Monday, January 25, 2010

Big Bang, baby



I've posted about reading lately. But I do watch TV, and my favorite show is probably Big Bang Theory (in the category of everything-that's-not-Mad-Men, which I love). I originally got into it because the characters live in Pasadena not far from my old home in South Pasadena (which for you geniuses out there is just south of Pasadena). It was really fun to hear them reference Old Town and see the Pasadena town hall out Sheldon's window. But soon I came to love the brilliant joke writing, and last night I watched the apex of the show - the episode from last season titled "The Maternal Capacitance." Christine Baranski as Leonard's mother, Dr. Beverly Hofstadter, was astounding. The central character of the show, Sheldon, met Leonard's mother and both of these characters are tacitly undiagnosed with Asperger's/autism. Now this wasn't brain science, but it was solid joke writing. The joke that sold me on the show last year went like this:

Sheldon: What are the odds that two unique people such as ourselves would meet?

Leonard's mother: Is that a rhetorical question or would you like to do the math?

Sheldon: I'd like to do the math.

Sublime.

Then of course there's this classic sequence:



2 comments:

  1. I love South Pasadena. This show IS pretty funny, although I've only seen maybe 1 episode. I'll have to check it out again...

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  2. You have to give Better Off Ted a try - it's one of our favorites with some brilliant jokes!

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