Arrested Development is a very European-style show. There are few explicit jokes and no laugh track. They aim more for puns and other wordplay, along with explicit foreshadowing that sets up a joke with no obvious punchline until the hammer drops (Buster's hand is a good example of this).

You're not spoon-fed the comedy and queued for laughter. There weren't many American shows like that when it aired, and that was one of the reasons it got canned. They even hinted at this in the script for the last season, along with the characters practically begging some other network to pick up the show.