Blog 4: Television: Genre, Humor, and Marxism

Situation comedies, or sitcoms, have been around for years now. The characteristics in these sitcoms are generally the same: there's an unseen audience laughing at the parts that are supposed to be funny, it's usually about a family who goes through day-to-day life drama but in a more humorous light to the viewer, the personalities and actions of the characters are surreal, and the main settings of the show are always the same. Everyone has seen a sitcom sometime in their life. They aren't as prevalent on tv as they used to be now with the rise of reality television, and some don't even have the familiar characteristic or feel as sitcoms from the past. This doesn't mean sitcoms are facing extinction; it just means that the majority of people prefer watching other genres nowadays.

I personally don't watch as much sitcoms as I used to back when I was a kid, but one of the last sitcoms I watched was Reba. I came to watch it one day because my friend LOVED the show, and then she got me hooked on it. The show is about Reba, a sarcastically wisecracking single mother of three kids, who's ex-husband, Brock, divorces her in order to marry his young and pregnant dental hygienist, Barbra Jean. Along with the drama going on between her ex and his terribly annoying new wife, Reba's eldest teenage daughter, Cheyenne, is also pregnant. On top of that, Cheyenne's high school football player boyfriend, Van, gets kicked out of his house by his parents after they learn that he plans to marry her, so has to move in to Reba's house. 

This show definitely fits the definition of a situational comedy. The show has the infamous laugh tracks that characterizes a classic sitcom show. This show also has typical drama that normal people experience every day, but their turmoil seems more humorous to the viewer because of the way the characters in the show handle it. Reba always has a sarcastic remark to make in every situation, and Barbra Jean always says something ridiculous which shows how unintelligent and unfit she is to handle the excitement of each drama. The type of humor most used in the show is wisecrack humor, mostly coming from Reba, or her daughter, Kyra. There is also some melodrama humor from Cheyenne, Van, Brock, and mostly from Barbra Jean. These characters totally ignore what the consequences of their actions would be until they come across a problem, and they also exaggerate how to react to simple trivialities of life.

Work Cited

Storey, John. Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: An Introduction. 5th. Longman, 2008.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5xdDgFe_Vk&feature=related