Moving The Characters Forward, The Big Bang Theory Season Five Is Better Than It Is Audaciously Funny.

The Good: Character development, Many of the jokes
The Bad: Plots are very formulaic, The humor is very predictable by this point.
The Basics: In its fifth season, The Big Bang Theory is funny, but makes more of a mark by advancing the characters in the show well.


The longer a television show goes on, the harder it is to keep it fresh. This is especially true of sitcoms when they have very few characters and they are built on a simple “gimmick.” For all of my love of The Big Bang Theory, the show is built on a very simple premise: a smart guy falls in love with a neighbor while enduring his socially-awkward genius roommate. So, by the fifth season of the show, it would be perfectly reasonable for me to be pretty sick of the show, especially as its humor has become more telegraphed and familiar. Even when I cannot call the next joke, it is pretty easy in the fifth season to call the type of joke because by this point, the casual throwing around of physics jargon and the snide remarks of Sheldon are pretty obviously paced.

But what keeps the fifth season of The Big Bang Theory interesting, worth watching and worth picking up on DVD is how the show grows beyond its original framework. In the fifth season, The Big Bang Theory dares not to be funny and when that happens, the show becomes sweet and smart and character-driven in a way that it has not always been. This is greatly assisted by the more permanent presence of Mayim Bialik’s Amy Farrah Fowler and Melissa Rauch’s Bernadette. Sometimes, adding new (and the right) characters works and Amy and Bernadette enhance The Big Bang Theory in a way that helps make season five of the show feel truly fresh again.

In the fifth season of The Big Bang Theory, serialized elements include Leonard dating Raj’s sister Priya – mostly as a long-distance relationship, Amy and Sheldon getting closer as Amy becomes increasingly attached to Sheldon, and Howard and Bernadette moving toward their wedding and negotiating with one another. One of the biggest negotiations comes in the form of Howard getting offered the opportunity to go to outer space and Bernadette being concerned about what that means for them (she is terrified he will die in space and wants to veto the mission). Recurring elements like Shedon’s conflicts with management at the college, Wil Wheaton, and Barry Kripke pop back up through the season as well.

In this season, there are usual episodic elements as well. One episode, for example, has Leonard confronting his childhood bully while another puts Sheldon at Amy’s lab as part of his forced vacation from work. Sheldon has to learn to do the right thing when he opens and breaks the vintage Star Trek toy Penny got him . . . which he then swaps with Leonard’s identical one. Sheldon humiliates himself to meet Stephen Hawking and learns to overcome his fear of birds. Another episode focuses on everyone in the gang pranking Sheldon on Halloween.

As it has in the past seasons, season five of The Big Bang Theory is a mix of technical jargon and a generally higher level of diction than what one usually finds on television and exceptionally predictable plot and character arcs that pretty much define the sitcom. In the fifth season, this unfortunate dichotomy is enhanced by an increased focus on character elements, usually relating to Amy and Sheldon and Bernadette and Howard. While Leonard goes through the predictable and inevitable breakup with Priya to return his focus to Penny, Howard and Bernadette actually wrestle with adult decisions that come from moving toward marriage. Howard and Bernadette wrestle with making big life decisions (like going into outer space and prenuptial agreements) together and that pushes the envelope out from where the show has been.

In the fifth season, the principle characters of The Big Bang Theory remain:

Sheldon Cooper – In this season, the esteemed physicist makes a relationship contract with Amy and deals with Leonard dissolving their roommate agreement, essentially leaving him helpless. He is still arrogant, but he works with people to get what he wants, like willingly degrading himself to Howard when Wolowitz has an in with Stephen Hawking. He neglects Amy more often than she would like and slowly learns to prioritize her (and feel for her),

Amy Farrah Fowler – Still working to be Penny’s “bestie,” she is thrilled to be a Maid of Honor for Bernadette and Howard’s wedding. Socially awkward, she dates Stuart once and uses Sheldon’s jealousy to push their relationship forward,

Howard Wolowitz – Thrilled to be marrying Bernadette, he discovers he has to compromise. Irked about having to sign a prenup and meet Bernadette’s father, he starts to experience real anxiety. Despite all his friends (and fiancé) having Doctorates, he is offered the singular honor of going into space, which stresses his relationships with Bernadette and Raj,

Bernadette – More pragmatic than Howard, she is pressured into asking him for a prenup. She tries to be nice, especially to Amy when she realizes that her and Penny shopping for bridal supplies has offended her. She reveals to Howard that she is not a fan of children,

Raj Koothrappali – Working to get past his love for Bernadette, he has to deal with having slept with Penny. He discovers he can talk to his digital assistant,

Penny – Sparring with Sheldon and quietly pining for Leonard, she is actually quietly thrilled when Leonard and Priya break up. She helps Bernadette with wedding plans and does a good deed by keeping Amy company when Sheldon is a jerk,

and Leonard Hofstadter – He tries to be a good guy, which means being up front with Priya when a comic book artist makes an advance on him and he is intrigued. In the wake of his relationship with Priya, he slowly turns back to Penny.

The acting in the fifth season of The Big Bang Theory is virtually flawless. By this point, all of the actors know exactly what they are doing. Guest stars like Wil Wheaton, Brent Spiner, and Stephen Hawking all interact easily with the main cast.

Ultimately, season five of The Big Bang Theory picks up the momentum and direction of the prior season well and sets up a potentially wonderful sixth season.

For other seasons of The Big Bang Theory, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
Season 1
Season 2
Season 3
Season 4

7/10

For other television reviews, be sure to check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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The Big Bang Theory Works Hard To Develop The Characters And Stay Funny In The Complete Fourth Season!

The Good: Decent character development, Still funny, Replays well, Mayim Bialik and Melissa Rauch are good additions to the cast mix.
The Bad: Nothing superlative on the acting front, Plots are pretty blasé, Light on DVD bonus features.
The Basics: On DVD, The Big Bang Theory Season Four remains very funny and actually progresses the characters fairly well.


The fourth year of a sitcom can be devastating for a television series. By the fourth season, most of the actors know their character well and they know their castmates well enough to have gotten the timing down right for interactions. Usually, sitcoms go one of two ways in their fourth season. They either plod along doing the same thing that made them successful for the prior three years (and the show begins to die fast) or it finds some way to retool. Sometimes, the retooling is forced upon the show, like when the actor who played Coach on Cheers died after the third season or when Phil Hartman was killed after the fourth season of NewsRadio. But less drastic retooling works sometimes as well, as it does for the fourth season of The Big Bang Theory. After a third season that was strongly plot-based, the fourth season of The Big Bang Theory returns with a real push to develop the characters in new and interesting ways.

The Big Bang Theory accomplishes much of its goal of keeping the popular show fresh in the fourth season through the addition of Mayim Bialik and Melissa Rauch to the main cast. Bialik plays the socially-awkward Amy Farrah Fowler, who is a female counterpart to Sheldon, introduced in the third season’s finale. Rauch returns as Bernadette, Howard’s ex-girlfriend who gets back into a relationship with him and gets serious about him. Aarti Mann recurs as Priya, Raj’s sister, and her addition gives Kaley Cuoco a surprising number of chances to reach for Penny’s dramatic potential. And she sells it.

Picking up months after Howard and Raj introduced Sheldon to Amy, Sheldon has developed a weird friendship with Amy Farrah Fowler where they video conference frequently, but Sheldon refuses to consider her a “girlfriend.” When Penny gets wind of Amy, she insists on taking them out on a date together. Amy finds herself interested in a friendship with Penny and she begins to associate more with Sheldon, Penny and the guys. Around the same time, Howard runs into Bernadette at the Cheesecake Factory, having broken up with her under mysterious circumstances. When Howard works to convince Bernadette that he is a changed man (via Penny), she gives him one more chance.

In advance of New Year's, Penny is lonely, so she hooks back up with her dumb-as-a-rock ex-boyfriend, which leads Leonard to get jealous and the guys to mock Penny’s boyfriend, much to Penny’s dismay. In trying to right things with Penny, Leonard works to restore his friendship with her and largely succeeds. He succeeds to the point that when Raj’s sister, Priya, returns, Leonard and Priya rekindle their romance. And as Sheldon and Amy get a bit closer, they explore the effect of gossip on the group as Howard moves his relationship with Bernadette to a whole new level.

The appeal of The Big Bang Theory prior to the fourth season has largely been the glorification of geek culture and the pretty incredible level of diction (and jargon) for physics presented in each episode. While the fourth season continues to impress viewers who are infatuated with geek culture – Wil Wheaton makes his annual appearance and the show features guest shots from George Takei, LeVar Burton, Katee Sackoff, and one of the founders of Apple Computers – the show tones down the jargon quite a bit. In that way, the fourth season becomes a bit more accessible and, sadly, a bit more common.

What fills the gap in the way The Big Bang Theory used to challenge its viewers with the complexity of the language is a real sense of character development. In this season, the fundamental characters actually grow and change. Here is how the fourth season finds and affects the principle characters:

Leonard Hofstadter – Working to get over his emotional attachment for Penny, he finally moves on. While living with Sheldon continues to grate on him, Leonard soon takes comfort in the arms of Priya who is just passing through. When she comes back to stay in the area for an extended period of time, Leonard is delighted to discover an ally in combatting Sheldon’s demanding ways. When Priya effectively challenges the roommate agreement, Sheldon leverages Priya’s discomfort with her parents finding out about the relationship against her and Leonard, for a time, moves into Raj’s apartment,

Penny – Feeling remorse over dumping Leonard, she tries to find someone new to love, but spends most of the year strengthening her friendships with Bernadette and (of all people) Sheldon while getting to know Amy. She is frustrated when her father comes for a visit and she uses Leonard to convince him that she has found a good man, a situation Leonard uses to his advantage. While continuing her work at the Cheesecake Factory, she is frustrated by Priya when Priya and Leonard start dating. The most acting she does this season is teaching Sheldon how to act after Sheldon has a disastrous lecture experience,

Howard – Quiet for some time on why he and Bernadette broke up, the truth comes out and he works to make it right with her. Soon, the two are dating, but when Howard asks Bernadette to move in with him, his relationship with his mother almost ruins their relationship. As the two try to figure things out, Howard continues to live with the indignity of not being a doctor, surrounded by friends who all have their Ph.D.s. He takes a bold step forward with Bernadette, which causes a bit of a rift between him and Raj,

Raj – Still unable to talk to women (without alcohol), Raj remains Howard’s sidekick (though the two prepare to fight over who is the hero and who is the sidekick). As the season goes on, Raj is frustrated when Priya begins dating Leonard against his wishes and Howard spends and increasing amount of time with Bernadette. While the others begin so suspect he may be gay, Raj actually begins to develop an attraction for Bernadette, which he refuses to act on because of his friendship with Howard. When Priya and Leonard begin having terribly inaccurate Star Trek sex in his apartment, Raj relocates to Leonard’s room and temporarily becomes Sheldon’s roommate,

Bernadette – having felt unloved by Howard the first time around, she is more willing to challenge him when they renew their romantic relationship. She becomes furious at the idea of simply taking over the niche Howard’s mother had and refuses to let Howard use her that way. At the climax of the season, she gets her Doctorate and is offered a fantastic job, which makes Howard deeply uncomfortable,

Amy Farrah Fowler – Socially awkward, she is a neurologist who enters into an arrangement with Sheldon to keep her mother off her back about dating. She has ups and downs with Sheldon – like when a philosophical disagreement leads them to terminate their friendship (inspiring Sheldon to get twenty-one cats) or when she gets very drunk and kisses Sheldon – but seems genuinely compatible with him. Despite her offputting nature, after a slumber party with Penny and Bernadette, she begins referring to Penny as her “bestie” and emotionally defending Penny as Leonard and Priya get closer. She delights with Sheldon in experimenting on the group by spreading rumors to see how the information flows between their mutual friends,

And Sheldon Cooper – Less baffled by human behavior, the brilliant physicist now gets tips on how to interact better from Amy. With Amy, he learns to massage himself and delights in experimenting upon his friends. He refuses to consider Amy his “girlfriend” (in a romantic sense) and continues to enjoy Leonard’s friendship, though Leonard pulls away from him quite a bit. After he is challenged by Wil Wheaton, Priya, and a roomful of graduate students, Sheldon begins to adapt to try to both restore control in his personal life and develop professionally. He also develops a three-person chess board and takes in Raj when Leonard de facto moves out.

In the fourth season, the actors who have been around offer very little that is new, even as their characters change. Kunal Nayyar is still compelled to play Raj awkward around women, Jim Parsons still has Sheldon as awkward (made even more so as Sheldon loosens up and releases sneering laughs from time to time), and Johnny Galecki shows no real new direction for Leonard, in terms of performance.

Rather surprisingly, Kaley Cuoco gives Penny greater depth in season four. As Leonard moves farther away from Penny, Penny begins to pine for him. Cuoco, then, is able to infuse Penny with some real sad moments and she sells them with a look of quiet desperation in her eyes that she has not revealed to viewers before. Sure, she still plays silly well – as she does in a hilarious scene in the season’s first episode wherein Sheldon calculates the number of men Penny has been with -, but for the first time, Cuoco is able to stretch dramatically and make Penny into someone who is something more than just a hot girl who lives next door.

Mayim Bialik steps right into the role of Amy Farrah Fowler and plays off Jim Parsons expertly. While there are a few times when it is clear she is trying not to laugh at lines delivered by her costar, Bialik adds a real zest to the cast that helps to flesh out the world of The Big Bang Theory better. Scenes with Bialik, Cuoco and Melissa Rauch become some of the freshest scenes of the season.

Now on DVD, The Big Bang Theory Season Four comes with remarkably few bonus features. There is a behind-the-scenes featurette featuring Rauch, Nayar and Helberg (Howard) where they ask one another questions about the season and share stories. This is a neat-enough few minutes as it includes some shots of filming the scenes, which is cool. The only other bonus feature is a gag reel and it is amusing once.

Fortunately, the primary programming on The Big Bang Theory Season Four is of such a quality that it is easy to recommend, despite the weaker bonus features. If you’re looking for funny and different, with a very human sense of heart, this is the season of The Big Bang Theory that is best for you!

For other seasons of The Big Bang Theory, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
Season 1
Season 2
Season 3

6/10

For other television reviews, please visit my index page on the subject by clicking here!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Even Predictability And Mediocre Bonus Features Can't Bring The Big Bang Theory Season 2 Down!

The Good: Funny, Decent acting, Good character development
The Bad: Slightly more predictable than I would like, Light on DVD bonus features.
The Basics: A clever, fun comedy, The Big Bang Theory season two on DVD is worth watching and picking up.


Historically, I was not overly fond of the works of Chuck Lorre that I knew about. I was never a big fan of Rosanne or Grace Under Fire, though I did enjoy Cybil more than most people (and critics). I was especially unimpressed by Dharma And Greg which had a pretty limited concept that soon fizzled out. So, I was especially pleased to discover The Big Bang Theory Season 1 on DVD (click here for that review!) and when the opportunity came for me to pick up the second season on DVD, I leapt on it. I went into the experience with a little trepidation, though. The first season finale left off in a place where I felt the show either had to change radically or it was in danger of falling backward into a sense of repetition. Sadly, my fear was realized when my wife and I sat down to watch the second season of the show. While I enjoyed it quite a bit, it was a bit more predictable than I would have liked and I found myself calling not only the plot points, but the character aspects as well.

This might seem like a little bit of sour grapes on my part, but it truly is an honest evaluation of what I watched on DVD. The "sour grapes" aspect comes from a revelation that came in the middle of the second season where Sheldon Cooper, the super genius reveals that his father is dead. This, alas, made the script I sat down over a weekend and wrote completely moot. Yes, sometimes when I encounter great or good television, I want to be a part of it and I had the idea that there was absolutely no one in the world who would have been better to play Sheldon Cooper's father than David Hyde Pierce, so I wrote an episode for the show which would played Jim Parsons and David Hyde Pierce off one another perfectly. (Note to anyone from Chuck Lorre Productions reading this: I could make the episode work still, if you can get David Hyde Pierce to do the show!)

The second season of The Big Bang Theory, which is essentially an ensemble situational comedy that puts four geniuses in the company of a fairly dim blonde woman, begins where the first season ended. The first season finale found Leonard Hofstadter finally asking his neighbor, Penny, out on a date. The second season begins with Leonard returning with Penny and the guys evaluating how the date must have gone. Sadly for Leonard, Penny and him do not work out on the one date and both resolve to continue being good friends.

The second season progresses with stories like Leonard delivering a paper he wrote with Sheldon at a conference, despite Sheldon's refusal to participate and Penny going on a date with the comic book store owner the guys know. Leonard dates a doctor, which allows Sheldon's desire to get body scans get satisfied and Penny begins to bond with Sheldon when she tries one of the multiplayer computer games. The hijinx continue with Sheldon having to spend a night with Penny when he gets locked out of the apartment and Sheldon bonding with Leonard's psychiatrist mother when she comes to visit.

The show, however, is more of an ensemble comedy and Raj and Howard are along for most of the adventures. Howard makes his move on Penny and, unfortunately, flips the Mars rover into a ditch on Mars. Howard also dates Leonard's ex, Leslie Winkle, and Raj continues to try to learn to speak to women without being completely intimidated. He largely fails, though he manages to get some this season as well. In fact, he manages to hit on Summer Glau while on a train ride by drinking a nonalcoholic beer until Howard ruins his streak by pointing out the lack of alcohol in it. The season ramps up to a season finale that offers the quartet of men a chance for a real scientific opportunity exploring the Arctic!

Unfortunately for fans of The Big Bang Theory, the second season on DVD illustrates a weakness in the series, which is that at this point it is moving toward being a more typical sitcom than a real character study. The humor is more often than not more generic than truly original and fans who loved the first season are likely to discover that there is a great sense of repetition in the plots and character actions this season. For sure, there are some fun episodes, like when the gang builds a robot to go up against a rival scientist's robot, but lacking Howard's engineering expertise at the time, they find themselves severely outmaneuvered. But more frequently, the episodes have simple plots like "Leonard's mother comes to visit and discovers she has more in common than Sheldon" or "Sheldon's sister comes to visit and turns out to be a super hottie that the guys fawn all over." The episodes have a more formulaic feel to them and as a result, the second season feels less fresh than the first.

On the character front, the second season of The Big Bang Theory does remarkably little to progress the principle characters. Penny is virtually assured to say "what?" to Sheldon once an episode while opening her mouth comically wide and Sheldon is pretty much guaranteed to use logic to resolve a hypothetical argument he and the other guys are having over comic books or other science fiction references. Howard has his chance to make a move on Penny and is predictably rejected and Penny and Sheldon finally come to intellectual blows when he expels her from visiting the apartment.

Still, the show is remarkably funny and it is written with a level of diction that is higher than most programs. When Leonard reveals to Sheldon that the Thai food he is eating is not from his favorite Thai place, but rather repackaged by Leonard each time he buys it from a place that is still in business, the joke is fresh, funny and unpredictable. But more often than that, the jokes are predictable, like the various guys visiting Sheldon's sister only to be rejected until the supposed "least likely" one arrives to learn that he is who she was hoping for.

Like most worthwhile television programs, The Big Bang Theory works (when it does, which is frequently) because of the characters. The primary quintet remains the same as the first season and those characters include:

Sheldon Cooper - The super-genius physicist who is quirky and beyond brilliant, but socially awkward. He reveals this season his complete love of trains and he attempts to make a new friend in order to get a prime location using a rare piece of equipment. He is, alas, afraid of heights. He enforces an intricate roommate agreement with Leonard and he spars verbally with Penny frequently,

Penny - The resident blonde who is the object of Leonard, Raj and Howard's romantic affections. She works at the Cheesecake Factory and uses Sheldon's need for consistency against him while working there. She is affectionate toward Leonard, though she continues to date men who treat her less well,

Howard Wolowitz - An engineer friend of Sheldon and Leonard's, he is constantly horny. He discovers satisfaction with Leslie Winkle until she dumps him. This sets off Penny, who reveals to him her exact thoughts on him and he reveals his more sensitive side. Still, he's pretty much a pig with a high i.q.,

Raj Koothrappali - Despite being cut by Sheldon when Sheldon needs to make room for a new friend, he is the heart of the group. He is sarcastic and quietly delivers wicked remarks,

and Leonard - Smart, but far more human than Sheldon, he is a physicist who still wants to connect with others. Leonard pines for Penny, but when she moves on, he begins dating a doctor who he truly likes but is not quite willing to have move in with. He dreads his mother's visit and tries to keep the group of friends together and friendly.

The acting on The Big Bang Theory is much more consistent than extraordinary as the characters settle into their stylistic ruts. So, for example, Kunal Nayyar (Raj) does great work with his sarcastic deliveries, just as Kaley Cuoco does well with alternating between brassy and clueless. But just like Simon Helberg acting smarmy, this is nothing new that fans have not seen from the first season. Still, Jim Parsons and Johnny Galecki play off one another and Parsons especially has an amazing sense of physical comedy.

On DVD, The Big Bang Theory Season 2 only comes with a featurette which includes clips from the episodes and this is hardly exceptional for a DVD release. There is very little fans will get on DVD that they will not get by catching the episodes in syndication.

Ultimately, though, this is still a comedy above the curve and well worth watching and picking up for anyone who likes smart humor.

For other comedies, please check out my reviews of:
Sports Night
30 Rock Season 3
Glee Volume 1: The Road To Sectionals

7/10

For other television series reviews, please check out my index page!

© 2010 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Chuck Lorre's Masterpiece Begins With The Big Bang Theory Season 1 On DVD!

The Good: Very funny, Likable characters, Good acting
The Bad: Light on DVD bonus features, Inexplicable character element.
The Basics: Hilarious and filled with more geek references than any other show, The Big Bang Theory is a surprisingly original situational comedy worth picking up.


These days, it takes a lot to get me into a television show, mostly because I'm working on my own and I am hesitant to glean things from other sources. However, when enough people tell me that something is truly magnificent and I absolutely have to see it, I tend to sit up and notice. For the past year, people have been telling me to check out The Big Bang Theory. A few weeks ago, my wife and I managed to snag the DVD set from our library, so I was able to. Now, I am happily adding my voice to those making the plea for people to watch the show. Why? It’s funny and there is nothing else quite like it on television. And there hasn't been.

One of the two creators of The Big Bang Theory is Chuck Lorre. Lorre might be best known for creating Dharma & Greg and Two And A Half Men (which still astounds me for its longevity), so The Big Bang Theory had two strikes against it when I sat down to watch it. After rocketing through the seventeen episodes of Season One on DVD, there are only two other strikes against the series: there wasn't enough of it on DVD yet and a specific character quirk. That's pretty astounding from where I sit.

The Big Bang Theory is a buddy comedy featuring two physicists: Leonard (who still has people skills) and Sheldon (who is so smart he seldom sounds human). Leonard and Sheldon live together doing things like playing Halo and posing philosophical questions to one another. After sneaking out of donating sperm for money, they arrive back at their apartment to discover their neighbor across the hall has moved out and been replaced by a stereotypically beautiful blonde chick named Penny. Leonard is quickly smitten with Penny and Penny likes him as a friend . . . enough to ask him and Sheldon to try to recover her television from her ex-boyfriend across town.

Penny soon gets to know Leonard and, to a lesser extent, Sheldon and their mutual friends Howard (who hits on her constantly) and Raj (who is unable to speak to women, including Penny). Throughout the season, Penny continues to date men who treat her poorly and Leonard acts as a shoulder to cry on. Penny invites the guys to a halloween party where all four come as the Flash before having to scramble to come up with other costumes. Howard has to take one for the team when Penny decides to throw Leonard his first ever surprise party and Raj has a chance with Sheldon's super-hot sister when he happens to be on an experimental drug for shyness during her visit.

Other situations shake the little group of five when the university hires a North Korean super genius whose accomplishments outshine Sheldon's, causing him to retreat even further from life. And when Leonard wins a prop from The Time Machine, the men have to figure out how to divvy up the time with it. All of this leads toward Leonard and Penny getting closer and opening up to the possibility that they might be right for one another.

The Big Bang Theory is an ambitious situational comedy with vibrant, if not instantly likable, characters. Sheldon is the best straightman since the original Star Trek's Mr. Spock and Leonard is enough to make geeks a sex symbol. In fact, The Big Bang Theory paints geeks as sexy and everyone but Sheldon manages to have sex at least once in this season. That's good odds for the people who like the idea that smart is sexy, especially when stacked up against other television geeks.

More than anything, The Big Bang Theory is fun and funny. The dialogue is written to be over-the-top intellectual, but everyone who watches it ought to understand what is going on based on context, if not from the literal jokes. Penny, in that regard, has little to do but frequently stare at the men and look like the dumb blonde she is characterized as. But outside Sheldon, everyone quickly realizes that the way to keep Penny around and interested is in learning her language some.

And herein lies the biggest problem with the first season of The Big Bang Theory. Here are four geniuses who work and play together and their lives are turned upside down by . . . the obvious stereotypical blonde who is not at all on their intellectual level. The other female character in the first season (a recurring colleague of Leonard's played by Sarah Gilbert) is played more like Sheldon, but with sexual needs. The smart men are not looking for smart women, they are looking for the same thing every meatneck jock in the show is looking for: the hot blonde who is pretty ditzy. This does not read as at all true to me. After all, those smart enough to operate on the mental levels these guys are ought to be smart enough to realize that mentally-inferior blonde is what men are conditioned to go for and overcome that. It doesn't take a genius to see that, so how it eludes four geniuses is a mystery to me. My point here is that smart people tend to fall for smart people who are also incredible looking (yes, physically beautiful with brains happens). Yet, from the moment the typical twentysomething blonde is dangled before Leonard, he turns into a horndog. At least with Howard, he hits on every female that comes along in the first season.

Still, this is not enough to drag down The Big Bang Theory in its first season. Why? Because even with so few episodes in the first season, the characters are so vivid and distinct that they make an impression. In the first season, the principle characters are:

Leonard Hofstadter - A theoretical physicist who is instantly smitten by his new neighbor, Penny. Despite this infatuation, he is practical enough to go for other women when Penny does not seem to reciprocate his interest. When Sheldon flakes out on him, he tends to turn to Penny for companionship and looks to include her in things, like Halo night. When Penny makes a crack about his toy collection, he sees the chance to do what society seems to demand of him by giving his toys up,

Penny - The new neighbor from Nebraska, she is ditzy but friendly and is the stereotypical blonde. Virtually everything Sheldon says goes over her head, but she becomes friends with Leonard easily enough. She is charmed by Raj and repulsed by Howard and continues to date jerks while working at the Cheesecake Factory. She likes to party and knows pop culture references like the men know geek things,

Howard Wolowitz - A rocket scientist working for NASA who has his mother living with him. He is Jewish and frequently looks to cash in his bar mitzvah bonds for collectibles or schemes. He hits on every woman he meets and is arguably the most physical of the group (at least with Dance Dance Revolution),

Raj Koothrappali - A painfully shy Indian who cannot talk to women, he discovers he can only speak with Penny or other women when he is drinking or on experimental drugs. Unfortunately, drinking ruins his arranged marriage and the drugs run out before he can score with Sheldon's sister, who is interested in him. He is the heart of the group,

and Sheldon Cooper - A supergenius with no discernible social skills. He lives with Leonard and relies on his roommate for transportation. Penny begins to open him up to more social situations while Leonard frequently challenges him intellectually. He is competitive, but selfish which makes him anything but a team player.

The Big Bang Theory is very well-acted as all of the principle characters are well cast. Kunal Nayyar (Raj) and Simon Helberg (Howard) support the big three of the show and their quirks allow for some of the best one-liners. Nayyar is a master of the dry delivery and Helberg has a great physical presence. Kaley Cuoco is great as Penny, but has very little to do other than show up, look good or look confused and she pulls it off.

Johnny Galecki and Jim Parsons (Leonard and Sheldon, respectively) are brilliant and play off one another perfectly. Parsons is the natural successor to David Hyde Pierce for physical comedy performances (Anyone from Chuck Lorre Productions reading this, there is no better choice to play Sheldon's father than Pierce!!!!!) and Galecki is great at both the technobabble and at bringing out the humanity in his character. The two play off one another with some of the best on-screen chemistry since The Odd Couple.

On DVD, The Big Bang Theory is remarkably sparse on extras. In fact, there is only a featurette on the first season and it is little more than a clip show with a few interview snippets talking about casting and the concept of the show. Fans deserve more for their money than that.

Even so, the first season of The Big Bang Theory is a rightful hit and if you're not watching it, there's even more incentive to pick it up on DVD: so you can watch it over and over again!

For other great comedies or wonderful shows for geeks, please check out my reviews of:
30 Rock Season 1
VR.5
Family Guy Volume 8

8/10

For more television set reviews, please check out my index page!

© 2010 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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