A new guilty pleasure

I’m going to admit to something but you can’t tell anybody. For years I’ve been saying that I hate all American sitcoms - they just don’t get comedy (with the exception of The Office US which is a British creation anyway). But that isn’t the revelation.

What I’m going to tell you is that … well I actually like an American sitcom - it’s brilliantly funny, really clever, sweetly geeky and full of ‘references’ that make me smile.

It’s not overly and painfully scripted like some US comedies can be and it has a brain.

You may even have already spotted it - I started writing this post after the pilot episode aired but got sidetracked - well we’re now about six episodes into the UK broadcast schedule and I still love it - so decided now was the time to stand up and tell you all that I love the ‘Big Bang Theory‘.

It’s basically a show about two flats - on one side you have a couple of geeky/nerdy theoretical physicists who’ve lived there a while and on the other side you have the hot blond girl who’s just moved in.

From the description it doesn’t sound great - before watching it I pictured the girl laughing and making fun of the guys and the guys doing insanely stupid, stereotypical comic geek things - I was wrong.

The girl lets US the audience laugh at the geeks (or in my case feel sorry for them / remember those times myself / agree with a lot of what they’re talking about) and actually you get the feeling she really likes them herself - even if she has no idea what they’re saying.





The show uses a number of British sitcom tricks like regular background sub-plot points and due to there being geeky characters - very sarcastic dialogue.

I have good feelings about the rest of the series and really hope it continues to live up to the early brilliance.

In fact I think it’s a testament to how much I like the series that, despite the US broadcast being about five episodes ahead of ours - I still haven’t given in to downloading it - instead preferring to wait for the high quality broadcast version on Channel 4.

The other thing brilliant about the series is that it has a top quality, sung theme tune from a known band - the tune is called Big Bang Theory and is by the Bare Naked Ladies (yes I’ve downloaded it from iTunes).





You can legally download it for £1.89 per episode from the iTunes store or you could probably get it from 4OD as a rental although I haven’t got 4OD installed anymore so I don’t know for sure.

It’s probably a post in its own right but the reason I no longer have 4OD installed is because the iPlayer and ITV.com have shown me that a better model is the web stream model over the separate app download model so until Channel 4 move online I’m leaving them alone - I used to pay to rent a fair bit as well.

Great post by Gareth McLean over on his Guardian TV Blog asking if the Massive American Studio Sitcom is dead (like Friends).

Share/Save