I have to admit. I'm genuinely impressed by The Big Bang Theory.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

I only started watching it a few months ago, but since they have reruns on TBS just about every hour of the day, I've managed to see most of the series.

And it's funny. Genuinely funny. It's made me laugh out loud multiple times. Sometimes I'll even chuckle thinking back on a joke I saw on it.

Why am I so surprised about this?

Because it's an old school laugh track/studio audience style sitcom, and I haven't enjoyed any of those for years. I think the last laugh track/studio audience style sitcom I enjoyed on a regular basis was The King of Queens. And before that, I have to go all the way back to Seinfeld. Most of comedies I watch on TV these days are of the "Single Camera" variety, sans laugh track. Such as Arrested Development, The Office, Modern Family, etc.

I've grown to abhor most of the laugh track/studio audience sitcoms because most of them are just painfully unfunny to me, and the laughter in the background just seems so forced. Heavy laughter for jokes that either are barely funny, or just not funny at all. My wife watches 2 Broke Girls, and I can't think of any show less funny than that one, and yet all you hear is laughter in the background over horribly stale and unfunny "jokes."

A good sitcom that features a laugh track/studio audience, like Seinfeld, will have you forget that the recorded laughter is even there. But those have always been far and few between. Most of the time, the laughter is all too loud, and all you can think is, "Really? You think that is funny?"

And that's why I avoided watching The Big Bang Theory for so long, because I figured it to be like the 95% of the sitcoms with laugh tracks/studio audiences. Having not been impressed by any of Chuck Lorre's other sitcoms, I didn't think it to be any different.

Turns out I was wrong. Bazinga!

[seabeyond]

1. knock knock knock, tommy. knock knock knock, tommy. knock knock knock, tommy.

ya. my son turned me onto it a couple months ago also. we rented the season dvds and i got caught up. love the show. the only show on tv that will pull me from a book and have me watching. loved sheldon. all the characters are a blast.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

3. Hello, seabeyond, do you like my bongos? Bet you didn't know that I had bongos.

Seabeyond no sleep while I play bongos! Bongo solo!

[seabeyond]

7. bongo man... remix

[MiddleFingerMom]

14. I've told this story before -- our drummer, Happy Sweaty Jimmy got a steel drum on sale.

.
.
.
He lived in a 4-story rowhouse with about 4 or 5 other people. He loved that steel drum SO much
that he would play it for hours.
.
The biggest problem was that he had only learned how to play "Three Blind Mice" and that was
enough for him. Although maybe the biggest biggest problem was that it was very loud.
.
His housemates soon confronted him and told him that they had called a house meeting to which
he hadn't been invited. They had voted unanimously that he wasn't allowed to play his steel drum
as long as there was the SLIGHTEST chance that one of the other residents was anywhere within
the house.
.
.
.
He understood. And, for a while, LIVED for those days when everyone was gone.
.
.
You woulda liked Happy Sweaty Jimmy. Everybody did.
.
.
.

[In_The_Wind]

2. It's on auto-record. I haven't missed one.

[catnhatnh]

4. It's quite good....

...but what caught me by surprise is the quality of the secondary and periodic characters. It's a delight every time one shows up for a visit.

[hamsterjill]

5. I really like it!

Bazinga!

[bigwillq]

6. Love that show.

It's hysterical.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

8. But, Leonard HOW we will raise the children ??

Do you like your time theory stringy or loopy?

The show is one of my all time favorites.

[bluesbassman]

9. Wheeeeaton!!!

Love that show.

[mockmonkey]

10. MASH DVD

I love MASH and it's even better on DVD because you can play it without that awful 70's laugh track.

Often on the new shows the laughs are "forced" because of screw-ups and flubs so the lines have to be redone and they tell the audience to laugh like they just heard the joke.

On YouTube if you watch the bloopers of "Everybody Loves Raymond" they will change up the joke line to see if it gets a better laugh when someone keeps breaking up.

Years ago, All in the Family on the last season went from "All in the Family was recorded on tape before a live audience" to "All in the Family was played to a studio audience for live responses". The laughter doesn't have the same energy.

I love The Big Bang Theory.

[arcane1]

11. I'm a fan too, and I don't even own a tv :)

Being a science geek helps too, I suppose, since they're getting laughs that no show has gotten before. I sometimes get bored with the relationship plotlines, for example, but I haven't lost interest and haven't stopped laughing

[walkerbait41]

12. We are fans of the show

When I get sick the wife sings "Soft Kitty" to me.

[seabeyond]

13. my 15 yr old made me the other day. and like sheldon, he had to tell me the words. was so funny...

and too cute.

[cyberswede]

15. I didn't even realize it HAS a laugh track.

That's a good thing, right?

I might get one of these t-shirts for my 12 y.o.'s upcoming birthday:

[pinboy3niner]

16. I'm not insane...

[pinboy3niner]

17. Sheldon: At my age do you know how I'm statistically most likely to die?

Sheldon: At my age do you know how I'm statistically most likely to die?

Leonard: At the hands of your room mate?

Sheldon: An accident
.
Leonard: That's how I'm going to make it look

[In_The_Wind]

18. Good one!

[pokerfan]

19. It's funny in spite of the live audience

But sometimes the audience participation works such as this exchange between Howard and Bernadette's father. The setup is that Howard is terrified about flying to the ISS (as a mission specialist):

Howard: All right, look, I'm going to level with you. I'm terrified about going into space. What if I don't make it back?
Bernadette's father: It's gonna be okay, son. (Audience goes awwww!)
Howard: You really think so?
Bernadette's father: Of course. A pretty girl like Bernadette ... she'll find a new guy. (Audience goes nuts with laughter.)

[Dash87]

20. It's also filmed in front of an audience (the laugh is obviously edited, though)

2 Broke Girls is up there in entertainment with watching Chuck Norris Total Gym ads at 2 in the morning. The brunette on that show is so monotone that she should be a particle physics professor, or something like that. Even the cast seems bored to be acting in this stupid phoned-in crap that Fox put out.

[jrandom421]

21. It's interesting to note

that most of the live audience in the past 3 seasons are Caltech professors and students

[opiate69]

22. So am I.. That Hubble was a genius to figure out redshift..

Oh, wait... We aren't talking about the same thing, are we?

[CBGLuthier]

23. I have always found it to be about as funny as Amos and Andy

Full of two dimensional stereotypes and quite offensive.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

27. I don't know. If anything, it's made nerdom a little more "cool".

Maybe 15-20 years too late for my own good, but oh well.

[patricia92243]

24. It is recorded live - so I'm not sure by what you mean by a laugh track. n/t

[Tommy_Carcetti]

28. I'm lumping laugh track and live studio audience shows in together. nt

[B Calm]

25. We been watching it for years, LOVE IT!!

[B Calm]

26. Soft Kitty, Warm Kitty, Little ball of Fur

#t=3

[Tommy_Carcetti]

29. I've actually gotten to singing that to my two year old daughter every night now.

And she'll sing it back to me.

[Goalie49009]

30. thanks guys appreciate it

now you have me watching the episodes from season 1 episode 1