A few articles ago I spoke about brilliant television shows that were axed to make way for horrendous television that seems to flourish these days. Chief amongst those examples was a show that ran for three struggling seasons, lost the Emmy for best comedy to (no sh*t) Will and Grace, and then died a quiet death to the dismay of a shocked audience. In my mind, this was the funniest show ever made (along with It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, which I will review later), and that show was… was Arrested Development.
I doubt you have ever seen this show, but I guarantee you have at least heard of it. During its short time on television this show was able to generate an image as one of the most original comedies to ever come out, and since its demise it is now often referred to as arguably the greatest comedy ever made (even more than Seinfeld). It also created a fan base so loyal and so fanatical that every time the series faced cancellation the fans would plead, march, and protest outside Fox in the hopes of renewing it for just one more season.
How was this show so well regarded? In my mind, it was because quite simply, it just plain got everything right. It starred the greatest comedic ensemble ever brought together and headed by a rebounding Jason Bateman, it was written by Mitchell Hurwitz (who would later go on to create It’s Always Sunny in Philidelphia with Robb McElheny), it was produced by film legends Bryan Grazer and Ron Howard, and was even narrated by Howard himself. It even won several Emmys for the first season it was on, but began getting shunned when the Emmys realized they were supporting a failing show.
The show centered around a wealthy family trying to cope in the middle of an economic crisis when their accounts are frozen after their patriarch father is arrested for a myriad of shady charges. What’s different with this show is the fact that this family is comprised of HORRIBLE people, and even though they occasionally show moments of humanity and likeability they are generally selfish, obnoxious, or idiotic. The mother of the main character is a condescending and verbally abusive drunk, the sister is a histrionic and self centered liar, the older brother is an idiotic magician, and the younger brother is… well… special. The only decent person in the family is the main character Michael, but even he has moments where he demonstrates a selfish nature and has a habit of neglecting his son’s wishes.
What really sets this show apart from other comedies however (and the reason it is so brilliant) is the style of its comedy, or rather the maturation of it. This show doesn’t typically follow the style of most shows on TV where it follows the basic “Setup->Payoff->Repeat” process of TV comedy. Instead of an immediate payoff followed by a laugh track, the show tends to allow the joke to linger and age so that the payoff is done in a much more rewarding way. What do I mean by this? Well it’s time for a little lesson in comedy.
In the world of comedy there are basically two different ways to elicit a laugh. The first of these methods is “the gag”, which typically consists of a quick, simple sight that the audience finds funny. This can be anything from the simple “guy falls down and goes boom” shtick which is so prevalent in Adam Sandler style films:
to “visual gags” that were made famous in films like Airplane:
to recurring gags which are actually repeating gags that become funnier the more the audience is exposed to them:
Don't you dare pretend that you don't know the name of this look.
Typically gags are the easiest laugh to elicit and are regarded as immature and trivial if used poorly or too frequently, much like “pop out and create loud noise” scares in scary movie. Arrested Development uses gags in their comedy, but they are typically clever and well done sight gags and never really devolve into “man fall down… go boom” comedy. The show also uses them sparingly, or more importantly, to advance the story. For example, in a scene where Gob falls into a pool it isn’t the fall itself that is funny, but the fact that he is carrying a cooler full of exonerating evidence which is then promptly destroyed.
The second way to tell a joke or elicit a laugh is the harder and more rewarding “Setup->Payoff” technique, or the “punch line”. Typically this technique is exactly what it sounds like, where someone will say a line or setup a situation, and then down the line (either immediately or after a longer period of time) something will happen as a payoff to the initial setup called a punch line, drum roll, cue laugh track, repeat. The longer the period between setup and payoff, the funnier the joke typically is, but if you wait too long for the payoff, then you risk the joke growing stagnant or being forgotten. This is a surprisingly delicate setup, but typically the bread and butter of almost every decent sitcom on television, and it’s also the workhorse for Arrested Development.
Where Arrested Development really shines though isn’t so much in the execution of the joke, but in the perfectly matured delivery of the joke. Where most sitcoms have a setup with an immediate payoff, Arrested Development takes risks and allows a joke to build steam before the payoff is finally executed. The maturation period between jokes vary, but some of these jokes have payoffs that the viewer won’t even see coming until the end of the episode, and I can think of several jokes that take so long to reach the punch line that the viewer doesn’t even know that they’re jokes. During one season one of the biggest story arcs revolved around a main character being retarded (no, not Buster), but the audience wasn’t aware of this fact until about halfway through the season. As a result every single line this person had spoken takes on a new light and pays off in ways the audience didn’t even expect.
Another direction the show sometimes takes is a combination of the “setup-payoff” structure and the “repeated gag” structure. For example, a quick joke will be told which is initially funny, but as the payoff is repeated and applied to other situations the result is much funnier than the initial payoff. Any person who is lucky enough to have seen the show will know just how funny these seemingly pointless moments are, such as:
The Charlie Brown Theme
“Her?”
“But where did the lighter fluid come from?”
Microwaving a Ding Dong
“Who’s Anne?”
“I’m Oscar… dot com.”
“Look at banner Michael!”
“So say goodbye… to THESE!”
“There are literally dozens of us!’
“Who’s the ‘her’ in that sentence?”
Finally, the last major comedic component that helps put this comedy in a class of its own is the fact that there are just plain SO MANY jokes. When overusing jokes like crappy shows tend to do they run the risk of becoming obnoxious. Shows like Whitney or Will and Grace were notorious for this, where their laugh tracks were so overused that anyone at home watching ended up not understanding what the hell is going on, or feeling insulted that a show was prompting them to laugh at something that just plain wasn’t funny. Arrested Development gets around this problem by:
A. Not using a laugh track
B. Having the jokes be genuinely funny
C. Filming the actors reactions rather than using the awkward “pause for laughter” effect
There are so many jokes on this show that it literally gets funnier on repeated viewings. Many of the jokes are so well scripted and subtly delivered that the viewer may not even notice them initially. I can think of one joke where Michael remarks about the detail of television shows, and in response Tobias says something along the lines of “You know those Hollywood shows, there’s always so much detail in them”. After saying his line he opens up a food cupboard which contains nothing but a single bowl for him to pull out on cue, and a Starbucks coffee cup that a stage hand left behind on the set, but it’s kind of hard to see these items. It’s so subtle that most viewers would miss it, especially since most jokes on sitcoms these days are always hitting you over the head with the punch line. Even better is that a minute or so later another character opens the cupboard and we the audience are treated to seeing him pull out a candy bar that wasn’t there a moment ago, it’s just so brilliant!
All these components together make for a great recipe, but the catalyst that puts it all together is the talented cast of genuinely funny comic geniuses. Every single person on this show is perfect in their role, whether it be a surprisingly funny Jason Bateman in the lead, or David Cross as a less than subtle closet case/wanna be actor, or Tony Hale as a special needs social pariah who is overly dependant on his mother, or Jeffrey Tambor as the lying, conniving patriarch of the family who may or may not be innocent. My personal favorite was Will Arnett (who I personally believe to be the funniest man alive) as the self-obsessed failed magician brother Gob, and sadly (or happily?) I believe that Gob Bluth will be the greatest role Mr. Arnett ever play.
So how could this show possibly have failed? Well, for such a brilliant and well made show, there were surprisingly a lot of reasons. First of all, this was not a show for the popcorn munching, Whitney watching masses. Not to sound condescending, but if you try to make a sitcom that is different than the other generic cookie cutter sitcoms out there you better be on a cable network if you want any security. I don’t want to sound condescending (which I totally am), but typically people don’t like different things, and watching a show as intelligent and original as Arrested Development makes them feel uncomfortable that there isn’t a laugh track or something available to prompt them to laugh. This type of comedy can sometimes distance a viewer, and it’s a big reason why many of the best regarded comedy films or television comedies aren’t initially well received (Arrested Development, Zoolander, Big Lebowski, Tropic Thunder, the first Austin Powers), but begin to spread in popularity upon repeated viewings.
When writing about Fringe I mentioned that one of its biggest problems is that the since the show is perpetually moving forward it’s very hard for new viewers to be able to tune in and enjoy, and sadly this was the same case with Arrested Development. This is one of the first sitcoms I can think of that had a story arc that was truly advanced through each episode, and while it paid off big with great character arcs and an intriguing story, the problem was that the average viewer might jump in about eight episodes deep and scratch their heads at what was going on. This led to a fan base that never really had a chance to grow, despite the great word of mouth that everyone was hearing about this show.
I’d love to say that Fox dropped the ball and cancelled this show before it even had a chance like it did with Firefly, Family Guy, and so many other great shows, but that isn’t the case here. This show was brought back from the dead several times because Fox saw a lot of potential in it, it just didn’t catch on the way it should have (there was even an episode of the show where the premise was a thinly veiled reference to this fact). Luckily for everyone the show is ready to make a comeback, as Netflix has bought the rights and plans on releasing at least two more seasons of the show followed by a big screen adaptation. This makes fans like myself giddy for a show like I never could have imagined, and soon everyone will have another chance to enjoy the greatest comedy ever made.
