Is the ideal comedy episode one that’s a rapid-fire deluge of one-liners? Is it a bold digression from a show’s usual form? A mix of the two? Those are some of the questions up for discussion on this week’s episode of Still Watching, the first of a two-part series looking at the best episodes of television from the last 25 years.
Before listing their personal picks for perfect comedy episodes, Still Watching hosts Hillary Busis, Chris Murphy, and Richard Lawson try to establish a rubric for defining comedy perfection. As one would assume, it proves tricky. “It has to be episodic, something that stands on its own,” says Busis. “I think it also should push the narrative of the show that it’s part of forward. These are two tricky and sort of competing qualities. Therefore, finding a way to do them both in a satisfying way is where you get perfection.”
Murphy, though, argues that a perfect comedy episode should be able to exist entirely on its own, advancement of the show’s narrative or not. “For me, a perfect episode of television is one where you could take anyone off the street, plop them down, put them in front of the episode in question without any context and they would enjoy it.”
Which leads to the question: do the Still Watching hosts’ picks fit the bill?
Murphy chose “Fish Out of Water,” from season three of the lauded Netflix animated series Bojack Horseman. It’s an interesting choice: a nearly dialogue-free episode in which the titular antihero finds himself in a strange new land, far from the Hollywood (well, Hollywoo) that forever sustains and thwarts him. “It creates a really finely drawn world that we’d never seen on the show before,” says Murphy of “Fish Out of Water,” which follows Bojack’s trip to an underwater film festival to promote his new awards-hopeful movie. Melancholy and wacky at once, it’s an unexpected but worthy pick.
Busis opted for an episode from one of this century’s biggest comedy hits, The Office. In season two classic “The Injury,” Michael Scott burns his foot on a George Foreman grill and makes it the problem of all his employees. It’s an older choice, from all the way back in 2006, but Busis says the series “stands the test of time.” Much of its humor hasn’t grown dated because “the jokes are rooted mostly in character.”
Lawson went way more recent with his pick, “Cary and Brooke Go to an AIDS Play,” from season three of the recently ended The Other Two. “It’s biting satire,” says Lawson. “But it’s not mean, it’s not flippant.” Which it could have been, given its somewhat risqué subject matter. Lawson describes the episode as “funny and antic,” which is maybe all a comedy needs to be.
You can listen to the full discussion below (or anywhere you listen to podcasts). The hosts’ picks for perfect drama episode will be revealed next week.
Vanity Fair
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