The Fifty Best Sitcoms Ever - Part Four (20 - 11)

 

Good morning and welcome to another exciting entry in my definitive, unarguable list of the best 50 sitcoms ever. 

The list is the result of me and my wife working together, trying to find a compromise between our differing tastes, reckoning that the result would give a perfect balance between our often opposing worldviews. 

What has actually happened is that we've created a kind of monster - a lopsided, insane creature that rampages through the concept of good sense, destroying all in its path. It tosses perfectly good shows into the lake, while clutching some really odd choices close to its chest, growling at anyone who suggests that maybe they're not that good.

This is part four. Part one is here, part two is here, part three is here. 

And now, because the world is cruel, comes part four. I warn you now - you're probably not going to like it. 

20.

The Good Place         2016 - 2020       Netflix

Not a bad start. This definitely deserves its ranking in the top 20. The Good Place has a startling and original premise for a sitcom. Eleanor (Kristen Bell) has died and gone to Heaven. That's where the show is set. That's the Good Place. It's a sort of day-glo paradise village, where you can do what you want. If that's not good enough, it's presided over by sitcom royalty Ted Danson, proving that Sam Malone was not his only brilliant trick. 

Except, right - Eleanor is not really meant to be in The Good Place. She was a bad, bad girl and she's only there because of an admin error. So here we have a pretty solid set up for a show. She's got to pretend to be good, which is funny to watch because she is, by inclination, selfish and a bit mean. There's also fun to be had with the 'Heaven as an administrative system' gag. And there are some fun supporting characters in Eleanor's fellow Good Place residents. 

All of which would have probably got it a place in the top 40. But there are several wrinkles which elevate it. One is the way the show develops over its seasons. This is not a sitcom that stands still, and it pulls of the rare trick of changing up the scenario, while keeping the core of the show - and the characters - intact. Pretty smart. 

The other is that the show uses the concept of 'being good' as a philosophical touch stone. That doesn't sound like comedy high jinks at all, does it? Well, you'd be surprised. Or perhaps you wouldn't. All comedy is, at heart, about the human condition and the tensions between who we want to be and who we know we are. The Good Place leans into that heavily, and the result is an absolute joy. 

19.

Extras           2005-2007      iPlayer

I tend to think of Extras as a relatively light follow up to The Office, with less edge and with most of its success coming from a parade of gimmicky celebrity cameos. There's some truth in that, and I would have had it lower down the rankings than its predecessor. However, Wifeface likes Extras better - probably for those exact same reasons, and so here it is.

Rewatching it helps to dispel some of my criticisms. It is gentler, that's for sure, but I think Ricky Gervais deserves some credit for letting it be that way. One of the great things about The Office was that it looked cynical, but actually contained some real warmth and optimism. Balancing those is tricky, and there's great pleasure in watching Andy Millman - Gervais's character here - negotiate the two sides of his personality. 

This is even more clear these days, when Gervais seems to have lost the ability to maintain the balance. His more recent offering, Afterlife, hasn't made our top 50 and there's good reason. It started well, but by the end had become little more than a showcase for Gervais's hectoring put downs on anything he didn't like, along with an inexplicable desire to show how good he was at sports. We get it - you're not as fat as you were in The Office. Sit down.

Back in Extras he still had the comic instincts to put vanity aside, letting David Bowie insult him in front of the world. Let's remember him like that.

18.

W1A        2014-2017     iPlayer

Now. What are you doing all the way up here, W1A? I remember that the wife and I liked you a lot when we watched you, that's fair enough. But look... you've beat Cheers, The Office... Alan Partridge. Does that feel right?

Maybe it's fine. I do recall this being a consistently funny, well observed piece of work that hummed with quiet confidence. It had a great cast, playing characters with strong, distinct personalities and preoccupations. And even though it was primarily about working at the BBC, the concepts resonated with anyone who's worked in any kind of institution. 

Perhaps that's it. This is a brilliantly drawn world of buzzwords, pointless meetings and nonsensical corporate systems. Unlike most sitcoms we don't really have an identification character, as far as I recall. We're just invited to observe the world and draw our own conclusions. OK, W1A... you can stay here, for now. Just don't cause any trouble.

17.

M.A.S.H.     1972-1983    Available to buy on Prime

When I first met Wifeface, many years ago, she was positively evangelical about MASH. I didn't call  her 'Wifeface' back then - that would have aroused suspicion. I called her by her real name, which is, of course, 'Attractive Woman I've Just Met Face".

She loved MASH and she still very much does, hence its inclusion here. I can't really remember much about it. I loved it as a kid, I know that much. Hawkeye - played by the brilliant Alan Alda - was one of my formative heroes, along with  Vila from Blakes 7, Number Six from The Prisoner and Murdoch from The A-Team. Yes, you're right, I was very cool and popular at school. 

I enjoyed Hawkeye's healthy disrespect for authority, and felt that there was a great similarity between his struggles with an uncaring military bureaucracy and my struggles with Mrs. Robertshaw and her constant demands that I did my homework.

Last time I watched MASH, I seem to remember that there was an annoying laugh track, which absolutely killed it for me. Some shows seem weird and bleak without a laugh track - we watched the Duty Free Christmas Special a few years ago, and its lack of audience laughter reframed it as an incredibly sad exploration of a failing marriage.  MASH, despite being an older show than Duty Free, has the sensibilities of a more modern show. You wouldn't put a laugh track on Ted Lasso, and I don't think one belongs here. That's how good it is.

16.

The Young Ones     1982-1984   iPlayer

Oh, The Young Ones. If I had my way, you'd be right up there near the top, looking down on all the other sitcoms and, if we're honest, probably weeing on their heads. You mad, gorgeous, peculiar thing. 

I do not have my way, though. My cruel, cruel wife watched it with me a while ago and I'm sorry to report that she was not that bothered. There was me, bouncing up and down on the sofa, trying really hard not to do all the lines along with Rik, Neil, Vyvyan and Mike, hardly able to contain my excitement at sharing this amazing show with my partner. 

She just sort of stared at it, like a cat looking at the Bayeux Tapestry. What was this and why was it supposed to be good? And for a moment, I saw it through her eyes. Here was an entirely male cast, shouting at each other in a cheap studio set with few jokes and no real story. This was incoherent nonsense, like a child's painting on a fridge had come to life and started swearing at the postman.

And then... Then the beautiful, luminous Rik Mayall said "Hands up who likes me?" and it all came flooding in again. The wonder of being a thirteen year old misfit, finding this incredible explosion of ideas and chaos and thinking, for the first time, "It's here. Something made for me is finally here." It's the very definition of 'You had to be there'. 

I was there. And I still am.

15.

Brooklyn 99      2013-2021     Netflix

I avoided this show for a while. It looked like a very obvious 'American Sitcom about cops'. Which, of course, is exactly what it is. But for some reason I didn't like the look of it. It looked frenetic and loud and full of daft stunts, which felt like it might get wearing after a while. 

I was, of course, quite wrong. Not about it being loud and daft - it certainly is those things. And it doesn't have the same level of wit that defines a great sitcom like Parks and Recreation, for example. But what I'd not reckoned with was the brilliance of the writing. 

The characters are fairly standard - the cop who thinks everything is an adventure, the gruff sergeant, the detective who needs everything to be perfect. But the writing, and some great performances, elevate each of them to someone you grow to love. There's an enthusiasm and joy to the relationships that makes each episode hum and also allows it to, occasionally, touch on serious stuff. 

"Touch on serious stuff".  Name of your sex tape.

14

The Thick of It    2005-2012    iPlayer

I have a vivid memory of watching the first episode of The Thick of It and not liking it. It looked very "post The Office" - cameras swinging all over the place in pseudo documentary style. Naturalistic performances where characters are low-key mean to each other. It didn't look very original and - worse - it looked drab and uninviting.

It's fair to say my opinion has shifted considerably since then. I think a little of that of that is due to the show developing into something more enjoyable. The camera work calms down a little and there's a widening of scope in terms of the characters. But mostly it's about me adjusting to understand the genius of what I was watching. 

Nowadays The Thick of It is most often referenced in terms of real world political events. Barely a month goes by without some governmental calamity being likened to this seemingly prescient TV show. You've got to wonder why all politicians aren't sat down on day one and forced to watch every episode, with someone next to the TV shouting "Don't do any of these things."

This is a breathtakingly clever show, hitting satirical targets with surgical precision while always feeling like a loose, shambolic fragment of real life. Devastating in its social commentary and painfully funny to watch, this is one of the best sitcoms ever made. 

13

Rev       2010-2014    iPlayer

It was quite a while before Wifeface and I remembered to put Rev on our list. It sort of slipped our minds. When we did recall its existence, we gasped in horror, as if we'd just remembered that we had a child and we'd left it behind last time we moved house. How could we have forgotten Rev? 

The answer is that Rev is quiet and unassuming. It bumbles along, much like it's adorable protagonist, Reverend Adam Smallbone, being gently funny and brilliant without really disrupting your life. It doesn't seem to get talked about much, and it seems to have fallen through the cracks of sitcom debate. 

Well. It should be talked about more. It a funny, clever show about human nature. People are excellent and stupid and courageous and weak and a hundred other things, all competing for dominance inside fragile egos. It's not an advert for religion, but it does use it's set up (small church in a big city) to explore failure, forgiveness and community. 

Rev does some work, I think, to pave the way for Fleabag. Maybe I'm just thinking that because of the priest. But I think there's something else - the way it manages to be a consistently funny sitcom, while also nudging against the darker edges of human frailty. It's very good.

12

Community         2009-2015          ITV-X

Wifeface and I find ourselves in a brief period of agreement. Community is great and deserves to be high up on our list. Hurray. Maybe we can go back to our normal lives after we've finished this list, after all.

Community is a show which inspires fanatical devotion, and that was certainly reflected by our reaction to it. It feels like the closest US sitcom has got to something like Spaced - a show that loves geeks and wears its creative, nerdy intelligence on its sleeve. Where a show like The Big Bang Theory parades geeks as objects of ridicule and invites us to laugh at them, this show takes misfits as its primary audience and shows them all the love.

The premise is regular enough. Here is a bunch of people with differing experiences and perspectives, thrown together randomly and forced to get on. In this case, it's a study group at community college. So far, so sitcom. But the show reaches far, far beyond that, letting ideas run wild and having tremendous fun with the very form of television comedy. It's a cine-literate, postmodern explosion of wonder that assumes the audience is as smart as the writers.

We watched this on Sony TV, back in the days when you had to find programmes on 'a channel' and 'record them to watch later'. Yes, like the cavemen did. For some reason the episodes on Sony were edited to the point of being incomprehensible. Maybe when we watch it again, in unedited form, we'll discover that the show is full of incredibly racist and transphobic jokes. In which case, I'm very, very sorry and this was the wife's choice really.

11. 

Peep Show        2003-2015        Channel 4, Netflix

Very narrowly missing out on the top ten, here's one of the best sitcoms I've ever seen. 

Peep Show distils sitcom to its very essence: the difference between how we are on the inside, and how we present ourselves on the surface. Jeremy and Mark are a fairly standard sitcom couple - one is too uptight, the other too loose. There is enormous fun in seeing them muddle along together, but the genius of the show is in letting us inside their heads. The  contrast between their internal monologue and the stuff they actually do and say is at once hilarious, shocking and uncomfortably resonant. That's us, right there, in that contradiction. 

The 'point of view' conceit could easily be a gimmick, but it always remains integral to the appeal and humour of the show. It's odd that this style of filming hasn't bled out into other shows, in the way that the pseudo documentary format of The Office has.

If it's so good, you are asking, why does it miss out on the top ten? Well, you're going to have to ask my wife about that, because apparently she'd rather vote for a load of beautiful Americans being consistently funny, than vote for two nebbish blokes who spend all their time failing and being sad. 

While you're asking her, could you also ask where we keep the weighing scales? I know it's one of the cupboards in the kitchen, but honestly there's so many of them.

There you go - that's all for now. We're into the top ten next, so there's that to look forward to. Here's where to find all the other parts:

Numbers 50 - 41

Numbers 40 - 31

Numbers 30 - 21

Numbers 10 - 1

Also rans

The 50 Best Sitcoms Ever - Part Three (30 - 21)

 

Welcome, weary traveller. You join me in part three of my run down of the best 50 sitcoms - ever! I know, it's exciting isn't it? 

Who'd have thought that the best way to work it out was for me and the wife to settle down in a hotel bar, drink a load of wine and then spend hours scribbling out each other's suggestions in a furious rage?

Part one is here, part two is here, and now, for your enjoyment and erudition, I present - part three!

30.

How I Met Your Mother      2005-2014   Disney

This is a curious show. On one hand, it's clearly massively successful. It got to... what, nine series? It has people in who are proper stars - Neil Patrick Harris, Jason Segel, Alyson Hannigan, Cobie Smulders, Josh Radnor - these people are in films and everything. And on the surface it adheres quite closely to conventional tropes - beautiful people in will-they/won't they relationships.

And yet. It seems to sit slightly outside the world of mainstream sitcom. It's not as cosy and obvious as Friends or Big Bang Theory. It has a more interesting narrative style, playing with non-linear story structures as well as having postmodern fun with the conventions of the form. There's a more frank approach to sex and grown up relationships. And there's some properly dark humour in there too. 

A lot of that dark humour is intentional, Some, though, comes from unfortunate lapses of judgement on the creative side. For a show that's barely ten years old, there seem to be a lot of moments where you think, "Ah, you wouldn't get away with that now." There are some strong female characters in the main cast, but women in general don't generally fair so well. 

However. All round, this is a fun show with great performances, some properly clever jokes and a lot to say about romance. Just avoid the last series, which is garbage and almost invalidates the whole thing. 

29.

The Office (UK)       2001-2003.    iPlayer

Another big difference in opinion between me and the wife on this one. We're starting to see a clear difference, aren't we, between my opinions (wise, intelligent, well thought through) and hers (demented). I tend to like comedy that elicits a variety of responses, not all of them comfortable. She's much more of the opinion that a comedy should make you laugh, not stare at a cushion for ages afterwards questioning everything you thought you knew. 

Writing it down like that makes it sound like I'm the one who's got it wrong, but let's not think about that. Let's rejoice in one of the most influential and well written sitcoms ever. The Office is brilliant. Its characters are sharply written and perfectly cast, pulsing with internal life. The scripts are led by those characters with impeccable logic. And there's perfect use of the documentary format, with half the show's meaning coming from the side-eye glances to camera and the revealing cutaway interviews.

I guess it can be quite hard to watch people being so relentlessly miserable, and so I concede that I wouldn't want all my comedy like this. But there's a warmth at its heart that stops it becoming an exercise in cynicism, and I think that's why its appeal has endured.

28.

Detectorists       2014-2022    iPlayer, Netflix

Some shows blow you away the moment they walk through the door. In they swagger, full of cool ideas and laugh out loud moments, changing your life with their dazzling smile and strong grasp of interpersonal character dynamics.

Some, like Detectorists, sit quietly down without a fuss and just chat to you, gently and without obvious fireworks. You'll smile, sure, and you'll enjoy your time together. But you don't spend the next day spinning around in a cluster of cartoon hearts, telling everyone you've fallen in love. 

Then, one day, you're there, watching Toby Jones and Mackenzie Crook wander across a field, sweeping for metal in the low, golden sun of a Summer evening. You fall into the comfortable, human rhythms of their conversation. And you realise... there's been a smile on your face for half an hour. You adore this world, and you want to stay here. 

You're in love. With two weird little blokes who haven't found what they are looking for, but carry on anyway. 

Watch this. It's delightful.

27.

Uncle        2012-2017.      iPlayer

One of those comedies that loads of people recommended to me, for ages, without success. Then, one day, I watched it, loved it and recommended it straight back to them. It is testament to their patience that they just went 'OK, thanks', rather than murdering me to death.

The titular uncle is Andy - a shambolic manchild who is suddenly called upon to look after his nephew, Errol. They instantly form a classic double act - Errol is as erudite and fey as Andy is slovenly and uncouth. Their interactions are a delight to watch and form the core of the experience.

Also great is that Andy is a musician, and so there are songs. These are sort-of part of the narrative, but often burst out into fourth-wall-breaking showstoppers and are as funny as anything else in the show. 

So, yeah. I recommend it. Unless you recommended it to me in the first place, in which case... I thought it was merely fine.

26.

Motherland        2017-2022    Netflix

This is a fantastic show and if you haven't seen it, you definitely need to get on it. It's about a bunch of mothers who hang out together while their kids are at school, failing in various ways to make sense of their lives. It's not so much about being a parent as it is about trying to work out who you are in the void between dropping the kids and school and picking them up again. 

Our players are mostly women, though we have one bloke in there: the hapless Kevin who is as excluded as the mothers from the world of Alpha Masculinity. That's the real joy of this show - it's written by women and fundamentally exists to explore women's lives through comedy, in the way that men's lives have been for decades. 

Looking at the scoring, I again find that Wifeface has scored this much lower than me. What's wrong with her? Doesn't she know that this is groundbreaking, emancipating stuff? It's literally made for her. I like it, because I'm unusually sensitive for a man. But surely she's, like, legally bound to enjoy it? Look - all the men in it are jerks! Don't women love that? 

Honestly. Emily Pankhurst must be wondering why she bothered.

25

Flight of the Conchords      2007-2009     Sky

If you like nerdy boys singing smart, offbeat, comedy pop songs, well have I got the show for you. Well, I have two - there's also The Mighty Boosh, from around the same time. But I'm less bothered about that. 

I like Conchords better for a couple of reasons. For a start, it seems less obviously designed to appeal to drunk students and spawn a bunch of catchphrases and memes. Boosh is funny, but it's primary intent very much appears to be 'how can I generate scenes that people will quote at one another until 3 in the morning?'.

Secondly, Conchords has better characters, better stories and better songs. The two main characters - Bret and Jemaine - feel like real people. Wide eyed romantics; children in a grown up world, using songs to make sense of the nonsense. And what songs. Both these guys would go on to bigger things, but I'm not sure they'll ever top the sentiments of "I'm not crying / I've been chopping onions / I'm making a lasagne / ...for one".

24.

Garth Merenghi's Darkplace     2004    Channel 4

Some comfort here for Mighty Boosh lovers, who might be feeling wounded by my cruel words above. Here's a show featuring a few of the key players, having some of that mad surreal fun I dismissed above. 

Darkplace is one of those lovely secrets that is an absolute delight to discover. It's like finding a room in your house you didn't know about, full of books and sweets and music from another dimension. It is unlike other shows, and burns with a beautiful, sweet brightness for six short episodes, and then it's gone. 

The conceit is brilliant. Our host - Garth Merenghi - shows us clips of a science fiction show he's meant to have made in the 1980s. That show is a glorious pastiche of  cheap mid 80s TV, with dodgy effects and dodgier acting. By itself that would be pretty funny, but the genius is in Merenghi's 'present day' commentary. He's a vain, deluded man who sees not a mad, cheap production, but a piece of neglected genius.

And he may be right. His show might have wobbly sets, cliched dialogue and plots a five years old would reject as 'insufficiently coherent'. But this is a keenly observed piece of work, shot through with observations about gender representation, the fragility of the artistic temperament and the glory of making something, against all the odds, for love.

23.

30 Rock       2006-2013      ITV X

As we made our list of great sitcoms, sitting in that hotel bar, I confidently put this forward as one of the best. This joyous cavalcade of jokes, this inventive, intelligent string of character moments and callbacks. I sat back and waited for Wifeface to say something like, "Yes, that is a good suggestion. Your ideas are as wise as your face is dignified." Something like that. 

Well, reader. She did not say that. She just pulled an expression which I've come to recognise as, "Yeah... that's fine, I guess. We'll include it, but only because I know you might cry if we don't." No applause. Nothing about my dignified face. Ridiculous. 

30 Rock isn't "fine" - it's amazing. It has an incredibly high gags-per-minute rate, darting between deft character comedy, fun wordplay, surreal cutaways and satirical observations on the production process of TV. It's quite meta, and it leans on style over substance for the most part. But it's consistently funny and thus, for me, one of the best comedies of recent years. 

Anyway. Here it languishes, in more-or-less middle place. I'm sorry, Tina Fey. I guess my wife just hates shows written and performed by women. I know, it's a daily burden, especially for a vulnerable feminist like me. 

22.

I'm Alan Partridge      1997-2002     Britbox, Sky

Another glaring disparity in voting, here, between me (correctly placing this near the very top) and the wife (insanely putting it at the bottom, like someone vomiting on the Mona Lisa). One thing we've definitely learned from this experiment is that she's not as keen as me regarding comedy that makes you bite into your own hand in embarrassment and horror. 

I'm a fan of Partridge in general, so this show kind of stands in for the whole 'Alan Partridge Cinematic Universe': shows like This Time, Mid-Morning Matters and Knowing Me, Knowing You (Aha!). This show is the closest of them to a fully functioning sitcom - the others are all presented as light entertainment shows of one kind or another. 

And I love this. Alan is a great comic creation, made up of tiny, beautiful details that position him in a perfect tension between 'enjoyably specific character in his own right' and 'avatar of all that is shameful about being a man'. Maybe that's why Wifeface isn't so bothered. She already experiences quite enough male fragility in a daily show called 'The husband who believes he is amazing but can't remember where the baking trays live no matter how many times he is told'.

Also this show features Sally Philips, who is as delightful as she is talented. If she was my wife, I bet this would have come higher up. In fact, I bet we'd agree on loads of things. When I suggested this to my actual wife, she felt so threatened that she had to cover her mouth to stop herself weeping with sadness.

21.

Cheers          1982-1993        Paramount

Ah, we're back on safe ground. Here's a show that even me and Wifeface agree on. Cheers is great, and the only people who don't think so are terrorists. You've seen it, right? Load of people in a bar? Everybody knows your name? That's the one.

We started a big rewatch of Cheers a few years ago. It holds up amazingly well, for something that's about four decades old. It's consistently funny, with characters so well written that you quickly feel like you've known them for years. The dialogue bounces along, smart and funny, with a comic rhythm that rarely lets up. When it does, it's to allow a little time for the characters to breathe: little moments of pathos and reflection that make each person a little more real. 

Cheers is like the basic textbook for sitcom, and it informed everything that came after. Why isn't it higher up on our list? Well, I guess neither the wife nor I like the way it promotes alcohol as a lifestyle choice.

Ha. Just kidding. We love drinking, and had to keep pausing our conversation about this list so we could order more wine and crisps. No, the reason is... well I think that Cheers is sort of solid and reliable. It does one thing, extremely well. And it turns out that maintaining excellence over a period of eleven years isn't enough for the exacting standards of me and Wifeface. We're like capricious Roman emperors, the tastes of whom no man can predict. 

So... if Cheers didn't crack the top 20, what on earth did? The answers will definitely annoy you. Find out, here:

Numbers 50 - 41

Numbers 40 - 31

Numbers 20 - 11

Numbers 10 - 1

Also rans

The 50 Best Sitcoms Ever - Part Two (40 - 31)

 

Evening all! 

Many have attempted to compile a definitive list of the best sitcoms of all time. But have they ever done it in a hotel bar, with their wife, based on nothing but vague recollections of things they've seen?

No. They have not. But thank goodness, here I come to redress the balance. What follows is the result of much scribbling on notepads, disagreement and compromise and I think you'll agree, it's devastatingly inaccurate. 

Numbers 50-41 are here, should you be so excited as to pursue them. But now, for your horrified disbelief, are numbers 40 to 31. 

40. 

Toast of London          2012-2020.   Now

This is an odd inclusion, really. In many ways it's not a great sitcom. It's wilfully daft and doesn't do any character work, as such. Nothing wrong with that - it's just not really my preferred mode of sitcom. 

I think its inclusion is testament to the power of Matt Berry's fizzing firecracker of a performance, which makes him impossible not to enjoy. He's a modern day Tom Baker by way of Brian Blessed, exploding through each episode in a Catherine wheel of exciting, flamboyant dialogue.

Massive respect here to Wifeface, for including this even though she knows that the mere thought of it will have me strutting up and down doing bad impressions for the rest of the day. Steady on Toast!

39. 

Friday Night Dinner        2011-2020.     Netflix, Channel 4

A fairly traditional sitcom, the like of which you don't get that often these days. A repetitive premise, with a bunch of mismatched characters forced together in a specific environment; catchphrases and broad slapstick rubbing along together as if it was the early 90s again. This is textbook stuff.

It rises above the herd due to some sharply observed character work and a strong cast. Paul Ritter, in particular, gives us one of the all time great comedy characters and there's a fun turn from Mark Heap as weird neighbour Jim. 

Quotable and easy to watch... this doesn't break any moulds, but its gently enjoyable.

38. 

Modern Family        2009-2020.    Disney, Channel 4

This feels surprisingly low down, doesn't it? A clever, heartwarming show that was genuinely progressive in its attitudes. OK, it was pretty white, but it did a decent job with gender and sexuality. Plus the cast was, for the most part, perfect - delivering even the weaker scripts with emotional dexterity and physical nuance.  

I rated it higher than Wifeface did. She thought it got too repetitive in later seasons, which is fair enough. Though apparently if you say this about Friends you are stupid and wrong and never load the dishwasher properly. 

37. 

Home         2019-2020.    Channel 4

A lovely little tale of an asylum seeker who smuggles himself into the lives of a middle class family and slowly wins them over. A sort of ultra-woke retelling of 'Love Thy Neighbour'. What's 'Love Thy Neighbour'? Well it's a sort of 1970s racist version of 'Home'. 

This didn't get to a third series, which is a massive shame as it was clearly set up for one. We watched as Sami - our asylum seeker - struggled with systems that set him up to fail, while trying to rub along with his adopted family. It was a show that felt important, in giving a voice to the refugee experience, while never forgetting that it was a character comedy. 

36. 

Feel Good          2020-2021.    Netflix

A lot of the comedies on this list tread a fine line between 'funny' and 'incredibly bleak, what were you thinking calling this a comedy, never recommend anything to me again.' Feel Good is perhaps the ultimate example of that. The title is a trick to lure you in, and let me tell you this - 'good' is not the only thing you'll be feeling. No.

It's a trend in sitcom, in recent years, to use the form to explore some pretty heavy stuff. In this case we're talking about mental health issues, gender identity and toxic relationships. Sounds fun, right?

But hold on before you run away for a big comforting mug of Only Fools and Horses. This here show is beautiful, and warm and wonderful and oh so many things. The central relationship - between Mae Martin and Charlotte Ritchie - glows with all the unpredictable, silly joy of real love and there's a sly, dark wit to the whole affair that makes it sing.

35. 

Frasier       1993-2004. Channel 4

I exist in a kind of quantum relationship with Frasier. When I'm watching it, I'm perfectly happy, marvelling at the quality of the character work and enjoying the razor sharp script. I love the way the characters seem to genuinely care for each other, and the perfect balance between intelligent wordplay and well constructed farce. 

When I'm not watching it, I simply can't be bothered with it. It seems smug and repetitive and visually a little bland. So while many people might have this quite close to the top of their lists, I've let it languish down here, where it might be advised to have a think about what it's done. 

For Frasier and Niles, this chart position is the equivalent of a perfectly good table at a middling restaurant. It's good company, but they would feel in their hearts that they should be somewhere better. And the fact that I know that about those characters suggests that maybe it should, indeed, be a little higher up. 

But it's not. How d'you like those scrambled eggs?

34. 

This Country       2017-2020.   iPlayer

This is a documentary style tale of young, directionless people in a small English village, with all the petty frustrations that entails. As far as I'm concerned, it's one of the most brilliant shows made in recent memory, if not ever. 

Looking at Wifeface's scores, however, I was shocked to find that she did not share my delight. What the hell? Hadn't we both massively enjoyed this, and had an incredible time watching it together? Well, apparently not. My memories are a sham! How much else of my life is a lie?

Well don't listen to her. Pretend this is higher up. It's amazing. It doesn't look great at first glance, I'll grant you. I avoided it for a while because the main characters looked very irritating. And they are, I suppose. Very irritating indeed. But as you watch there's a sweet vulnerability to them that really grows on you. I mean, you wouldn't want to spend any actual time with them. But watching them is lovely. 

There's also a sneaky thing, where the pretend-documentary gives you facts and figures about what it's like to be young and have no prospects in 21st Century Britain. Bloody woke BBC - smuggling in socially responsible messages while I'm having fun. 

33. 

Catastrophe       2015-2019. Netflix

Some shows make you feel good about humanity and the possibilities we have for happiness once we surround ourselves with the right people. Others - like Catastrophe - hold a great big mirror up to our lives and simply raise two sarcastic eyebrows. We are jerks, 90% of the time, says the show, and the best we can do is try to find it funny. 

This is a show about relationships, and how they are quite like clinging on to a raft, in a storm, and the raft is on fire, and you have to work out what your raft-partner is thinking or they'll go into a huge passive-aggressive sulk. 

The central couple - played by Sharon Horgan and Rob Delaney - tumble through a romance that is brilliantly, terrifyingly realistic. They argue in a way that is so true to life that I'd advise caution if watching with your partner. Laugh too hard at one of their horrible, hilarious put downs and you'll be getting quite the side eye. 

32. 

Black Books        2000-2004.     Channel 4

A big tick from the wife for this show, and a kind of 'Yeah... OK,' from me. Though why I'm being so grumpy about it I don't know. This is a pretty good show and whenever it's on I'm compelled to watch it. And then I laugh loads and I know all the lines. So what am I even talking about? It's obviously good, and I'm just trying to look cool in front of my friends.

This is textbook sitcom stuff, rejoicing in the conventions of the form. Mismatched ersatz family? Check. Stuck in the same place every episode? Check. Clearly delineated types of humorous reaction to situations? Check! That's bingo - open the wine!

This is good, clockwork comedy that teeters on the edge of surrealism without ever quite going there. If the reality police came in, it could quite easily straighten its tie and say, "Why no, officer. I'm just a show about a perfectly normal bookshop." But there's a wonderful chaos to the whole thing that wins by putting the joke first, every single time. 

And there's room for odd moments of poetry, in among. A wistful Bernard, surveying his musty bookshop through the wine bottles and cigarette smoke, somewhere in between despair and wonder, and smiling... "This is fantastic". Now that's what comedy is for.

31. 

What We Do In The Shadows      2019-2024    iPlayer, Disney

Like the film which spawned it, this is a pseudo-documentary about a bunch of vampires who share a house. As a pitch, it sounds pretty awful - the sort of nonsense you could imagine on ITV in the 1980s, starring Spike from Hi-De-Hi in a set of comedy fangs, saying things like, "I guess that's what I get for suggesting we go out for steak!"

Well, it's not like that. It's very good indeed, and there are no dodgy fangs to be seen. Instead we get a collection of well drawn, believable characters, living in a world that is both wildly supernatural and reassuringly mundane. It's a delicate balancing act, done with such skill that you never question the parameters of the world building. 

After series three I was starting to wonder if the show had run out of ideas, and was starting to tread water a little. Then series four did some cool new things that reinvented the energy of the show and was even surprisingly moving. Well done, you vampires.

So there you go. That's numbers 40 to 31. Don't like them? Write your own list. But don't do it with my wife - she'll just tell you that you're wrong, and your taste is awful, and if you wanted beans so badly why didn't you put them on the shopping list?

Here's the other rankings, for your pleasure and disagreement:

Numbers 50 - 41

Numbers 30 - 21

Numbers 20 - 11

Numbers 10 - 1

Also rans

The 50 Best Sitcoms Ever - Part One (50 - 41)

 

Hello gentle reader. Let me start off by apologising for the title of this article.  The 50 best sitcoms! Ever! What a ridiculous conceit. The egotistical ranting of a maniac. I'll tell you right now, going in: that title is wrong. Even I don't agree with it. 

I considered a variety of alternative titles, such as:

"50 great sitcoms, which may or may not be the best ones, but here they are."

"50 sitcoms you might like, with some notable and probably sacrilegious omissions."

"50 sitcoms which me and my wife argued about for ages and frankly neither of us are very happy with the compromise."

That last one is probably the best one. The two of us recently found ourselves in a hotel bar, with some wine, a notebook and literally nothing else to talk about. Before you knew it we were drawing up a long list of sitcoms, with the avowed intention to whittle it down to the 50 best. We argued. We compromised. We tried to persuade the service staff to side with one of us against the other. We apologised and ordered more wine.

What we have here is the result of a very flawed but quite exciting process, whereby we have created a list which will please literally no-one. This is part one, which deals with the lowest ranking 10 shows in our top fifty. Yes, I know. You already don't agree. Blame my wife for not acquiescing to all my choices, in mathematical order.

50. 

Red Dwarf             1988 - 2020. iPlayer

Well done, Red Dwarf, for making it into the top fifty. I'm sorry you're right at the bottom, but you've still done better than, for example, My Hero, which would have struggled to get into a top 150 and should count itself lucky to be mentioned at all.

Red Dwarf was a very good show to start with, using its sci-fi setting to explore funny and original concepts while rooting its comedy in the lives of its characters. The cast weren't great actors, for the most part, but they had loads of charisma and they were, crucially, fun to watch.

After a while, though, the show got overexcited about the opportunities afforded by special effects and forgot to be funny. Plus there was the problem all popular sitcoms face: how do you keep going for years without reducing the central premise to a series of quirks and catchphrases? In this case, the answer was "I'll have the quirks and catchphrases, please."

The strongest vote for this came from me. I'd enjoyed it a great deal in my youth and it formed a foundational text during undergraduate years, when I thought quoting Kryten was an acceptable substitute for having a personality. The wife already has a perfectly good personality, and was therefore relatively unmoved.

49.

Don't Hug Me, I'm Scared           2022. Channel 4

There was some debate, between Wifeface and I, about whether this counts as a sitcom. It's certainly quite different from a lot of the other shows here. If you've not seen it, it can be best described as 'What if David Lynch made a show for very young children, while refusing to compromise on any of his artistic principles?'

On the surface it's very odd, with puppets and actors dressed as sort-of monsters. Like if you were having a nightmare about the kids TV show Rainbow. The reality of the show's world is tenuous, and it's as often scary as it is funny. However, it has some fairly solid sitcom elements. They live in a house, they're a kind of family, and the humour arises at least partly from their differences in personality. There's a sensible 'mum' one, a full-of-himself 'mad' one, and a comedy 'idiot' one. That's sitcom DNA, right there.

Eventually we decided to include it because 

a) we'd included The Young Ones, which is pretty similar and 

b) I threatened to do a huge, evening-ruining sulk if we left it out.

48.

Stath Lets Flats             2018-2021.  Channel 4

We'd got quite a long way through our initial long list before we remembered this show. When we did we slapped our foreheads and did much theatrical gasping. How could we have forgotten one of the most excellent shows of recent years?

This is one of those shows that we came to late. It seemed like a terrible premise, and had an undeniably awful title. I think it was maybe our housemate who recommended it, and we put it on with a kind of, "Well, I'm sure this will be fine, but I can't imagine OH MY GOD I'M SO IN LOVE WITH THESE PEOPLE'. 

47.

Yes Minister            1980-1984.  Prime. 

There are relatively few 'legacy' sitcoms on our list. The nature of our selection process ('What can we remember while drinking in a bar?') meant that things from years ago got relatively short shrift.

Yes Minister, however, survived our dodgy memories for a couple of reasons. One is that we love to wander through the TV channels late at night before going to bed, and it seems impossible to do so without coming across Sir Humphrey's cunning smile, or Jim Hacker's worried, big eyed frown. And you don't have to hang around for very long before hitting a perfectly scripted exchange, or a lovely bit of character work.

The other reason for inclusion is that this programme is, simply put, class. I may not have watched an episode all the way through in years, but I don't need to, to remember how ace it is.

46.

Big Boys                   2022 - ongoing.  Channel 4 

This is one of the most recent entries on the list, so it's hard to know how enduring its appeal will be. But both Wifeface and I loved it to bits and when it came up we both sort of waved our arms about and cooed with delight, as if someone had spilled puppies all over the table.

There's a myth that comedy has to be hard and vicious and have some kind of target. I think comedy can do that, and there's great joy in seeing the David Brents or Basil Fawltys of this world be punished for their hubris. "Take that, my boss from work in fictionalised form!"

But there's also a real place, I reckon, for comedies that are warm hearted and full of love. This manages to be delightful and compassionate at the same time as making me laugh like a lunatic. 

45.

Arrested Development           2003-2019. Netflix, Disney+

Neither the wife or I have watched this since it was on, so we couldn't really remember what we thought. We seemed to remember liking it for the first few series, and then despising series four. We subsequently turned against the whole show with quite unreasonable venom, as if betrayed. 

It was good, though, I think? I seem to remember the characters being lots of weird fun, all in some form of self denial and with their own distinctive flaws. The plots were driven by vivid, imaginative chaos. And the structure was enjoyable, full of cutaways and repeated gags that built over the series. It came at a time when American sitcoms were doing interesting, experimental things and this was one of the better experiments. 

44.

The Vicar of Dibley               1994 - 2007.    Britbox, Now

Full disclosure, I did not vote for this. I don't dislike it, as such. I've just observed it from a distance and decided it probably isn't my thing. Like Mumford and Sons. I'm sure they're fine, but there's a sort of 'popular but nothingy' vibe to them that I can't be bothered with.

All of which counted for nothing against the sheer ferocity with which Wifeface demanded its inclusion. She was sure she'd seen me laugh at it on a number of occasions, and when she listed those occasions I had a vague flickering of familiarity and the faint echoes of internal happiness. Damn her android-like memory.

Anyway. Here it is. Apparently there's an amusing bit where she jumps in a puddle, and maybe a bit where someone shouts "Moo!" half way through a joke. 

43.

Shrinking                2023 - ongoing.  Apple

Another late inclusion, probably because it was on quite recently and thus hasn't settled into long term memory yet. We also didn't really talk to anyone about it, because it's on Apple TV and so no-one in the world had seen it except me and the wife.

It's the story of a man who's wife has died, and so he decides to start telling people the truth rather than being careful about their feelings. Yes, like in Afterlife, except a) he's a psychiatrist, so it has more profound implications and b) you don't have to put up with Ricky Gervais showing off how awesome he is all the time like a massive insufferable prick.

It's funny, and a bit sad - a lot of comedy is like that now, it seems and I'm totally here for that. And it finally gives Harrison Ford chance to show that yes, he can be as funny as anyone else if you give him the right place to stand. 

42.

Him and Her                2010-2013.     iPlayer

We nearly forgot about this one. It's ten years or so since we've seen it, and though it's very lovely, it's also very low key. The stakes are small, the characters gentle and its more likely to elicit a smile than a laugh.

One thing it really does have going for it: the characters seem absolutely genuine. We used to talk about them as if they were real people, discussing them the next day as if, rather than watching them on TV, we'd spent the evening at their flat. Why was Laura so mean? Was it just that she couldn't articulate her vulnerability? Would Paul go through with the wedding? Should we have them over for dinner? Hang on, no, that's not going to work...

41.

The Simpsons               1989 - ongoing.  Disney

It's hard to have an opinion on The Simpsons, isn't it? It's undeniably brilliant, sure. But there's so much of the thing! Somewhere in there is a sharp, well written show, but it's lost in a ever-present miasma of jokes and ideas that sort of bleeds out beyond the boundaries of the screen, into everyday life. It's less a thing you watch, more a collection of phrases and archetypes which have become part of our shared vocabulary. 

Added to this, neither me or Wifeface had properly seen it for years. What we could remember, we liked a lot. I guess it's probably stuff from the first five years or so. Clever jokes and slapstick humour, all rolling along together with wit and panache. That bit where Sideshow Bob stands on some rakes. That was good. How long ago was that? No, actually please don't tell me.

So... it's here, and it feels worthy, but for some reason we were both a little reluctant to put it higher. Maybe comedy has to feel like it belongs to you, before you can love it? Loving The Simpsons feels like loving the concept of pizza. Yes, it's tasty, and once in a while it's exactly what you're in the mood for. But everyone likes it, so what does liking it even mean?

Anyway. That's the first ten of our top fifty. They're all delightful shows, even the ones I don't really want to be there and only included in the spirit of democracy. Join me at the links below, for more sitcoms that will make you laugh, make you cry and make you seethe with rage at the stupidity of their ranking.

Numbers 40 - 31

Numbers 30 - 21

Numbers 20 - 11

Numbers 10 - 1

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