New comedy trend: Plot over jokes? - Sitcoms Online Message Boards

TMC · 03-26-2015, 01:23 AM

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/26/ar...ambition.html?

Serialized storytelling with a "mountain of plot," as seen on the new Comedy Central series Big Time in Hollywood, FL, may be comedy's next big trend as viewers binging on Netflix shows crave stories with complex plotting.

EmoJoe · 03-26-2015, 01:49 AM

I would argue that serialization in comedy really started with the original run of Arrested Development, which was one of the first comedies that actually attempting story arcs and rewarded viewers with callbacks and ties to previous episodes. Since AD most comedies have had some kind of mild element of serialization, although in general they still tend to be episodic.

I think shows like Kimmy Schmidt strike the best balance with serialization in comedy - it has an overarching plot, but each episode still tells its own story and the focus is still on humor and character over plot. Arrested Development Season 4 was just too much for me, it overloaded itself with complicated storylines (most of which never went anywhere) and in turn was a lot less consistently hilarious than the original run (though part of it was also due to the fact that they basically just didn't bother to edit anything and allowed episodes to run 35+ minutes).

03-26-2015, 01:23 AM	#1
TMC Member Forum Idol Join Date: Jan 09, 2001 Posts: 126,626	New comedy trend: Plot over jokes? http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/26/ar...ambition.html? Serialized storytelling with a "mountain of plot," as seen on the new Comedy Central series Big Time in Hollywood, FL, may be comedy's next big trend as viewers binging on Netflix shows crave stories with complex plotting.

03-26-2015, 01:49 AM	#2
EmoJoe Cool cool cool Forum Addict Join Date: Apr 23, 2004 Location: New Jersey Posts: 71,478	I would argue that serialization in comedy really started with the original run of Arrested Development, which was one of the first comedies that actually attempting story arcs and rewarded viewers with callbacks and ties to previous episodes. Since AD most comedies have had some kind of mild element of serialization, although in general they still tend to be episodic. I think shows like Kimmy Schmidt strike the best balance with serialization in comedy - it has an overarching plot, but each episode still tells its own story and the focus is still on humor and character over plot. Arrested Development Season 4 was just too much for me, it overloaded itself with complicated storylines (most of which never went anywhere) and in turn was a lot less consistently hilarious than the original run (though part of it was also due to the fact that they basically just didn't bother to edit anything and allowed episodes to run 35+ minutes).
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