I was watching an old episode of Seinfeld this week, and an odd thought hit me: do I love this show because it is legitimately funny, or does my nostalgia for it make me think it's funnier than it actually is? After all, my teenage years were formed by watching the show every Thursday night and then discussing it with my buddies the next morning at school. Am I simply reliving that joy and over-estimating its quality? The episode I was watching is nearly 25 years old. Virtually no other sit-com from that era still makes me laugh the way Seinfeld does. Try it yourself--go watch some old sit-coms from previous decades. They are mostly terrible and leave you thinking, "Why in the world did I used to find that funny?" But Seinfeld breaks through those historical barriers, at least for me. And the episode I saw the other night, and specifically this scene from it, proves why.
This scene does something remarkable, I believe. It is not only funny for Seinfeld aficionados; it's objectively funny, which is incredibly rare. Any person would fine this humorous, regardless of other comic tastes. The hypothetical premise, deciding to turn in a friend for murder, is based in seriousness, yet we know such a question is absurd on its face because no sane person would ever actually contemplate a potential murder and subsequently have this conversation. But the humor of this scene isn't just based in absurdity. We see that by moving from the hypothetical ("would you?") and its applied subjunctive verb to the present tense ("you are supposed to be") and then to the past tense ("I thought I did"), an entire history of this murderous plan has played itself out grammatically. The speed at which it moves from casual conversation starter to stressful reality (that, in their minds, has already happened) heightens the absurdity from broadly silly to specifically funny.
The specific nature of the scene's humor is further amplified by the characters of Jerry and Kramer. As we see George exit, we already know he is morally ambiguous with most of his life decisions. Therefore, his commitment to abet a murderer isn't really a surprise. Jerry is often caught in the middle of his friends' moral dilemmas, and he often plays the neutral stand-in for the audience to relate to. But here, he appears to be more in agreement with George, which surprises us. And our surprise is further enhanced because Kramer is often so unpredictable, we are never quite sure where he will stand. Yet, in this scene, he is the most morally responsible of the bunch. Since he is such an eccentric, seeing him as the upstanding citizen and abiding by a firm morality is another level of absurdity. We don't expect it, so it's funny. And it gives yet another layer to the complexity of Kramer's odd persona.
The use of language and characterization is brilliantly played out in this scene, and it's what makes most of the Seinfeld episodes so endlessly watchable, even after all these years. So I've determined that my nostalgia has not gotten the best of me, in this case anyway. Seinfeld is still the funniest show in tv history.
The specific nature of the scene's humor is further amplified by the characters of Jerry and Kramer. As we see George exit, we already know he is morally ambiguous with most of his life decisions. Therefore, his commitment to abet a murderer isn't really a surprise. Jerry is often caught in the middle of his friends' moral dilemmas, and he often plays the neutral stand-in for the audience to relate to. But here, he appears to be more in agreement with George, which surprises us. And our surprise is further enhanced because Kramer is often so unpredictable, we are never quite sure where he will stand. Yet, in this scene, he is the most morally responsible of the bunch. Since he is such an eccentric, seeing him as the upstanding citizen and abiding by a firm morality is another level of absurdity. We don't expect it, so it's funny. And it gives yet another layer to the complexity of Kramer's odd persona.
The use of language and characterization is brilliantly played out in this scene, and it's what makes most of the Seinfeld episodes so endlessly watchable, even after all these years. So I've determined that my nostalgia has not gotten the best of me, in this case anyway. Seinfeld is still the funniest show in tv history.