by Maya Schioler

Created on: December 13, 2009

When Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David created the show they were agreed it would be “about nothing”. That might not sound like a great concept for a sitcom, but since Seinfeld ran for nine years and is both universally loved and critically acclaimed, well apparently it is.

Despite the long duration of the show it never got sappy in the slightest. A rule was set from the very beginning that there was to be “no hugging, no learning”, which made sure the show always remained funny. Unlike so many other sitcoms it never sacrificed pure humor for morality lessons.  It is a sitcom that treats its viewers as adults, capable of independent thought. This is a big part of Seinfeld's greatness.

Jerry Seinfeld is a fairly successful comedian with a fairly unsuccessful love life (because no-one can live up to his perfectionism). Next to his best friend George Costanza, however, he comes off as a Greek god. During a large portion of the show George lives with his parents and is unemployed. The third musketeer, Elaine Benes, is Jerry's ex. Somehow they still manage to maintain a close, mostly frictionless friendship. The last character of the main cast, Cosmo Kramer (whose given name was kept secret for four seasons or so) is Jerry's extremely eccentric neighbor.

Jerry, George and Elaine are all believable, although quite neurotic and odd, characters. Kramer on the other hand is not the kind of guy you would expect to find in the same crowd. He would be more realistic if seen with a bunch of drug dealers or in an asylum, but nevertheless he adds a lot of zest to the show. Without him it might have gotten too dry.

Seinfeld is true situational comedy. Its humor is found in the mundane aspects of life. There are episodes about everything from muffin tops to waiting in line at a busy restaurant. It is never base or crude, but always very humane. We can all recognize ourselves, our friends and our families in Seinfeld. The every day dilemmas that are portrayed in the show are universal, and that is why it is still so popular, eleven years after its final episode! Whether you experienced the 90’s or not is irrelevant. Seinfeld is timeless.

There is an episode about who can abstain from pleasuring themselves the longest, an episode about what happens when one man eats his Snickers bar with knife and fork, an episode involving George ending up pretending to be a marine biologist and an episode concerning eating only the muffin tops. Seinfeld has explored every little inch of the potential comedy of daily life.

The sitcom has been proclaimed dead. If that is true, then it is because Seinfeld already took the genre to its limit. After such a brilliant show there is nowhere left to go. Still, there is no need to despair - we will always have the reruns.

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