Of the old-school style sitcoms with the audience/laugh track my favorites are: Fresh Prince Yes, Dear (most underrated sitcom of all-time, IMO) How I Met Your Mother I like Seinfeld, but I'm kinda sick of it at this point. I can tolerate Raymond, but that Debra is a real b****. It's a real shame too, cause I'd like to pork her. I can't lump shows like Modern Family or Sunny into these shows. They're a different animal...and well, superior. I'm happy to see more shows move away from the typical format.
I am in the tiny minority of Clutchfans who isn't a Seinfeld fan. I should have been right in Seinfeld's wheelhouse cause I was a single guy, I flatter myself to think I have a plus IQ and I can be a little snarky. In the end I just didn't feel a "rooting interest" in the show, the characters didn't care much for what happened to anyone else, so I didn't care much what happened to them. ELR I sometimes watched, but Debra was such a shrew and her "who can be more overbearing" contest with his mom made me want to send poor Raymond the sportswriter who never attended a game on a long road trip. Also, I never could get over where exactly the kids were when all the adults were gathered together in 80 percent of the episodes and the kids were nowhere to be seen. Of the 3 the first 6 seasons of the Simpsons were very enjoyable.
i think this should be Seinfeld or News Radio. Everybody Loves Raymond was okay but imo Seinfeld is on another level. I don't really like the "clean" shows though. Curb Your Enthusiasm trumps Seinfeld imo.
I actually really like this show as well, I always watch it on TBS But, Newsradio is the most underrated of all-time, it's the only show that can hold its own with Seinfeld.
For seinfeld, the simpsons is nowhere close to seinfeld. I don't know anyone that doesn't love seinfeld, I know plenty of people who don't like the simpsons at all.
Seinfeld lasted 9 seasons, the Simpsons is in season 21. I understand why people might not like the recent Simpsons, I haven't liked the past several seasons. But for me, the first 9 seasons of Simpsons > Seinfeld.
Newsradio is awesome (and I should've listed it on my favorites), but there are a lot of people out there who love that show. And almost everyone is familiar with it, at the very least because of Phil Hartman. It's definitely underrated (especially the Jon Lovitz episodes, which weren't bad, just different) but Yes, Dear is never talked about when it comes to funny sitcoms, and most people haven't even heard of it.
seinfeld might be the greatest sitcom ever (up there w/ i love lucy, threes company, mash or cheers). ive seen every episode multiple times and i still watch it regularly. ive actually never watched a full ep. of raymond and if i tallied up all the time i have spent watching while channel surfing it would be under 5 minutes.
Well, we sure know the demographics of this site based on the poll. I Love Lucy, no matter how sexist and silly (and, in some cases, dated, but that reallly doesn't make sense- don't all shows reflect their times??) it can be, is the king of comedy. Yes, The Honeymooners was classic, too, but it was too short. ILL- there are just too many funny moments- and that was the first ensemble cast that really made it work. Then, you had All in the Family- the malapropisms along would make you laugh out loud (you know, Archie Bunker saying stuff like "constipation" instead of "constitution")- plus it was very radical at the time. Good Times, Three's Company's- great stuff from the 70s. Then, Taxi and Cheers- great, great casts- Reverend Jim, Latka Gravas, and Louis DePalma were three of the best sitcom characters ever created (put it this way, without Reverend Jim, there would be no Kramer). Friends was pretty cool, too. Seinfeld? Very funny. But even with Archie Bunker, arguably one of the most racist and insensitive characters in sitcom history, you saw moments of the humanity come out. Seinfeld, as someone else mentioned, had characters that were very funny, but very hard to like - well, maybe. Same with It's Always Sunny.. but some people don't mind that at all. What I really liked about The Office was the first episode of Season 2- The Dundies. Funny stuff throughout- Michael doing OPP, the Bushiest Beaver Award instead of the Busiest Beaver Award, etc. Then, that jerk throws the food at him, Michael shuts down, and Pam and everyone else cheer him on to continue. It's moments like that, among all the humor, that make The Office one of my personal all-time favorites. It's a clever comedy with heart. Yeah, yeah, heart, schmart. I just prefer a comedy that has its few moments of drama among the comedy (e.g. Mash). But it has to be funny. Raymond? Hmm, not for me, personally. But I can see its appeal.
I think Everybody Loves Raymond is awesome, I like to watch it, but Seinfeld its on other level. I love Newsradio and Frasier, those are amazing TV shows
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if you took a national poll (or global) of favorite shows seinfeld would probably come out #1. it would at least be top 3. would everybody loves raymond even crack the top 20? top 50? and its no exaggeration to say that seinfeld has had a beatles-esque impact on american culture and vernacular. look at all the words and phrases that came out of that show which are still in use today... "not that there's anything wrong with that!" "sponge-worthy" "man-hands" "shrinkage" "no soup for you" / "soup nazi" "master of my domain" "double dip" - "you dipped the chip, took a bite...and dipped again" "serenity now" / "hoochie mama" "festivus" "stop short" and this was all just off the top of my head! what other show has had this kind of impact on the way we talk?
As of right now, 18 people have voted for Everybody Loves Raymond over Seinfeld. I'm just going to assume they either misclicked, or they misread the question.
Raymond's great, but seinfield is just on a different level. It's like Aaron Brooks and Michael Jordan. They're both good ball players, but the latter is just so much more superior you can't even compare.
A previous poster is correct about I Love Lucy being the greatest (and funniest) American sitcom of all time. Just watch some of the clips. It's timeless.