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I'm kind of addicted to How I Met Your Mother at this moment. In fact, it's on on the other tab, I just ran out my 72 minutes in Megavideo today. It started a couple of weeks ago when I got home around five and too bored to open Mimin, so I just turned on the TV. There it was, no, not How I Met Your Mother, but (half of) Will and Grace. After that, on another channel, half of Everybody Loves Raymond, and after that, How I Met Your Mother (wow, this surely is quite a long title).

Anyway. I don't know which season is on TV. I wiki-ed for basic information, read Barney's blog (of course back in 2005 blog was still cool, now he tweets), and next thing I know, I started watching illegally from season 1.

Before I got hooked up with HIMYM, bored of waiting for new episode of The Big Bang Theory, I watched a few episodes of Mad About You. I like it. Paul Reiser is a hell of funny guy (who also can act) and I love Helen Hunt. But I was stunned of how simple it was. Mostly it's only one plot (I think it gets more complex on later seasons), and the intensity is just... well, lack of. Feels like you have to wait for a few minutes for a gag.

HIMYM doesn't really offer anything new, per se. Take the 'Kids, back in 2005...' off, it's actually just Friends set in a bar instead of a coffeeshop. Sometimes it also has only one plot (Friends always had 2 or 3), but it's intense. Constant comedic situation. The Big Bang Theory recycles a few old ideas (Revenge of the Nerds, Urkel's Family Matters, Weird Science etc) but brings them to a new level of (geekiness and) comedy. Will and Grace (started last century, actually) had quite a new idea. I don't know whether it's a trigger or a symptom of LGBT-approved TV shows. 30 Rock is comical. The Office is British.

My point is, I'm always a fan of sitcoms and I'm amazed of how they had evolved. +sali once pointed out how drama (thriller? suspense?) evolved by comparing CSI and The X-Files, but I wasn't really into them. Or actually I'm not really into TV, or maybe Indonesian TV stations. I don't have cable at home, that's probably part of the problem :P

Back to topic. Yes, the 'new' sitcoms may not always be new in ideas, but they sure are fresh and definitely hilarious. Maybe because they're, of course, new so I can relate more to them. Actually I think the new sitcom characters tend to be more comical, but somehow they still feel real.

Awkay, back to HIMYM S01E16 :D