are situational comedies, remedies?

I am a huge fan of sitcoms. The old ones, the new ones, you name it. While I might not watch all the sitcoms available, I did watch a couple of shows which I consider my comfort shows. Simply put, 3/4 of my comfort shows are sitcoms, actually.

What are sitcoms, anyway?

My understanding of sitcom is that it is a genre of the show which emphasize comedy. Generally, there is a distinction between the traditional sitcoms (80s-90s ish, think about Friends or The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) and the more contemporary ones (like New Girl).

The most noticeable difference is probably the absence of the laughing track. I have mixed feelings about it, to be completely honest. I personally love love the laughing track because, well, it’s kind of a sitcom staple. However, sometimes silence is loud which then contribute to the hilariousness of the show.

What does the last sentence even mean?

Think about Brooklyn 99, where the silence sometimes is intentionally loud, and then the zoom-in of the camera kind of adds to the total awkwardness which is — hilarious.

And that’s basically that for the more “Theory” ish part of this post, haha.

My love for sitcom perhaps started way earlier than I reckon. But, the major turning point which made me realize “boy I do LOVE this type of show” is during mid-2019. I was obsessed with Aladdin (dir. Guy Ritchie, 2019) and I saw it 8x in the cinema. You read that right. Eight. Times. Long story short, I realized that Will Smith is an amazing actor (well, duh) and started to look into his earlier work, which includessss… The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, yes!

I proceed to watch (and rewatch) the series countless times. The reason behind my love for Fresh Prince is simple: it is light, easy to watch, it is hilarious, it relieves stress, however, it's still able to tackle real issues in the best way possible.

And then I begin to discover more and more sitcoms over time. Older and more recent sitcoms, like Netflix's Ashley Garcia, Brooklyn 99, New Girl, How I Met Your Mother, and the list goes on and on and on.

I have the tendency to rewatch the sitcom even after it ends. And I do not know if you noticed but most of the show I watch has reached their finale long before I started to watch them. But I do find comfort in rewatching my comfort sitcoms.

Maybe there is a scientific explanation behind this? Well, I know for a fact that laughter is linked with happiness, so maybe, subconsciously my brain associates the sitcom →laughter →happiness cycle so sitcoms → happiness?

In other words,

are situation comedies, remedies?

Besides the nice little rhyme, I think it is incredibly true. It’s a remedy in a way that it can relieve stress, which might be due for whatever reason. School, work, personal relationships and or friendships, you name it.

It kinda is a remedy in the sense that it has the power to — -distract — our brain a bit. distract our mind from the reoccurring thoughts that are not nice. It has that escapism element, in my opinion.

Anyway.

I do have genuine love and interest in sitcoms, so I might as well give a list of my sitcom recommendations, which might be useful to add to your watch list :)

And yes that’s the end of this post. Maybe anti-climax-ness should be my signature. But yes this post ends here.

NADIA SYARIFAH’S ULTIMATE SITCOM RECOMMENDATION LIST

1. Brooklyn 99
2. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
3. How I Met Your Mother
4. New Girl
5. No Good Nick
6. Alexa & Katie
7. The Good Place
8. Mr Iglesias
9. Family Reunion
10. Ashley Garcia: Genius in Love

(there are still a lot so i might edit this in the future but, these are my top 10 as per today)