Curb Your Enthusiasm on HBO - Larry David co-created Seinfeld and was head writer for the first 7 seasons.

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia on FXX, Hulu, Netflix

Mythic Quest on Apple TV+ - created by people who work on It's always Sunny

Veep on HBO - staring Julia Louis-Dreyfus!

Avenue 5 on HBO - same producers as Veep

It's Always Sunny absolutely takes inspiration from Seinfeld.

They're even self aware about it in the episode "The Gang Does a Clip Show" where they mistake a bit from Seinfeld as one of their own memories - https://youtu.be/fCwI3KDGtRk

How did you like Mythic Quest? I'm really glad to see Rob and Charlie involved but it's definitely a bit more tame. I really like Danny Pudi playing a Dennis-esque character and the actress who plays Poppy is hilarious.

I really enjoyed MQ. It is ridiculous but also quite true to life according to my wife who is a video game producer. A lot of big personalities, egos, etc.

I loved F. Murray Abraham's character. Quite the departure from Dar Adal in Homeland. Overall the whole cast on MQ was very good though.

I never watched Seinfeld or Curb Your Enthusiasm however I grabbed season 1 of Curb two weeks ago as I am in lockdown and wanted something different/new (to me) to watch and fell in love with it.

I am now on season 8(!) and there hasn't been a single episode I have not thoroughly enjoyed.

It is a superb show with some excellently executed jokes. Probably some of the best I have seen on TV. Some of the jokes are so superbly setup as well that you don't realise until the punchline drops that the build up has been several episodes.

I also watched Mythic Quest earlier in the year which was a lot of fun. We mostly watched it because my wife is a video game producer so we had a good time laughing at how real some of the craziness can be in the video game production world.

Avenue 5 took a while to find its pace but by the end of the season it was quite fun. Different but well done. I am looking forward to season 2.

I plan to sit down and watch Always Sunny, Veep and Seinfeld now :)

I prefer Other Space to Avenue 5. It's also a comedy set on a spaceship with a hapless/semi-competent crew.

Only 1 season ever made, and it's on Yahoo! Entertainment for free:

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/other-space-episode-1-in...

I remember Other Space! I watched it when it came out and really enjoyed it as well. One of the actors from Other Space is on Avenue 5

https://m.imdb.com/name/nm2654481/

And if you like Veep & Avenue 5 then check out In The Loop & The Thick of It - both by Armando Iannucci (Writer/Creator of them all)

The sibling comments all have great shows listed. I'd say It's Always Sunny/Arrested Development get closest to the format of "a sitcom about terrible people".

Seinfeld also contains a stand up comedian playing himself. In that respect shows like Louis and Master of None are also quite similar.

Louis in particular is a fantastic show if you can ignore Louis CK's recent scandal.

I never get this comparison. The characters on Seinfeld have completely reasonable and funny criticisms/observations of every day life- the characters on Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia are just boring jerks.

Disclaimer; I am a pretty big fan of Seinfeld. But, I don’t think anything comes close to what the writers and actors achieved with Seinfeld. Luckily if you’re anything like me you can continue to watch Seinfeld for over a decade and still not get tired of it.

> the characters on Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia are just boring jerks.

Ah! Triggered! /s

I agree that the "jerks" trope is at play here. But I don't think the characters are boring or without their observations on the world. The characters have plenty of observations about arising cultural moments, political issues, etc. Many episodes are essentially "The Gang Takes Opposing Views on X". Then we get to see these characters take each side to weird extremes while learning very little from the experience.

Like the "show about nothing" It's Always Sunny is in its prime during meta commentary episodes like "The Gang Tries Desperately to Win an Award".

Genuinely interested, why does everything have to be a "trope" when we are discussing TV media. Can't they sometimes be character patterns?

I suppose trope has a negative connotation but I view them as tools in a writer's toolbox, not as an indicator of lazy writing.

Having said that, tropes are usually a little more specific or identifiable than just the concept of "mean characters", so it probably wasn't the best use of the word.

Actually it's not just this comment here, I see trope being used everywhere.

Google ngram search for the word: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=Trope&year_sta...

Why exactly are you upset by this? It's a word that describes commonly used narratives. It's incredibly common to tweak or reuse commonly known narratives and there's nothing inherently negative about that.

I love it’s always sunny, but I agree. I think “Seinfeld is a bit terrible people” is really heavily influenced by the final episode. The true core of Seinfeld is having a violation of minor social norms blow up in your face, and funny word play.

> I think “Seinfeld is a bit terrible people” is really heavily influenced by the final episode.

I agree. Most people who I tell this opinion to who are also Seinfeld fans disagree though.

The social norms violation thing is also why Curb You Enthusiasm comes so close; it is mostly about Larry David’s opaque social norms being constantly violated.

I'd say Peep Show! They're both fairly similar in that they're both about chaos and nihilism where the characters completely fail to grow. If you like Seinfeld you'll almost definitely enjoy that.

Peep Show is pretty good but a great deal darker than Seinfeld which tends to keep its comedy pretty tame- which in my opinion is what makes it so good.

I don’t know about that. There’s a story arc where George’s fiancée dies and he’s relieved because he didn’t want to go through with the marriage.

There’s an episode of Peep Show where one of the two main characters kills a dog and then feeds it to his girlfriend- the owner of the dog. Totally different level of dark. It’s a totally different sense of humor actually.

Being regrettably engaged is a relatable situation, and miraculously being relieved of that engagement thru a freak accident is definitely Seinfeld’s darkest moment but is still fairly innocent. It’s actually one of the reasons season 7 is so unique and funny but I would hardly put it next to Peep Show in terms of darkness.

That's not what happened in that episode at all.

What actually happens is Jez accidentally runs over his "girlsfriend"'s dog (hard to really car her a girlfriend when they had only just met) while backing up the car, then hides the body in a messenger bag to conceal the incident. Later in the episode, he tries to burn the corpse but fails at that. Toward the end, they're on the girl's father's boat, and the girlfriend asks what's in the bag. Jez replies that it's barbeque chicken(?) and reluctantly takes a bite. Shortly after, they find the dog's collar in the bag and discover the horrible conclusion.

Jez may be a lot of things (selfish, lazy, etc.) but he's no murderer.

Maybe I misremembered it but your description of the episode doesn’t really refute my argument at all- that’s all far more disturbing than any situation on Seinfeld.

There's no maybe about it; you clearly misremembered if you thought Jez murdered a girlfriend's dog and then purposely fed it to her. Not only that, but it's uncharacteristic of any of the characters on the show.

The premise of the episode can be boiled down to the following:

1. Jez meets attractive girl. 2. Jez wants to date this girl (they get along well). 3. Jez accidentally does something that would prevent #2 from happening. 4. Jez tries his darndest to hide his mistake. 5. The truth gets found out and girl casts Jez away.

The entire ordeal is comical because Jez makes repeated efforts to hide the dog's corpse and fails at every turn. The only really "dark" thing about the episode is that the dog was pregnant, which was only briefly mentioned (and easily forgotten).

> if you thought Jez murdered a girlfriend's dog

Never used the word "murdered" not sure where you got that from? He did in fact kill the dog.

> then purposely fed it to her.

I did misremember this part. I still stand by the idea that eating a dog in front of their owner is really, really dark.

> The premise of the episode can be boiled down to the following:

> 1. Jez meets attractive girl. 2. Jez wants to date this girl (they get along well). 3. Jez accidentally does something that would prevent #2 from happening. 4. Jez tries his darndest to hide his mistake. 5. The truth gets found out and girl casts Jez away.

If you ignore the part of the script where Jez KILLS the girls dog and then EATS IT IN FRONT OF HER then yeah it is pretty innocent.

> The only really "dark" thing about the episode is that the dog was pregnant, which was only briefly mentioned (and easily forgotten).

If you think that is the only really dark thing about the episode then I think you and I might really disagree on what constitutes dark and this argument is pointless.

> Never used the word "murdered" not sure where you got that from?

> one of the two main characters kills a dog and then feeds it to his girlfriend- the owner of the dog

The way you framed it implies murder. Yes, he kills the dog but it is entirely accidental, which is the relevant part that you conveniently omitted for the sake of your own argument.

> If you ignore the part of the script where Jez KILLS the girls dog and then EATS IT IN FRONT OF HER then yeah it is pretty innocent.

Again, you're intentionally framing it in a misrepresentative way. He only takes a bite out of a piece of the burnt corpse out of desperation because the group of people present are inquiring about what is in the bag. He says it's BBQ chicken and takes a bite to try to convince the others that's it completely innocuous. He's not doing it out of malice; he's doing it out of panic. And he's definitely not enjoying it either as he's visibly uncomfortable with doing it.

Anyone who watches the episode will clearly see that the way you're framing the whole episode is completely skewed and disingenuous.

> this argument is pointless

Finally something we can agree on.

EDIT: The scene where the dog is accidentally killed: https://youtu.be/E6WYvAWIowU?t=135 The scene where Jez takes a bite: https://youtu.be/cKaqzvzlgKU?t=50

Jez kills the dog. Jez then eats the dog. In front of the dogs owner. No amount of hand waving or interpretation changes that it is what happens in the episode. It is also very dark.

So what you're saying is that pertinent details that provide context for any given situation is "hand waving" and irrelevant? Seems like an obtuse approach to arriving at a conclusion.

The pertinent details are that he eats a person's pet in front of the pets owner! His motivations don't matter! His motivations do not absolve him from his actions. No Seinfeld character comes close to this level of sociopathy and I challenge you to come up with an example where it does.

And just for the record I like peep show, and I think the holiday episode is funny if a bit disturbing.

Peep Show is criminally underrated in the US

As far as having the different character stories interfere with each other in interesting ways, there's Arrested Development.

For a British flavour, try:

People Just Do Nothing, two pirate radio DJs and crew trying to hack it https://imdb.com/title/tt3762198/

Detectorists, two small town “smartest guys in the room” try to rediscover their friendship through their shared love of metal detector operation https://imdb.com/title/tt4082744/

And for a Japanese kick:

FLCL, a coming of age story about nothing, but writ LARGE https://imdb.com/title/tt0279077/

Steins;Gate, hard to generalize and hard not to spoil anything but it feels like if Back to the Future were made as a modern anime https://imdb.com/title/tt1910272/

While I love both Steins;Gate and FLCL, I'm having a hard time understanding how they relate to Seinfeld in any way.

FLCL is a world where change seems distant or impossible, and the sameness itself is stifling and a major source of conflict in the plot, as in Seinfeld.

Steins;Gate's protagonist's alter-ego Hououin Kyouma is a larger-than-life egotistical (comedy) genius which is analogous to Jerry when he's on-stage in the monologue segments of the show. But that same SG protagonist as his "normie" self Rintaro Okabe is crippled by self-doubt, upstaged by his own alter-ego, and would do anything for his friends, much like the version of Jerry we see outside the monologue segments. If you've seen the last episode of Seinfeld, the parallels between the two are a bit more clear. In Seinfeld, the past catches up with Jerry and the crew, and they cool their heels in jail as a kind of karmic payback or comeuppance for their years of prior shenanigans. In Steins;Gate, at a certain point the comedic backdrop lifts, the folly of Rintaro's ego and hubris is laid bare and elevated, and the karmic debt seeks its due via time and space.

Kyouma is far more of a Kramer than a Jerry Seinfeld. Jerry's the snarky straight man surrounded by oddballs, that role in Stein's Gate would probably be Kurisu.

Good point about Jerry being the straight man. I was trying to explore the difference between onstage Jerry and offstage Jerry and draw a comparison to Rintaro/Kyouma, but I don't disagree with your interpretation. I think if we bring in the sequels, Maho is the closest we get to a straight (wo)man foil to Kyouma's color man.

I feel like FLCL is about a hell of a lot of things, it just is not very interesting in really articulating them in great detail.

It's still a hell of a thing worth watching, I should really get around to watching the sequels sometime.

Naota: Nothing amazing happens here. Everything is ordinary. We crossed the bridge as usual, and before we knew it the seasons had changed. Mamimi left town. She said she wanted to be a photographer. I don't know what happened to her after that.

This is just one quote, but it captures the vibe of the show IMO. Events happen and reactions to those events happen, but the sameness itself is the source of conflict in the plot, without getting into spoilers or character motivations or backstory.

I need to watch the sequels too, as my thoughts are based on the original 6 episodes comprising S01.

Curb Your Enthusiasm

Just about everything that came after Seinfeld copied much about it so it is hard to find something that seems to be comparable because everything you've seen shared so much.

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

Truly funny ones :

Silicon Valley

Parks and recreation

Community

The office (UK)

Maybe Parks and recreation

The IT Crowd

Extras