9. Parks and Recreation
A few days ago I talked about why I love The Good Place, but for Mike Schur shows about small weirdos going up against a big system, it's Pawnee every time for me. Parks and Rec took a little while to find its rhythm, with a first season that's honestly best skipped, but when it settles into that groove, there are few shows that can match it for that trademark blend of hysterical comedy and genuine sweetness. Similar to The Good Place, the characters here are very much the little men in the shadow of a larger uncaring system, but it keeps this aggressive optimism, where every small push is a step towards productive change. And while that approach has earned the show some criticism, personally I think it's a good fit for an underdog story, where the characters earn small but valuable wins in spite of the titanic odds
Again, lightning didn't strike right away, and it takes Parks a few episodes to shed that early installment awkwardness and get comfortable with its characters, but once Brendanawicz is swapped out for Chris and Ben, the show eases into itself and really establishes itself as the best workplace sitcom I've ever seen. It does everything you'd want from a show like this, using the framework that writers Schur and Daniels established with The Office (which this show was originally conceived as a spin-off of), and doubling down on the charm and the zaniness of the characters to make a show with endless quotability and an infinite rewatch factor
All of it is just so wholesome and kind, especially compared to the snarkiness and dry irony of some of its sitcom contemporaries. It's feelgood TV by it's very nature, where every single beat is used to fortify the show's untouchable optimism. There's so much charm and heart gone into every moment in Parks and Rec, and even though comforting sweetness is in at the moment (see: Ted Lasso and Schitt's Creek), there's something about Parks' good nature that still holds up incredibly well all these years later. Alright look, maybe the show's can't-we-all-just-get-along approach to politics is dated and clunky, but watching the whole thing again recently, the show as a whole has endured pretty damn well, because the humour is consistently sharp and creative enough to cut that shimmering idealism. It holds up because it invites you to invest in a group of characters that, archetypal as they are, are just incredibly easy to care about. Parks paints everyone with love and care, and that's a hard thing to take away
That's entirely down to the cast, and Parks and Rec easily features one of my favourite sets of main players in any sitcom. The character work is pristine here, especially from the end of season two, where the whole ensemble click into who their characters are, and the show gets a real handle on both its comedy and its sense of heart. Ron Swanson is obviously an incredible comic creation and Nick Offerman is stoic perfection, but I think every character is just as much of a work of genius. They're simple and broadly drawn on paper, but the magic comes from how the cast improvise and workshop their characters in real time, filling in the details and adding the specificities as the show progresses. Seeing Donna and Jerry go from supporting players to part of the main ensemble is indicative of how Parks knows a good thing when it sees one, recognising the strength of its cast and using that to improve the show even further
Yes every character in this is a broadly drawn archetype (the idealistic oddball, the grumpy stoic, the loveable idiot, the neurotic wreck), but the cast do a fantastic job at making them all feel so real. They're all hilarious, and the comedy is entirely driven by the strength of these characters, but I think they endure because on some level, they're all just people that you want to see succeed. Other shows would have characters like Ron, April or even Tom be the stock asshole character, but Parks gives each of them goals and values and things that they genuinely care about, and so it's hard not to fall in love with them even when they aren't as obviously warm as the likes of Leslie or Andy. That steadfast belief that most people are ultimately good is the lifeblood of the show, and it never fails to unlock that goodness in every character by honing in on what matters to them and using that to place them into a large world of small people, where everyone's just trying to keep going
I could really just name every character and describe why each of them work so well, but I won't do that because this is one case where, despite the stacked cast, I find it incredibly easy to pick a favourite. Chris Traeger is LITERALLY a perfect character. Whoever looked at Rob Lowe in all of his Brat-Pack glory and thought "this man needs to smile his way through an existential nightmare" deserves a very large medal because it's one of the funniest character arcs in all of television. Introduced as a perfect specimen and an optimistic health nut, Chris really becomes the best character when the show explores his reason for smiling all the time. His spiral into the void is utterly hysterical, but it's also played with a lot of love and heart that ensures his journey through the depths of his soul always feels in character and brings out an insane comic energy from Lowe that's honestly never been topped since
But what I love about this show above all is how alive Pawnee feels. Setting is a weird thing in TV. It's something that I think can be underused quite easily, but when a show nails its sense of place, it builds a much stronger connection with the viewer, where everything that happens feels like it's happening somewhere. Don't forget, this is the world you're spending hours of viewing time in, and while it would've been easy for Parks to rely on its comedy and breeze past the specificities of its setting, it instead makes the smarter decision and matches Leslie on her intense adoration of her town. Obviously it's all done in the framework of comedy, but the attention to detail with Pawnee's history, culture and the inner workings of the town is actually really impressive for this kind of show. There's a huge rotating cast of recurring and one-shot characters that make the place feel so much more dynamic and alive, adding to the running joke that everyone in Pawnee is deeply, deeply weird and giving the show a huge boost of personality and energy. Parks works because it knows that no great story happens nowhere
If you're a fan of shows that feel like a warm hug, or just like your comedy off-kilter and quotable, then Parks is the show for you. It might lack the edge of a 30 Rock or an Always Sunny, but it's among my favourite sitcoms from that era precisely because it deals in such brilliant optimism. And it's hilarious to boot, with such a generous approach to its gags that means that its best jokes will echo on for a long time to come. If you haven't seen it, take a leaf out of Tom and Donna's book and treat yo' self
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