tool. Good riddance.
- What it means is that the writer is closer in personality to Douglas than the rest of the cast. And that’s telling.
It was long after the reunion which I realized this and I feel ashamed for all times I’ve rewatched the series since.

The big bang theory was not for geeks or nerds. It was pure shit.

Misogynistic pure shit.
It had a good few first episodes with fun geeky jokes, but it quickly turned to bad jokes and lazy stereotypes and relied loosely on stereotypes to contain the geekyness.
I always felt like it was a show for moms of geeks and nerds that missed their kids once they moved out.

If I had to rate the IT crowd out of ten, I'd give it 01189998819991197253

... 3
- I'll just put all the fire together

No... the IT crowd is a sitcom FOR geeks. That other shit just makes fun of us

I believe this is what happened to Dr Who. When it started it was for science and history nerds, science sounding gobble-de-gook, cos play outfits, very low production values (the infamous duct tape boots). All just good fun.
When it was rebooted the focus had shifted. The Doctor as the cool guy, a Jesus figure, became more and more pronounced. They started to make fun of nerds on a regular bases. Amazing writing and production values, but at some point during the Tennant era I stopped watching in disgust.
- The original Doctor Who was an educational show mostly aimed at school aged children that used a sci-fi gimmick to teach history lessons (much of which are a bit outdated now). They would alternate storylines between future and past settings through most of William Hartnell's run.
  Towards the end of classic Who it was already much more like modern Who than those first seasons.

If you think otherwise, you're head disabled.

The problem with the r-slur wasn't the word itself but dehumanizing mentally disabled people; I guess being more overt about it is preferable, if we have to choose one or the other, but you're not circumventing anything.
- It's a reference to the show, but thanks for the insight my dude.

It’s cuz they work as a team. An IT team. Team, team, team. Team players, each and every one.

do you like saying the word Team, and that picture on your desk, is it of your family?
God I loved that character. Wish he lasted longer, I found his absurdism waaaay funnier than his son's rape jokes.
What a way to go though.
- He was actually a big get to start the show. But only agreed to do the two seasons. But I absolutely would have loved to see where the absurdism went. He had such a dry deadpan delivery that just made it everything he did funny.
You think that's a picture of my family? No! It's the A-Team!

I watched one random episode of BBT after it was recommended to me by a few people. That one episode was enough for me to decide that I never want to see that show again, and also that I should disregard all recommendations from the people who said I should watch it.

I watched a scene where someone posted it without the laugh track and it was super cringey. Semi-related note.. Taking the laugh track out of BBT ruins it, but taking Garfield out of Garfield comics takes it to a new level, see here -> https://garfieldminusgarfield.net/
- Taking the laugh track out of anything ruins it. You are replacing laughter with dead air.
- I do prefer the Realfield edits, that replace Garfield with a normal cat.
  Gives mire crazy cat guy than mental illness vibes.
  https://imgur.com/gallery/realfield-reposts-jMDXG
- You might like the Heathcliffe without Heathcliffe posts right here on Lemmy https://lemmy.world/c/heathcliff
The laugh track alone is enough evidence
- IT Crowd also has a laugh track.

Yes

Exclamation mark

Yes

Exclamation mark

To whom it may concern... No too formal
Looking forward to hearing from you.

No no IT Crowd is a show about sysadmins, not geeks lol. There's a very clear difference.

And Moss was a nerd not a geek. He wasn’t obsessing about comics, videogames etc. like the characters in BBT.
- I also think this is a cultural difference. The comic book obsession seems more like an american thing. In the Netherlands and Belgium there is also a big comic book appreciation, but it's much less about heroism and more humorous.
- Flashbacks to the rett & link "nerd VS geek" music video
- Yeah, it's an interesting difference.
  There was a lot of pop culture references in IT Crowd, all the music posters, the retro computers, etc. but the cast didn't even acknowledge it.
Yes, in the proportion of furries vs weebs.

I've always saw BBT as just a way to re-normalize making fun of neurodivergant people.

I think that's right but at the same time I think you're not doing it justice by implying that's all it is.
And a way of renormalizing misogyny.

If BBT was made today it would be accused of being written by AI. Fully flanderised characters, and endless filler episodes.

AKA "The Chuck Lorre Special"

I watched both, and yes.

I watched none, and yes.
- Start here

In my mind, I still picture this as the archetype of an office's boss inside a boss's office. If it doesn't have the 4th breaking wall picture, then it's a fake boss

- See, a real boss, ready to work for the greater good
FATHEERRRRRRR!!!!!
Ps: that's how you know that J. Jonah Jameson wasn't the boss at the daily Bugle, there was no self referential picture
Chris Morris is a legend. I love Matt Berry but Morris is legitimately one of the most influential figures in British comedy.
- The Day Today and Brass Eye put him on the map.
  Jam is one of those shows that I doubt many people outside the UK would really get.

IT Crowd S02E01 is probably the funniest episode of any sitcom I’ve seen

How did they steal your wheelchair?
Mournfully: “I don’t knooooow”
Cracks me up every time
- “I’m disabled”
  The situation just keeps getting more and more ridiculous and amazing
Absolutely. My favourite of the IT crowd.
Aside from all the hilarity inbetween, the set ups to the last few gags are ridiculous and the payoff is brilliant.
Jen, talking to Roy, figuring out why on earth he's in that wheelchair only to turn around in desperate need of a drink, to see Moss politely ready to serve her at the bar...
"Willys, willys, I like willys" "I love willys..." "What?" "It's I LOVE WILLYS!" "---Sir, would you keep it down!?"
My favourite too, mate. So bloody good.
"A gay musical... called 'Gay'. That's quite gay."
- "I'm disabled."
- “Willys, willys, I like willys!”
  “It’s I LOVE willys”
That episode is a masterpiece
Yes yes. That's my introductory episode for people who haven't seen the IT crowd yet.
https://youtu.be/cj490uNht4o

BBT is a show about smart people for dumb people. The IT Crowd is a show about smart people.

I've watched IT Crowd half a dozen times.

I haven't managed to finish an episode of BBT before I switch it off in disgust.

See also: Community.

Community, IT Crowd, Arrested Development, 30 Rock, Scrubs... The 00's had a lot of great sitcoms. We didn't know how good we had it.
- My name is Earl
  (Since you're including things that began barely in the 00's, I'm going to include things that ended in the 00's)
  Friends
  Frasier
- Community had less than half a season in the '00s, so calling it an '00s show sitcom seems a bit of a stretch.

For sure it's no contest. Did you see that ludicrous display last night?

Cooper always tries to walk it in.

I'll alway remember the time I was hanging out with my GF at her parents house and she mentioned that she was going to play D&D later and her moms boomer-ass friend just immediatly started cackling about how "it's just like big bang theory!!".

There was no joke or anything just "oh, yea I'm going over to xxxx's house to play D&D later". That was enough for me to never bother with that show.

That is the joke to them though. That's literally what the show is like. It's so bad.
- [avengers "I get that reference"]
BBT is a bad show, but that's not a good reason not to watch it, that's just a dumb person who can only relate to reality through media references.
Just to be clear I'm not saying to watch it, but that a stupid person liking something isn't a reason to reject the thing...
- but that a stupid person liking something isn’t a reason to reject the thing
  Historically I've found that to be a very good indicator that I'm not going to like something. I've learned to trust my gut and I've seen enough clips of it since then to know my gut was right.
A older person has heard of DnD because of a sitcom and laughed when they meet someone who plays? And thats why youll never watch the show? I finally gave dnd a chance after freaks and geeks. Which for me was after almost two decades of playing magic.
Dont get me wrong, ive seen a few episodes of big bang and yea nothing you need to watch. But seems an odd reason to write it off if you like sitcoms ... which the more I think about it a lot of sitcoms were nerd comedy. Best dam line out of friedns was alwazy "Ill prove it like a therom!!" And Frazier... And while never as cool as Homer, Lisa was always miles above Bart...
Sorry most of that was not actually in response to your comment. Hope the campaign is going/went well!
- A older person has heard of DnD because of a sitcom and laughed when they meet someone who plays? And thats why youll never watch the show?
  I guess you had to be there. This was not a "laughing with you" situation, and it indicated to me that the show was mostly just making fun of nerdy people so I wouldn't enjoy it. That was enough for me. I've seen enough clips of it since then to know I was right.

I've only seen the one episode of BBT, I think the first one, where a goddamn theoretical physicist spends a whole day forgetting the basic properties of light.

My family stared at me the whole time, expecting me to find it funny. Then THEY got mad at me when I said that was the dumbest shit I've seen in a while. Later I found out that Sheldon uses Ubuntu and brags about it.

But, okay, dumb jokes aside - the show doesn't explore any concepts or situations in new and interesting ways And THAT'S why it's bad.

Shelden uses linux. Hahahaha. That's it. A good writer could make a whole episode about that, alone, and it would be hilarious. Imagine him on internet forums. Imagine him fumbling during a talk because his laptop wouldn't work with whatever vidchat/system/software his hosts used, and getting haughty about it. Imagine Sheldon traveling across the country to "fix" an entire auditoriums tech to run on Arch after his failed remote speech. Walking away all "You're Welcome" as the staff can't figure out how the fuck to use it.

Funny, but now you're talking about the layman being cut out. Ratings won't survive and it dies after one season. But that would be better lol
- I mean, the IT Crowd ran for 5 seasons while actually being funny to people working in the field it portrays, unlike Big Bang Theory which many nerds (not just physicists) find un-funny

While I like IT Crowd it’s unfortunately written by a TERF activist so I will never watch it again. Also explains why there is an episode about a trans woman getting beat up

Edit: before you downvote me maybe lookup what kind of activism Graham Linehan has been doing after he made IT Crowd.

A man so abhorrent his wife and family wants nothing to do with him.
Goddamnit. Father Ted and Black Books too. I won't stop watching because shows are made by more than one guy, I just won't do it in any way that gives him money.
All three of those sitcoms had excellent comedians and writers in the cast, and they don't deserve to have their work overshadowed by one man's terrible views.

I mean people are allowed to like different things. There is no gatekeeping to be done on something as subjective humor

no, but i can gatekeep it for its misogynistic and abelist rhetoric, or its racist depictions, or having musk in an episode.
expressing dislike is not gatekeeping though..?
or am i gatekeeping gatekeeping now?
But yes, I haven't watch BBT but IT is better.

IT Crows was amazing, I laughed to death. Where the bigbang theory was not so funny, too much detail IMO.

IT Crowd was three British goofballs doing elaborate running gags over 24 episodes.
BBT was four creepy bigots and a nice blonde woman doing pop culture references and calling one another stupid for 279 episodes before spinning out an 80s nostalgia prequel series.
It was the difference between a few cherished cleverly crafted comedy routines and endless derivative slop.
Next season might turn out to be IT Pigeons

this thread feels strange to me. anyone else?

I've recently been feeling as though astroturfers have finally discovered lemmy (and recognized their lack of features to detect vote-rigging).
Just a feeling though, and nothing concrete to back it up.

IT crowd 100%

I've usually seen big bang theory compared to jersy shore.

one is a smart show about dumb people, and the other is a dumb show about smart people.

if we follow this logic, does that make it crowd a smart show about smart people?

Moss, how many times have I told you to shave those sideburns?!

People be forgetting that the first season or two of the big bang theory was legitimately very good.

The first season or two of the IT crowd was... oh yeah, the whole show.

IT crowd's best episodes were best-in-class. tnetennba. But it had a lot of meh too.

The thing about the IT crowd is they always try and walk it in

I did not know The It Crew, going through the first episode and I'm quite liking it.

If someone else is curious: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQxUFrtzYaUmbH4EzI4dxqpQt5Dhu_6Gs

I would take the notoriously bad American attempt at the IT Crowd over big bang theory any day

But Silicon Valley is better than either of them.

SV is too real. I was close to Bay Area tech when I was watching it, and that show hit too close to home sometimes.
IT crowd maintains a humorous distance from the really shitty parts of tech and I’m here for it.

TBBT can be an okay show if you don't mind the overused surface level nerd culture references, casual misogyny, and Elon Musk's appearance. Other than that it can be a guilty pleasure of mine.

Are they still pretending that Sheldon is not supposed to be autistic?

He was just cosplaying as the Doppler effect

By far. I think that Big Bang Theory has rotten the minds of lots of highschoolers (that now are at university, or have already graduated)

I remember IT Crowd as having some really funny moments back when I watched it, but also being very hit or miss. Looking back, the episodes with the theater gays and the trans woman were... deeply unfortunate. Also it turned out Graham whatshisface is a full-time transphobe. So it's consigned to the trash bin for me.

BBT, I never saw more than a few episodes and what I did see was very bland tbh.

TL;DR maybe they both suck actually

Not disagreeing that Linehan has some awful opinions and that has leached out into a couple of his writings. But, the theater episode, at no point, makes the fact that people are gay the butt of the joke it's the main characters that are terrible people in that episode, particularly Roy.
It's like getting upset that Father Ted is racist for the episode that specifically makes racists the target of the joke.
- Not at all. My issue was with the portrayal of the characters themselves -- so vapid, touchy-feely, and simply stereotypical of the "theater gay" trope. Plus, after all her opining, whatshername was right about that guy's orientation.
  Also, I found the theater material a bit, uhh... it felt to me like a Rocky Horror parody written by an adolescent person. Yes we're all singing "I love willies" because that's what being gay is about, yahaha.

Still all the normies be watching the big bang theorie.