GORDON: Ladies and Gentlemen! It’s the Evan and Gordon Show!
<Theme Music>
Starring:
Evan as Evan!
Michael Fassbender as Gordon Brown!
The closest this man will ever resemble me was when he lost 30 lbs to play a prisoner who died on hunger strike….
And guest starring . . .
Gordon’s inflated ego!
EVAN: This is why I don’t like it when you do intros.
GORDON: In all seriousness though, ladies and gentlemen, tonight’s topic: sitcoms- what makes ‘em, what breaks ‘em, and how we’d create our ideal versions.
EVAN: This subject kind of dawned on me because it’s the summer, and every day I get back from work knowing that I don’t have one of my show’s waiting for me that evening is a deeply painful one.
With the upcoming fall season giving us a sizable handful of sitcoms from the big US networks, I got to thinking about what we [Gordon and me, not the rest of you] would actually want to see on TV come September or whenever.
GORDON: Speaking for myself, I’m looking forward to the return of American Horror Story and Hannibal. Hopefully, their continued popularity will spawn a host of similar big-budget horror shows for me to enjoy.
EVAN: Sitcooooooooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmms. Situation comedies.
To be fair, I haven’t seen either Hannibal or AHS, but I don’t think I’m going out on a limb here by assuming they’re not laugh-a-minute programs.
GORDON: Yeah, I have no idea what just happened there. I’m going to try to blame that slip-up on the fact that half the sky is covered in smoke from the Mt. Charleston fire right now.
Still beats living in the Midwest.
EVAN: Adding that to the fact that Toronto had a straight-up deluge yesterday, I’m pretty sure we’re facing the end of the days.
GORDON: Now Evan’s pointed out something pretty important- next autumn will have on the biggest voids in sitcom history since, well…
I have no idea. Probably since forever. The end of NBC’s heavy hitters The Office and 30 Rock, combined with the cancellation of smaller shows like Don’t Trust the B—- In Apartment 23. And Community, which is dead to ME, even if it’s still on TV. It all really piles up.
EVAN: Happy Endings kicked the bucket as well.
And, to add insult to injury, it turns out that Donald Glover will only be appearing in 5 of this upcoming season’s episodes. Cue the “my emotions” gif, Gordon.
GORDON: Those were the only good parts of Community after Season 2.
EVAN: I thought Season 3 had some real gems, but Season 4 was pretty much utter garbage.
ANYWAY.
G-Town, what kind of sitcom would you like to see grace America’s television sets?
GORDON: Ideally, I want something to fill the hole that the end of Ugly Americans left-
Ideally, that thing would be a third season of Ugly Americans.
But barring that, I guess I’d want some viciously dark, satirical comedy, the kind of thing that the more conservative pastors of the churches of this nation will waste Sunday sermons on condemning.
EVAN: I certainly wouldn’t mind an Ugly Americans Season 3, which kind of leads into how the animated sitcoms are faring. Futurama is done after this upcoming season, and we’re not going to go into how long ago The Simpsons [and Family Guy, for that matter] should have ended.
A show that really pushed the bizarreness would be great, because really that’s what’s so great about using that particular medium. You can draw whatever you want-
GORDON: Superjail would certainly be evidence of that. And for a channel devoted solely to stoners, you gotta admit Adult Swim puts in a surprising amount of effort into their cartoons.
EVAN: Both of your statements are definitely true, considering that China, IL, is a thing.
To push our creative muscles a little, Gordon, present an actual premise for a sitcom you want to watch, and then I will, and then we will keep this ball rolling.
GORDON: Hm, that’s a tough one.
I want to see something based off of a specific kind of profession, similar to Scrubs. Maybe it could straight-up fill Ugly American‘s shoes and deal with Social Work.
Y’know what? Scratch that. I want to see this:
A sitcom based on a campaign trail of what is the most evil, depraved, corrupt politician in American history. ALL of American history. This guy would make Cortez blush. The main character is some idealistic, naive campaign organizer, hoping to run for office on his own, one day.
It’d allow for satirizing politics, modern events, politics, American culture in general- and at the end of the day, there’d always be some little kernel of hope left for us.
‘Course, you’re going to have your wacky assortment of supporting characters as well-
EVAN: Of course.
GORDON: The guy who may or may not be a spy from the opposing campaign.
The jaded reporter who serves as the primary love interest.
EVAN: The naive guy who keeps trying to market the politician to various subcultures and groups.
GORDON: Heh. He’d be ridiculously out of touch.
EVAN: “Uh, goths are still a thing, right?”
GORDON: His attempt to get the youth vote would have the politician on a skateboard.
But yeah, I think there’s some promise there
EVAN: I’d definitely watch it.
GORDON: The politician must be played by- you ready for this?
Paul ****ing Giamatti
EVAN: YES. A THOUSAND TIMES YES.
GORDON: His opponent: Patton Oswalt.
Katey Sagal can be one of the mistresses, since she won’t be playing Leela anymore
EVAN: [see above]
EVAN: My idea, which I actually came up with months ago, was to kind of do an occupational comedy somewhat akin to Scrubs, as Gordon suggested. This time, however, the cast would be school teachers.
GORDON: Nice.
EVAN: And it would be really easy to create roles, I mean, it basically writes itself-
The gym teacher is the jock, the calculus teacher kind of nerdy, the chemistry teacher keeps trying to make meth but he’s pretty inept at his job . . .
GORDON: Ha!
EVAN: They’re all ragging on each others’ jobs, because the art teacher doesn’t really grade anything and the math teacher only uses scantrons.
Oh, and they all hate the principal, who is kind of like the pointy-haired boss from Dilbert
GORDON: Heh.
EVAN: ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, wait, no, not you. Uh, HBO? Listen up.
These are great ideas. They are not necessarily free, even though we did just post them online for any monkey with an internet connection to browse through.
GORDON: That said, if these were to be taken and not cancelled after one botched season, I don’t think either of us would mind all that much.
EVAN: Again, we are looking at you, FOX. And ABC, actually, taking into account how they butchered airing Don’t Trust The B—-.
GORDON: I’m digging this, actually- let’s do another.
I’d like to see something sci-fi, actually. I never loved Futurama like Evan did, but I’ve always respected the role it played, and I think there oughta be something to fill it’s place-
I’m thinking something along the lines of Zapp Brannigan getting a spin off, ’cept instead of Zapp, it’d be… Nathan Fillion? Is he done screwing around with that one terrible detective show yet?
EVAN: I hear Castle‘s quite good, actually. Again, I can’t corroborate that having never seen it myself.
GORDON: Forget Fillion.
Neil Patrick Harris. I want to see that guy lead a less-than-intrepid space crew.
This is why we can’t have nice things.
EVAN: Really, a wacky take on Star Trek leads to galaxy of possibilities. Space puns. Haha. And I’m sure there a few avenues [however unlikely it may seem] that Futurama hasn’t covered yet.
GORDON: Definitely. It’d be tough, but some historical sitcom wouldn’t be out of place either. What with the craze surrounding Downton Abbey and it’s ilk.
EVAN: I mean, M*A*S*H was super popular right? Korean War and all that? It’s kind of insane to imagine the exact kind of thing now.
GORDON: I assume so. I know very little about that show. I mean flippin’ nothing.
Oh wait. Wasn’t Samberg coming out with some cop show?
EVAN: He was, and I’m looking forward to it, and I’ve embedded a trailer below.
GORDON: I guess the last idea I want to put on the table would be something really relevant to today. A show centered on recent college grads trying to find and keep work, dealing with the general state of the world as it is.
EVAN: Someone actually mentioned that 2 Broke Girls was the closest thing the world had to a 99% show. Which is- painfully disappointing.
GORDON: That… that causes me severe pain. The concept is… horrifying.
NO, YOU ARE NOT.
EVAN: I mean, they had a fair point.
There have been episodes that revolve around them donating blood or eggs to make money, and finding work on Craigslist, and doing medical trials-
These are all more or less actual options I considered before I found my job.
GORDON: It is a fair point.
It’s just a damn shame that this generation’s representation is a sub-par show known for it’s unabashed racism.
EVAN: To close us off, since we really are running out of time, I was wondering-
Is it possible to address truly important topics, like boycotting a company like Coca-Cola for its unethical business practices, in a sitcom? Scrubs dealt with death because it took place in a hospital, but I like to think this is a little bit different.
GORDON: Some of the most moving and touching scenes on television have taken place on sitcoms. Think of the bee episode of Futurama. Or better yet, the ending scene with Fry’s dog
EVAN: Jurassic Bark.
I’m not saying that sitcoms can’t have moments of emotional poignancy, more whether or not they can communicate important, serious issues.
GORDON: I’d probably point to South Park for that one.
EVAN: Considering I’ve only ever seen two full episodes, I guess I’m going to have to defer to you on that one.
GORDON: What about that episode of The Boondocks, where they send up the Iraq war?
EVAN: There you go-]
The Boondocks actually did do a fantastic job of riffing on some very serious topics in a way that was hilarious but still made you think. That’s what we need more of.
GORDON: True that.
EVAN: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for reading Gordon and me blather on about sitcoms. While it was largely about what we think would be pretty hilarious to watch on TV, we also touched on the fact that they can be used as a vehicle for some heavier stuff.
Tune in next time, for when we talk about some other topic we come up with half an hour before talking.
GORDON: Or you could, for once, suggest something-
EVAN: Technically I suggested this topic, so you could suggest something-
GORDON: How ’bout we talk about this: http://i.imgur.com/EGZ6gMR.jpg
EVAN: Sounds good to me, man. Now say good-bye and thank you to the nice people.
GORDON: Good-bye and thank you to the nice people.
EVAN: I really don’t.
