The 12 Best Comedies of 2012 (if you have the exact same taste as me)

Hello, everyone/no one! I haven't posted in a while, because holidays I'm lazy/was busy with finals then got lazy. But I decided, on this wonderful New Years' Eve, that while everyone else is getting drunk, I'd intoxicate myself with television feelings, like I do most other nights. So, I'll be posting my top 12 TV shows of 2012 and my top 20 TV episodes of 2012.

Here are some disclaimers: I pretty much only watch comedies, so you can consider this a list of the best comedies of 2012. I do watch some dramas (okay, mostly just Mad Men), but I'm not as well-versed in them as I am in comedies. Also, I chose 12 because...I felt like it. Besides, 2012! Get it? Okay.

Anyway, here are the 12 comedies you should've been watching in 2012, according to me.

12. South Park 

2012 wasn't really South Park's strongest year, but it still managed to churn out a ton of pretty damn fantastic episodes that easily rank among the show's best. For a show that just ended its 16th season, that's no small feat, and when you compare to other aging cartoons like The Simpsons and Family Guy, the show's continued strength becomes even more impressive. There are probably dozens of factors as to why South Park remains a viable entertainment option while other cartoons have fallen prey to the DVR delete button, but I'd attribute it to the fact that the show is still interested in pushing itself and its characters to places they haven't been before. In this year alone, the show turned itself into an action reality show for half an episode, put its own spin on "shipping", and even questioned its own influence on morality. As long as the show can keep churning out similarly fresh ideas, it should have no problem remaining the reigning champ of long-running animation on TV.

Highlight Episodes: "Cash for Gold", "Cartman Finds Love", "Raising the Bar"

11. Suburgatory

Suburgatory was a show that I was pretty torn on last year. I loved so much of the cast and felt it had tons of potential, but the whole "city dad moves his troubled daughter to the SUBURBS!!!!" angle seemed so trite, and the show wasn't really putting any new spins on it. Luckily, the show downplayed that aspect of it this year, turned its homebase Chatswin into less of a demonic Stepford Wives-esque world and more of a lovingly bizarre Pawnee/Springfield type setting. But what really made the show stand out - aside from America's favorite family, the Shays - was the way it was able to take Tessa's maturation into adulthood and relationship with her father seriously. The show was by far at its best when it was dealing with Tessa trying to reconnect with her long-lost mother and figure out just where exactly she came from, and how that affected who she is today. Suburgatory still stumbles into over-the-top territory a bit too often, but when it's at its best, mixing its off-beat humor with serious emotional depth, it's easily one of the most compelling shows on television.

Highlight Episodes: "The Motherload", "The Wishbone", "Krampus"

10. Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23

Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 was easily one of the year's most surprising new shows. Its high level of quality wasn't necessarily what was surprising, but rather the fact that an ABC sitcom was allowed to go to places as dark, disgusting, and downright weird as Apartment 23 - or, more affectionately, Bitch 23 - went over the course of the year. The fact that a network that refuses to even air the show's actual title somehow gave the green light to a scene that prominently featured a main character blatantly masturbating in a bathtub is a television miracle in and of itself. Unlike some other shows that highlight their raunchiness, though, there's a lot of talent that goes into Apartment 23, and what makes the show as great as it is is not necessarily its raunchiness, but its excellent performances (especially by surprising comic genius Krysten Ritter), truly unique style of humor, and its way of taking old sitcom plot points and turning them in completely bizarre directions that somehow make total sense in its world. There's nothing else quite like it on TV, especially live-action TV. Unfortunately, that very well might lead it to an early demise, but even if Bitch 23's reign is a short one, the fact that it even happened at all is a pretty amazing achievement.

Highlight Episodes: "It's Just Sex", "A Reunion", "Love and Monsters"

9. Ben and Kate

Few shows have developed an online following as quickly as Ben and Kate, and with good reason - in the time where most sitcoms are figuring out just what the hell they're trying to say, Ben and Kate had already established one of the best comic ensembles on TV, with each character bringing something truly unique to the show's warm, pleasant rhythm. Ben and Kate's strength lies in its authenticity - the show's stakes aren't that high and it never digs all that deep, but it's formed a bunch of misfit characters whose problems and personalities feel real, down-to-earth, and extremely relatable. That's probably why its small but dedicated audience clung onto it so quickly, other than the fact that it's boasting some seriously excellent comic performances from just about every member of its cast. Unfortunately, as dedicated as they are, Ben and Kate's audience does remain very small. Here's to hoping 2013 brings around some kind of turn in fate for the show, because its created such a pleasant world that would be a lot of fun to hang out in for a few more years.

Highlight Episodes: "Kate's Birthday", "Scaredy Kate", "Reunion"

8. The Middle

If there was one comedy underdog in 2012, it was The Middle. Sure, the show's ratings are higher than any other show on this list. But in terms of acclaim and general fanfare, The Middle has slipped quietly under the radar - and that's a bit of a shame, as it's slowly turned into one of the most realistic family comedies in several years, and just a really great sitcom on the whole. It's understandable that the young folks of the internet wouldn't be interested in a family show that airs on ABC and stars Patricia Heaton, but the show has done an excellent job of painting an accurate picture of what it's like to be a family on the brink of economic turmoil - and considering the age we live in, the one where everyone is running around yelling things like "DEBT CEILING!" and "FISCAL CLIFF!" all the time, its message has become incredibly poignant. Still, the show's slow but steady march to greatness needs to be partially chalked up to the Hecks themselves - a flawed but endearing bunch who all have pretty big problems but are able to get past them and become a functional and even loving family unit anyway. With the show going into syndication next year, let's hope people who wrote it off as family-fluff will catch an episode in between Seinfeld re-runs and discover one of the strongest, funniest family sitcoms of our time.

Highlight Episodes: "The Guidance Counselor", "The Second Act", "Christmas Help"

7. Veep

Veep is one of those shows where there was basically no way it could have gone wrong. The Thick of It creator Armando Ianucci creating an American political satire with Julia-Louis Dreyfus playing a frazzled vice president? With Buster Bluth and the girl from My Girl playing her cronies? That sentence alone would be enough to make my "best of 2012" list. The best thing about Veep, though, was its ability to mix razor-sharp satire with extremely strong comic characters. The fun of Veep lied not nesseccarily in its big statements about American politics - truth be told, there weren't really many of those - but in the way it took seemingly powerful, all-important people and brought them to human levels, having them nonchalantly toss around phrases like "fuckload of bread" and...well, various other spins on the F word. It brought a weirdly human level to the annoyingly un-human world of politics, even as it was having its characters make some classically despicable political moves. And of course, so much of Veep's magic comes simply from having a bunch of talented people working in a room together. Sometimes, that's really all you need.

Highlight Episodes: "Frozen Yoghurt", "Catherine", "Tears"

6. Parks and Recreation

2012 was a big year for Leslie Knope. Not only did she embark her on one of the most extensive fictional political campaigns in TV history, she got engaged to her Game of Thrones-loving boyfriend Ben Wyatt and was awarded with the seat of City Council. But if I'm being completely honest, I enjoyed Parks and Recreation the most this year not when it was telling big, grand stories of triumph and victory, but when it was telling smaller, more intimate stories, like Leslie learning she'll have to compromise a bit to be successful in politics, but can still stick to her roots - or April subtly showing she's grown to care about her job and the people in it. Not all of the beats the show hit during the campaign arc worked for me, and there were times where I felt like the story was taking the show off the rails a little bit. But the show always brought itself back around with the small, subtle character details that made it stand out in the first place. Parks is an aging show now, but it's built enough love and respect for its world and the people ingrained in it that it'll have us following them no matter where the show takes them. And that's pretty much exactly the place a veteran comedy show should be. No matter what happens, we'll always treasure the time we get to spend hanging out with the Parks Department in Pawnee.

Highlight Episodes: "The Comeback Kid", "Win, Lose or Draw", "How a Bill Becomes a Law"

5. Louie

I almost think Louie can't be ranked against the other comedies on this list, because what it's trying to do is so radically different from what any show on TV is trying to do. Louie has absolutely no concern with story, or character, or really anything that usually makes TV what it is. Instead, Louie is simply 22 minutes of Louis CK telling amazingly crafted short stories where he lets us in on his view of the world. The show doesn't just disregard continuity - it snarls in the face of it. Character development, storytelling - none of that has any place on Louie. It's a little jarring the first time you sit down to watch it - but it eventually reaches a point where everything is just so damn beautifully crafted that you stop caring about any of those things. And then it gets to a point where you actively enjoy the fact that you can sit down, watch an episode, and have no idea where it's going, because any sort of storytelling convention is completely out the window. You like that you're actually caught by surprise when the end credits pop up. It's a really unique and interesting new spin on the television format, and it'll be interesting to see if it winds up being a trendsetter or an outlier. Either way, Louie is something that's incredibly rare in pop culture - something that's never been done before.

Highlight Episodes: "Miami", "Daddy's Girlfriend (Part 2)", "New Year's Eve"

4. Community

Community had a turbulent 2012. It started the year on a forced hiatus with no announced end date. Then, its creator, the beloved Dan Harmon, was fired right after NBC announced the show would return for a shortened fourth season that would be buried on Friday nights. Right before its planned return date, NBC delayed the premiere until early 2013 - and if that wasn't enough, the troublesome Chevy Chase quit the show just before production on Season 4 ended. All of this turmoil seemed to cause a lot of people to forget that Community actually produced a fairly great run of episodes in 2012. Despite a few missteps, the show carefully put together an emotionally satisfying arc that dug deeper into its misfit study group than ever before, using Ken Burns-style documentaries, 8-bit video game spoofs, and Law & Order homages to tell a really excellent story about how far these people have come since we first met them, how much they've had an affect on each other, and how the influence they've had on one another will stay with them forever. Community's future may be uncertain, but its fans can at least take comfort in the fact that the three excellent seasons it did air were able to build to such an excellent, moving character study. Hopefully Season 4 will continue down that path- but even if it doesn't, and even if 2012 will go down as the end of an era for the show, it'll be an era that ended on a high note.

Highlight Episodes: "Pillows and Blankets", "Digital Estate Planning", "Introduction to Finality"

3. Happy Endings

Happy Endings was the true underdog of 2011, starting off as a generic mid-season replacement that no one cared about only to rapidly and unexpectedly develop into one of the fastest, funniest shows on the air. In 2012, Happy Endings cemented itself into the hearts of comedy lovers everywhere, continuing its delightfully wacky antics and joke-a-minute dialogue while simultaneously adding new comic layers to its dizzying array of hysterical characters. The show has little goal other than to make you laugh and smile for 22 minutes, and it hits the mark perfectly every single time. As the show continues on, though, it's begun to develop its own distinct personality - a perfect example is the fact that it has practically invented its own language through the weird iterations and shortenings of words that its characters use. Watching an episode of episode of Happy Endings is almost like entertaining another universe - a universe where just the way everyone talks is hilarious, and where you're constantly surrounded by people who would be the  "funny one" in any other group of friends. Other shows may make you think more or have better developed character arcs, but there's no show on TV right now you're going to have more fun watching than Happy Endings.

Highlight Episodes: "The Butterfly Effect Effect", "Cocktails & Dreams", "No Ho Ho"

2. 30 Rock

Most sitcoms limp their way to the finish line. Truth be told, trying to mine comedy out of the same characters for years upon years gets to be pretty difficult. But the very best comedies figure out a way to keep the momentum going despite their age, to keep you laughing and loving their characters right up until the end. 2012 was 30 Rock's last full calender year, but it can sit proudly up with the show's prime years as a fine example of the show at its very best. So how? How does a show keep such a high standard of quality after having so many episodes behind it? In 30 Rock's case, the answer came from two different factors - a willingness to go deeper and darker with its humor than it ever had before, and carefully plotted character arcs that brought its characters to their crescendo as 30 Rock neared its sunset. The best example is Liz Lemon, who the show has put through hell on her quest to "have it all" - which only made her first stable relationship, the first time she found someone who actually accepted her, her decision to finally fulfill her dream of having a baby, and her long-awaited marriage even more satisfying. There's still a few more episodes of 30 Rock left, so it remains to be seen if the rest of the show will wrap up as nicely. But either way, 30 Rock is going out with one of its best seasons and one of the strongest final seasons of a sitcom I can remember - and one of the best comedies of our times deserves nothing less.

Highlight Episodes: "Leap Day", "Stride of Pride", "Mazel Tov, Dummies"

1. New Girl

No comedy had a more exciting 2012 than New Girl. The show debuted last fall to huge numbers, but most critics wrote it off due to its obnoxious advertising campaign and middle-of-the-road pilot as a soulless Zooey Deschanel star vehicle. Most comedies likely would've been completely fine with this, ranking in their huge numbers and carrying on. But despite its rocky beginnings, it was always clear that New Girl wanted to be something more than that. And in 2012, the show rapidly turned the corner - it brought out the talented members of its comic ensemble, toned down Deschanel's performance while simultaneously bringing out the best in her, and started working its way toward being a comic character study of a bunch of weird, lost 30-somethings who have nothing to rely on but each other. The show slowly started to earn back all of the people it had lost by churning out strings of excellent episodes that no one would've ever believed the show was capable of when it first started. This can be attributed to many things - creator Liz Meriweather's dedication, some truly excellent writing, but perhaps most important is the the chemistry between the show's ensemble, who - much like their characters - each have their own unique vibe and personality that they add to the show's whole. Watching New Girl grow from a troubled young show with a lot of potential into a legitimately excellent comedy has been pretty incredible, and while maybe the show isn't technically the very best comedy on TV right now, the journey it took me on this year was more rewarding than any other show this year, and that's why it's getting top honors on my list.

Highlight Episodes: "Normal", "Fluffer", "Eggs"

Notable mentions:

• Archer - Admittedly, I've just started watching this and haven't made it to the show's 2012 offerings yet. But considering I assume I'll be all caught up by the time next year rolls around, I would be pretty surprised if it didn't end up high on my list in 2013, unless it has a terrible year or something. Because man, I am loving the shit out of it.
• Saturday Night Live - SNL is like a totally different TV experience for me, so I didn't rank it among the other comedy shows on my list, because it'd be a weird comparison. The show's quality fluctuates so much from week-to-week and operates on such a different standard that I think it'd be difficult to really rank on a list like this. But don't worry, I still love it.
• Raising Hope - Poor Raising Hope suffers with me because there's just too much good TV on Tuesdays, but when I do happen to watch it, I usually really like it. Hopefully I will discover it on TBS in like 2 years and fully appreciate it or something.
• The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, The Soup - Again, like SNL, these shows are kind of a different type of TV viewing for me, but I enjoy them all very much.
• Mad Men - I'm not nearly caught up on all of my Mad Men, but I really enjoy what I what I do see of it, and it's a show I'm planning on sitting down and watching from start to finish sometime hopefully soon. It's definitely a landmark TV show and one that is doing some pretty amazing things.

Well, there we have it. This was a pretty incredible year for TV, honestly - lots of amazing stuff all-around. I feel like 2013 is going to bring a lot of change, but hopefully things remain just as good, because having TV be so great is pretty fun, right?

Jingle bells, jingle yay, jingle good for you! NBC Comedy Thursday 12/6/2012

It was Christmas night on NBC Thursday! And...it didn't really feel like Christmas in either 30 Rock or Parks & Rec tonight. But there were Christmas trees in the background! And they went to a Christmas party on Parks & Rec! And both episodes were good! So, yay! Jingle good for you, shows.

It would've been very hard to top last week's all-time classic, landmark 30 Rock. But...damn, if this episode didn't come really close. In terms of pure laughs, this episode might've even been better, even if it wasn't quite as "special" as Liz Lemon's WEDDING, YOU GUYS. Yes, Liz Lemon is MARRIED. And Jenna is pissed. The one thing I was very slightly disappointed to see in last week's episode was the lack of Jenna at Liz's wedding, but apparently it was just so that we could witness her beautiful, beautiful rage this week, so I have no qualms. It actually makes sense, because Jenna making the wedding all about herself probably would've threatened some of the subtle sweetness of Liz's big day. And again, it gave us this plotline, which featured Liz and Jenna attending an event celebrating women in comedy "who aren't Betty White". The plot featured a lot of female stereotypes (women can't work the TV! a woman whose husband left her and now she's horribly depressed!) but 30 Rock always manages to get away with making these kinds of generalizations because a) they're funny and b) it's pretty clear the show is doing it in a tongue-in-cheek matter, making fun of the generalizations more than the actual people they're generalizing. The plot actually does a pretty good job of highlighting some of the tension in Liz and Jenna's relationship with Jenna explaining that seeing Liz happy made her insecure because Liz was always a way for Jenna to feel better about herself, and now that Liz is actually doing well, it sort of removes that dynamic in their relationship. Of course, in typical 30 Rock fashion, Jenna is only being this open with Liz because she "took a pill that lets her feel things", but it was still a nice little analysis of their friendship. The show seemed to forget Liz and Jenna were friends for several years there, but in the past two seasons they've done a good job of going back to that relationship, which is good because it's always been an interesting friendship to me with a lot of comic potential. The other main storyline saw the return of Colleen, who seems to be at the end of her rope and is trying to give Jack signs, but Jack takes it as her trying to shame him yet again...which she does, by giving him a slightly condescending speech right before she dies. It was a surprisingly dark twist for an episode for 30 Rock - I spent a lot of the plotline wondering if the show was really going to go there. But I think they pulled it off, and it served as a nice conclusion to the Jack/Colleen saga, with Jack realizing that her pushing him and constantly criticizing him is what made him the person he is today. Also, it gave us a funeral scene that turned into Jenna and Paul's wedding and featured a guest spot from Kermit the Frog. Pretty amazing stuff right there. The C-plot was simple but actually much more entertaining than most C-plots - Kenneth is depressed after being dumped by Hazel and "wishes his life could be more like TV", which leads to Tracy trying to make Kenneth's life exactly like a TV show by getting him stuck in an elevator with Florence Henderson (Carol on The Brady Bunch), but of course, Florence is a mean alcoholic rather than a loving TV mom, and Kenneth discovers that life just isn't like TV. Pretty standard 30 Rock material, but that's not a bad thing - it was entertaining, had some great lines, a solid guest spot, and a typically perfect meta line (there wouldn't be a TV show where a famous guy tried to help a lowly janitor because if there was, no one would watch it!). It was all a lot of fun. I kind of forget that Kenneth isn't a page anymore, though. I'm still rooting for him to take over NBC at the end of the series.

Parks and Recreation also saw the return of an old favorite tonight, but this one didn't die. Tammy II returned to stir the pot with Ron's new girlfriend Diane, and Leslie ain't havin' it. Oh, and the four are all at a woodworking awards show together, which is awesome. I've seem some complaints that the plot saw Tammy II awkwardly shoehorned in, and that the reveal that it was Leslie that Diane was jealous of rather than Tammy was forced. I get those criticisms and sort of agree with them on some level - particularly Diane being jealous of Leslie, which reminded me a lot of the 30 Rock episode where Avery told Jack and Liz they had to stop talking to each other. But 30 Rock pulled it off a lot better than Parks did - I just didn't really get the feeling that Leslie and Ron were really that close enough that it would be an issue, and it sort of seemed like creating plot for the sake of creating plot to me. But honestly, I can't say I really cared that much, because the Leslie/Tammy scenes were just fucking perfect, and I really liked the speech Ron gave to Diane at the end of the episode. I also really liked the B-plot where the Parks department is forced to realize that Jerry's life is kind of awesome and the fact that he's a klutz at the office seems minimal compared to his hot wife and loving family. Some people often feel the Jerry stuff goes too far, and this seemed like a good way to point out that Jerry probably doesn't really give a shit about it. The other plot of the night was a Chris plot, which largely haven't been working lately, and...this was no exception. Nothing even really happened, other than...Chris seeming marginally better and Ben noticing? The show hasn't really had anything for Chris to do since "The Trial of Leslie Knope", and they've kind of been running in circle with the character since then. But all in all, this was a really good Parks & Rec. Not necessarily anything groundbreaking, but very enjoyable to watch. And after a few seasons of brilliance, if that's the show Parks is going to be from here on out, who's to complain?

That's the last of these shows until January. Which...seems really god damn early, right? Since when do shows go on break for Christmas during the first week of December? Also, this means there's only four weeks of 30 Rock left, which...I hate life.

So there will be new episodes of all of the Tuesday comedies next week, but after that, we're completely done until December. What the hell?  But it's alright, because during the off weeks I'll be posting my year-end lists, which I'm pretty sure are going to feature my top 20 episodes of 2012, and I think my top 10 or 15 shows of 2012. Or 20. I haven't decided yet. We'll see!

You missed a spot...in my heart: ABC Wednesday Round-Up 12/5/12

So Wednesdays are a pretty long day for me at school, meaning I usually do not feel like doing shit when I get home. Therefore, I'm just getting around to writing about last night's ABC comedies now. Sorry! I think you'll survive! Especially since you probably don't actually exist! Anyway, here they are. By the way, I should specify that by ABC comedies, I really only mean The Middle and Suburgatory, because Modern Family lost my interest a while ago and I don't watch The Neighbors because...well, what do I look like to you?


The Middle is kind of a weird show for me, in that I rarely really look forward to watching it like I do with my favorite shows, and I usually don't bother with watching it live and wait until later in the night or the next day to watch it on my DVR. (Which I realize is how most people watch TV these days, but I'm a fucking old-fashioned kind of guy with this stuff, okay? I like pretending it's still 1996 and we're all watching everything together). And yet, when I am watching it, I enjoy it more consistently than most shows on TV right now. It's never going to be most ambitious or interesting show out there, but it's a show that has an excellent grasp on its characters, knows exactly what it wants to do, and does it very, very well. Last night's Christmas episode was a fine example of the show functioning at its best - it centered around the Hecks struggling to make ends meet for Christmas and trying to give their kids the best Christmas possible regardless. That may not be an overly original plot when you're looking at TV as a whole - hell, that's basically the exact plot of the first episode of The Simpsons - but there aren't many shows on TV dealing with economic turmoil as head-on as this show is right now. It doesn't sugarcoat the fact that these people are struggling and really, you can see their struggle. Their house isn't big and pretty like so many other supposedly "poor" TV families - it's small and sort of dumpy, and they don't spend too much money on extravagant things (okay, maybe Sue's 1,000 cookies were more pricey than what would've been realistic, but eh, I can cut the show some slack). On a night where the Modern Family gang is crashing an extravagant car every week and thinking nothing of it, this really sticks out. And yet, through it all, the show manages to show that these people - as flawed as they are, and as many problems as they have - still share a bond that unites them together. Oh, and also, the lines are funny! Not just "funny for a family sitcom". Frankie's "maybe I can fake my own death and then show up on Christmas - surprise! I'm alive!" line was one of my biggest laughs on TV this week. I think The Middle is a seriously excellent portrayal of the modern American family and I kind of wish more people were talking about it. It's quietly having a bit of an all-star season.

As for Suburgatory, that's another weird show in that it can have one of my favorite TV episodes of the year one week and one of my least favorites the next week. The previous two episodes - "The Wishbone" and "Friendship Fish", were so different that it's hard to believe the same show was responsible for both episodes. The former was a gut-wrenching Thanksgiving episode about Tessa finally meeting her estranged mother that really dug into the concept of family and how it shapes our identities. The latter was mostly an infomercial for the Microsoft Tablet that centered around a talking fish. Luckily, this week's Christmas episode resembled the former much more than the latter. It still retained some of the show's cartoonishness - which is a good thing. Suburgatory being a live-action cartoon while simultaneously being a pretty interesting family drama makes it one of the most ambitious and interesting comedies on TV. As great as the meaty family stuff is, it wouldn't be the same show if it didn't have Dalia making a viral video asking for her maid back that inexplicably takes place on an airplane or Ryan Shay running around town shirtless like a wild animal. "Krampus" struck that balance exactly right by balancing all of that with some seriously thoughtful scenes where Tessa realizes that, while her mother is her mother, she isn't her mom. Suburgatory is an inconsistent show, but - Microsoft Tablet infomercials aside - it has been increasingly playing to what works for it this season and eliminating what doesn't aside. If it can continue to churn out episodes like this one and "The Wishbone" (which was genuinely one of my favorite episodes of TV this year), it'll pretty easily join my ranks of the absolute best comedies on the air right now.

Both of these shows are ending in a pretty good place for me this fall, and I'm excited to see what they'll have in store for us after the holidays.

Tuesday Comedy Clusterfuck 12/4

So for some reason, the networks decided they were going to throw all of their good (or, in NBC's case, trying too hard to be good) comedies on the same night because...I don't know, why the fuck not? That's made Tuesday into a gigantic comedy clusterfuck. Tuesdays include a whole lot of the very best comedy that network television is churning out right now (and, on NBC, some of the worst). So in this post, I'll run through each show (that I watch) and offer you my inspiring thoughts on each of these programs that air on the televisions.

(Note: I usually don't watch Raising Hope because even though I like it, I need a fucking break at sometime during this n ight. I also don't watch the NBC comedies because, if you can't tell from my previous passive aggressive comments, I think that they suck).

Let's start off with Ben and Kate, which is pretty easily the best new comedy this season and arguably the only one really worth a damn. Its tepid ratings suggest it may not be long for this world, but right now I don't want to think about that, and I just want to enjoy the misadventures of these wonderful weirdos for a half-hour every week. Actually, tonight's episode was sort of about just how weird all of the people in Kate's life are, and although I thought that was a flimsy excuse for her to break up with the guy whose name I can't remember (I'm sorry, I just can't keep track of all of these vanilla temporary love interests peppered through various sitcoms), it was a nice way of kind of tying together the ensemble and showing just how important they are to Kate. I also really enjoy the BJ/Tommy interaction in this episode. It's gotten to the point where basically anything BJ says is going to make me laugh out loud for several minutes, and she said a lot of things in this episode, so I was happy. This show has really found its groove rather quickly - I can't remember the last time a show was firing on all cylinders a mere nine episodes in. (Well, maybe Apartment 23 this season, actually, but whatever, before that). I keep praying for a ratings miracle with this show because it really seems like the type of show that could stick around for a long time and not wear out its welcome. It's just so pleasant, and very low-key while still being funny and entertaining, which a lot of shows that try for that down-to-earth, conversational style forget to be. Seriously, if you like comedy and you aren't watching it, watch it! I don't care how weird Nat Faxon's teeth look, the dude's hilarious.

New Girl has become a reliable powerhouse this season, churning out excellent episodes pretty much every week. "Bathtub" wasn't quite on the levels of the best of this season, like last week's "Eggs" or "Menzies" from a few weeks ago, but it was still an episode I really enjoyed on the whole. I particularly liked seeing Jess and Winston sharing a storyline together, even if it got a little typical sitcommy at points, but Zooey Deschanel and Lamorne Morris were clearly having a lot of fun with the material which really sold it and made it really entertaining. It also provided a nice contrast to the surprisingly heartwrenching Schmidt/CeCe plot. I was unsure of how the show was handling the CeCe/Schmidt break-up early on, but I like how they seem to be building to getting them both to a point where they realize they both need each other. It'll make their reunion feel earned rather than typical sitcom will they/won't they schmuck. (Can I use that word?). Nick's plot was also pretty entertaining (can a Nick Miller plot ever be less than at least pretty entertaining?) and having his crush turn out to be a stripper was kind of an interesting test for the character. While I like Olivia Munn far less than Lizzy Caplan, let's hope her character can do just as many good things for the show as Caplan's did. I also liked the return of perverted landlord Remmy. Yay for universe expansion! I'm just really enjoying the fuck out of New Girl right now. Never change, friend.

The Mindy Project, on the other hand, was...fine. I don't know, I'm just really not being drawn into at all, and I can't say this episode did much to change that. There was nothing particularly bad about it, and I chuckled a lot through-out the episode, but the whole thing still feels weirdly unfocused for a show so early in its run. This episode was about Mindy trying to balance her home life and her work life, but really, we've hardly seen any of her home life, so who cares? The show has a bad habit of trying to get us to give a shit but never actually taking the steps required to get us to give a shit. That said, the office dynamic worked better for me in this episode. The generally useless assistants got some funny lines, and the Jeremy/Danny/Mindy dynamic was well-done. I see plenty of inklings of a good show here, but the show really needs to sit down and realize exactly what it wants to be, because right now it's a mildly amusing jumbled mess.

And now on to the ABC side of the equation...

Tonight's Happy Endings might have been my favorite episode of the season so far. As much as I appreciate it when it tries to do something experimental and play with its format a bit like it did in the last episode, I always enjoy it the most when it just buckles down and does a lot of silly shit. When Happy Endings is going all out with its playfulness, there's nothing quite like it on TV. I love just sitting down and having no idea what weird place any of these plotlines are going to go - who would've known that the seemingly generic "Jane tries to be one of the guys" story would turn into Brad becoming a trophy wife and buying an obnoxious pig? (This show is a big fan of impromptu animal purchases. First Alex's parrot, now this). Penny's guy-of-the-week plotline was once again great if for no other reason than the fact that it was an excuse for Casey Wilson to do a bunch of perfect physical comedy, and I like that the show is making Dave a more interesting character by essential having him lose his mind. Happy Endings is never going to be a particularly deep show or one that takes its characters very seriously, but damn if it isn't the most fun show to watch right now. The recent news that ABC is pulling it from the schedule in March seriously depresses me, and I hope it can pull a Cougar Town and save itself somehow because my life will be sadder without its servings of pure insanity every week.

Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 - or simply Apartment 23, or as I prefer to call it, "Bitch 23", had a Season 1 holdover on tap for tonight. It was pretty obvious that it was a Season 1 holdover considering it featured that unnecessary stalker girl that we haven't seen at all this year, and it seemed a little less polished than the show's other offerings this season. Still, it was pretty funny, even if it was one of the show's weaker outings thus far. The sequence in the beginning that showed Chloe and June's routines on fast-forward was the highlight of the episode, though there were plenty of good gags through-out. My main issue with the episode was the plot, which came across as rushed and even slightly out of character for June. This show may have the tendency to go dark, but this episode may have been a step too far. I have to say though, after watching a handful of episodes of American Dad recently, it's interesting just how much this show plays as a live-action version of that one, and I mean that in the best way possible (I mean, American Dad's a pretty excellent cartoon). Chloe has so many similarities to Roger that it's uncanny, and June is kind of like Francine, seemingly well put together on the outside but just as horrible as everyone else on the inside. So while tonight was far from the show at its best, I'm still enjoying just how weird this show is willing to go every week. This is another show whose future is looking pretty grim, so I guess I'm just going to have to enjoy its insanity while I can. Again, if you aren't watching this and you enjoy comedy, you should watch it, as it is fantastic.

Geez, this took a long time. Make smarter scheduling decisions, networks.