The premise was Garry Shandling has a sitcom. The characters are all aware they are on a sitcom. He regularly interacts with the studio audience. Each episode he does a monologue. This stuff is out there in 2011. But it must have been insane in 1986. Closest thing I can think of to compare it to is American Dad. Which has these crazy fourth wall breaking moments while still sticking to a coherent plot. What I'm going to do here is talk about a few episodes.
In this episode Garry finds a dog. His opening monologue cracks me up. This bit about a cow resenting another cow for having a car. Its something in the delivery.
The episode seems to be about boxing. Garry and his attractive but platonic friend Nancy play Rock em Sock Em Robots as his theme song plays. And hey its Optimus Prime and Megatron.
After the theme finishes a dog walks up to his back door. Garry takes care of it til he finds the owner. What follows is something that kept me laughing. I can't go into it very much without spoiling the fun. One thing about the show is despite the premise all the characters are sincere in what they do, which makes the jokes funnier when they go past the fourth wall.
Another thing is and its a reflection of the era we live in. But the show was not mean spirited or vulgar. Not that I have a problem with vulgar. This episode has a very dirty joke that is completely clean at the same time.
I think after watching so many shows from the last few years, I expected something bad to happen to the dog. You'll know what I mean when you get to it. Instead it goes another direction and is much funnier for it.
This episode Garry is all set to go to the beach with his neighbors the Schumakers but they are mad at him. Everybody is mad at him and Garry doesn't know why. Oh the theme in this one was a great gag.
He goes to the Schumakers house and finds they are furious at how he behaved at Pete Schmakers parents anniversary party. Garry can't remember doing anything so Grant suggest having one of his stupid flashbacks.
But the flashback cuts out before he can figure anything out.
Finally the reveal of what he did. Which with the build it got needed to be big and it was. I can't say what it is. But it really made me laugh.
Now this episode really plays with the format of the show. It starts with a Shakespearean actor coming in carrying a giant #1. Garry hired him to play the role of Fate. The number is to announce which scene we are at. Garry is set to go fishing with Pete and Grant.
But his obnoxious neighbor Leonard stops by with his cousin the psychic. He makes six predictions. Five of them harmless and accurate. The last one is his friend Nancy will be scarred for life in scene 4 on her date.
Garry is concerned so he checks out the script and walks across the studio to the Diner set and meets her date. Who has an anger problem. Oh and Fate has informed him it is now Scene 2. Every time he changes sets the scene changes. So when he returned home it is Scene 3.
So Garry decides he will just stay in Scene 3 and Nancy will be safe. Fate kicks up a stink so Garry locks him in the closet. But his obnoxious Neighbor Leonard drags him to the Diner and Scene 4.
I don't want to ruin the conclusion. It was very funny and unique.
I love this show and plan on buying the DVD set very soon.
