What shows have you grown out of, or has society grown out of? Were they popular in their time? Were they not so much? Why do you feel like they’ve aged? I’ll leave mine below
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Pretty much any cop shows.
Monk, NCIS, whatever. They’ve got so many narratives that are basically: it’s ok for cops to ignore laws so they can get the bad guy. Somebody else in the thread mentioned Frasier for the misogyny, and that reminded me there’s also an episode where the dad talks about being proud of lying on the stand to put someone in jail.
Ugh a warrant?! We don’t have time, he’s the bad guy and we need to get in there now! If you hold up the process DA then you’re responsible!
Gullible viewers: “Yeah! Stupid DA, holding up the perfect bold cops by… respecting the 4th amendment”
I don’t watch much bad television, but two shows come to mind.
The first is Walker, Texas Ranger. It’s basically “Excessive Force: The Show”. To be fair I got into the show as a kid in the last 4 seasons so they define the show to me, and I saw the first few episodes of the show with my family earlier this year and they’re not as bad as the later episodes. But still, it’s just…awful. Running around kicking bad guys without probably cause, beating up people when peaceful means are necessary, and bad guys resorting straight to violence without running away or trying to lie their way out of a situation, it’s all very cartoonish. Not to mention replaying every one of Chuck Norris’ roundhouse kicks three times.
The second is The Carmichael Show. It’s actually excellent, and probably my favorite modern multicam sitcom. On a sidenote, if there’s any modern spiritual successor to All in the Family, it’s this show. Anyways, it’s based on Jerrod Carmichael’s life and family (if loosely), and a key catalyst for the start of the show is that Jerrod has a girlfriend who has just moved in with him. It feels a bit off since he’s come out as gay.
I’m rewatching How I Met Your Mother. One of my favorite rewatch shows, especially when I’m feeling a bit low it’s a feel good show.
But man has it not aged well. Spoilers ahead if you care:
Barney is just sexist, flat out. What I (and most Americans) thought was funny 15 years ago is just not anymore, how he thinks women are just dumb items to be used makes my stomach turn just a bit now. They redeem it a bit later with him realizing why he was like that with past trauma, but that doesn’t make up for several seasons of that behavior.
Ted was a lovable romantic when I first watched, but now he seems just as bad as Barney, if not a bit worse. At least Barney is obvious about his womanizing, Ted is with dozens of women, and lies just as much as Barney does all while whining about not being able to find true love.
Robin and Marshall are pretty fine on my radar, both have issues, but nothing huge in my book.
Lily is probably the worst character, and just a straight up narcisist. Her problems are always the most important problems no matter what else she goes for. The biggest ones I have seen
- Saying yes to marry Marshall, then not telling him of her worries and just up and leaving
- Coming back to Marshall and being surprised when he doesn’t just jump at the opportunity
- Being mad at Ted who put Marshall back together after she left
- Hiding what seems to be tens of thousands of dollars of Credit Card debt from Marshall, even into their marriage
- Pushing Marshal to take jobs he hates to continue hiding her credit card debt
- Puts Ted’s career in danger for her own selfish reasons (with his Boss’ baseball)
- Continuously breaks up anyone she doesn’t personally approve of, this happened multiple times to Ted, she attempts to break up Robin and Barney, and does it a few other times in the show
- When Marshall finally is happy in his corporate job (that again she pushed him into) she has this meltdown realizing he’s gone corporate and literally says “I want you to be the person I fell in love with”. What?! Who says that about their spouse?
- When Marshall does change his values and decides to leave said corporate job, he is un-employed for a few months. (Few months). Lily has a meltdown in this time and abandons him to go on a solo trip to Spain saying he “Doesn’t pay attention to her anymore”. So lose-lose for Marshall. Then we’re supposed to clap and be happy that she decides not to go after abandoning Ted at the airport.
- My number one hated one, she comes up with the “8 or higher” rule when she does have a child. Nothing her friends say is relevant to her unless she and Marshall deem it an “8 or higher”. It doesn’t matter if it was a breakup, or someone needed some support, or whatever, unless it was life altering it was not important.
Lily is one of the worst characters on television. She is manipulative, constantly plays the victim card, and is arguably worse than Barney. This didn’t start out as a rant against her…but here we are. Now that I’ve seen it, I can’t unsee it.
Wow, very Interesting comment, thanks
Over the last few years I did some stretches of a lot of 90’s and early 2000’s sitcoms.
In regards to the ones I now cant stand: Home Improvement, Everybody Loves Raymond and King of Queens tops my list. I adored those shows growing up, now I wouldnt watch bored flicking through the channels.
Was very surprised how much I ended up loving some I hated growing up. Seinfield, 3rd Rock from the Sun, and Frasier, just to name a few.
I feel like everybody loves Raymond was bordering on aged when it premiered.
Third rock is on my to-watch list, I’ll have to bump it up. I agree with you on the can’t watches. You can tell Home Improvement just wanted to solidify male toxicity as a normal thing, albeit they goofed with it a bit, and at least Jill went on to get her doctorate - but there were still very much gender roles throughout the show. King of Queens is just… annoying now, the only positive is when Patton Oswalt is on screen. Everybody Loves Raymond I’ll admit is a comfort show. Not for it’s award winning acting or anything, but I still find it a chill veg-out tune-out show.
3rd Rock is quite good. Definitely a product of its time, it has what appears at first to be all the same poorly-aged sentiments, but almost always with the purpose of parodying how backwards and savage that behavior is
a lot of ’90s and early 2000s* sitcoms
My girlfriend is rewatching the Big Bang theory. Not a fan of the laugh tracks, but even beyond that the humor seems quite dated and offensive due to using a lot of negative stereotypes: ableism, sexism, racism, etc
This was a hard one for me, the show definitely started as “Let’s laugh at the nerds”, and for me I was like “Oh great, let’s just normalize my bullying growing up”. Then they had to pivot because thanks to Marvel now nerdy stuff was cool, and then haha isn’t it fun being nerdy?! I never got over that. These guys make a ton of money and are incredibly smart, but the laughable thing is they like Star Trek. Swap out nerds for other groups of people and you quickly realize how offensive it can be. “Lets make a show that shows _____ group of people and laugh about their love of ______ because it’s not normal”
Hey now, they did not make a ton of money. The only one living alone had wealthy parents. I’m pretty sure they covered the whole research doesn’t pay well thing a few times. You’re right about the early seasons though, they were very much insulting nerd culture. The later seasons seem to be more a generic dating sitcom with the occasional nerd joke.
Yes, definitely agree. My girlfriend is aware about those issues, but she knows the show so it’s just a way for her to unwind after work
Yeah, definitely what I still do with sitcoms. Ignoring the obvious flaws as a way to unwind
I found the show offensive when it started because I don’t care for how they made fun of the neurodivergent. It grew on me but I never became a big fan. Betting it didn’t age well
My brother in law loves that show but I’ve always thought it was pandering at best and outright stupid most of the time.
Anything with a laugh track.
Fucking Bones.
When it was spread out week by week, over multiple seasons, it was easier to miss how horrible the writing was.
They turned every character into a one dimensional caricature about midway through the run. And, when you watch it binge style, you realize that Booth was a major asshole. Just shitty to any of the other men, despite claiming to be friends.
Any good examples? It’s been a long time since I watched
Bug boy. That’s what Booth called Hodgins (spelling?) right up to the end of the show. The same thing he called him at the beginning when swinging his fbi dick and trying to intimidate people. He was constantly trying to pull top dog shit on Sweets.
Bones herself went from a fairly believable scientist with friendships and an understanding of people to being either the absent minded professor that’s behind the times, or (as some people have phrased it), an autistic savant with no ability to understand basic human interaction.
Angela stayed pretty consistent though. So did Cam.
Frasier. So much misogyny.
I didn’t discover frasier until ~5 years ago, but I just love it.
The character frasier is definitely misogynist. But isn’t that the point? Laughing at a pompous and deeply flawed individual was the whole idea, I thought.
I didn’t discover frasier until ~5 years ago, but I just love it.
Same, I grew up knowing about Frasier, but it’s always “old bald man” show to me. But several years ago (7ish?), I was bored and started a nostalgia trip and I loved it. Frasier and Niles is just perfect. I took a few year break in between and binged it about 3 years ago.
Anything by Graham Linehan. He put out some excellent tv, then when he got a social media audience reveals he’s a gigantic TERF.
Going back, you can start to see it in his work.
Rules of Engagement. There’s so many really bad gay jokes. There’s episodes where half the jokes are just say gay as the punchline. Most everything else is pretty generic sitcom.
Seinfeld and Friends. Products of their time, and they need to stay there.
Seinfeld is for sure hilarious, in context of a 90s show. I don’t think it would work at all now
30 Rock
As the kids say: it just hits different 🤷🏼♀️ Maybe I was just too young & naive to understand what it portraying was when it came to racism & sexism.
You can take my werewolf bar mitzvah from my cold dead hands
I never watched it originally, but having seen most of it later I just don’t find it that funny. The show wasn’t as clever as it thought it was.
I can still enjoy it, but there are definitely things in there that would not fly anymore. I try to take it in stride, that we should be happy that those sort of jokes aren’t okay anymore, but I still cringe at some of them.
I agree w you 100% 🥴😵💫😅
