Can anyone bear to watch the 1st season?

I avoid most of those episodes. They do have moments of brilliance, but at the time, the characters were not totally developed, and this is common amongst many popular television shows' 1st seasons. The Simpsons and Married With Children being prime examples. Homer and Al Bundy were smarter people, until the writers gradually made them more of buffoons as the series went on.

George seemed to almost be bossing Jerry around in an early episode where he begs George to go to the laundramat wirth him. Then, as the characters developed, George became sort've the laughing stock who was still lovable, but always seemed to be the brunt of jokes. George is anothe classic example of a character that became weaker and lose his self-confidence, much to the fans' delight.

I have all the episodes at my disposal, and I always avoid Season One. With 180 shows to pick from, I randomly lean towards everything but the very early stuff. Am I alone on this?

No, you are not alone. I too tend to avoid them. Having said that, when i do watch them they are pretty funny.

"Johnny Dupe" wrote in message news:bnfk0v$qid$[email]...

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Why not try to watch them in the context of the time they were made forgetting what comes next. Or retrospectively knowing what happens to characters later on. Or a bit of both. I don't think they are as good as later episodes of course but the seeds are there. They're different, not as good, but still good.

"Johnny Dupe" wrote in message news:...

I know what you mean about the character development. Additionally, in both the early Seinfeld and Simpsons shows; there seems to be the presense of "space". A slow-paced lag in between jokes and just a general feel involving space. The later, more entertaining, episodes (on both shows) have a quicker rhythm and deliver the jokes one after the other with ease.

[email] (zvoidx) wrote in message news:...

I personally think that although the early episodes lack some of the humour of the later episodes, they are generally more believable, maybe not always storylines, but certainly timing. The time between certain gags also suggests that the characters are thinking rather than reading scripts. Kramer is really just a neighbour who we see rarely, but is wierd compared to civilisation; Elaine is an ex of Jerry's and they still feel uncomfortable around each other at times; George is an reasonably intellegent friend who's lack of judgement and "coming from a long line of failures" means that he will naturally fail in whatever he does; and Jerry is just a better than average comedian starting to make it into the big time.

All the episodes are classics.

"Johnny Dupe" wrote in message news:bnfk0v$qid$[email]...

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I watch and enjoy everything from that period, but I agree that it's different. George isn't a failure like later, Kramer is like a bum and Elaine is too successful. Jerry lacks something too, but I can't figure out what it is.

//..kk

"Kramer" wrote

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I think Jerry was lacking confidence (his character, that is). You know how when there are always groups of friends, there always seems to be someone that stands out as being the "leader" so to speak?- the one who seems to have the voice of reason. Jerry ended up to be that kinda guy, and the writers tried to make Jerry that way from the get-go (after all, the main meeting place is always Jerry's, outside of restaurants). But Jerry seemed to be sort of equals with George as far as intelligence and confidence. Once the show developed, Jerry seemed to insult George alot more (playfully), and Kramer as well.

Elaine always had a strong prescence and really seemed to have her act together at first, and then slowly turned into a shadow of her former self, with almost George-like behavior (the weird dance moves, poor decision-making with jobs and boyfriends, the juji fruits, and the classic "i'm turning into George!! I'm turning in GEORGE!!".

That was the funniest part about her character development- she hung out with social misfits and turned into one herself, and finally ended up getting thrown in jail with the fellow misfits because of it.

George seems very Woody Allen ish to me.

"Johnny Dupe" wrote in message news:bnmlon$jh8$[email]...

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classic

On Tue, 28 Oct 2003 21:41:57 GMT, "Itchy-n-Scratchy" wrote:

Jebus, he isn't THAT Bad!

DB

Yes he WAS!! "Don Boring" wrote in message news:[email]...

Jason Alexander himself admitted that he modelled his character of George on woody Allen. early in the series.

"Itchy-n-Scratchy" wrote in message news:EoBnb.52515$e01.129758@attbi_s02...

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In article , [email] says...

I've always wondered about this, since to me, it is *very* obvious that Alexander is doing Woody at times. There are some scenes in which everything - the phrasing, the nasal whining, the subject matter, etc is so much like Woody that if you closed your eyes and just listened, it is like Alexander doing an impersonation, and damn well done. I wish I could recall one of the exact scenes right now, but there are several good examples.

Dennis

[email] (DT) wrote in message news:...

I saw an interview with Jason Alexander where he said he would doing some sort of a Woody Allen thing as he was finding the character early on. I don't know if this is the best example, but there is one where they are waiting in line to eat in the Chinese place. After George finds out he missed the call from this girl, his speech about not being in the mood now and telling Elaine and Jerry to go without them to the movie. That kind of reminds me of Woody Allen.

George on

One thing that I have never seen mentioned on this newsgroup - or anywhere for that matter - is how Jerry and George often slip into a Laurel and Hardy mode. One case is in the Miss America contestant episode with the pigeon, Jerry gets out of bed, douses the pigeon, and gets back in bed. That is pure Laurel and Hardy, and very well done, too. There are several other instances - none of which come to mind at the moment, of course.

On Fri, 14 Nov 2003 06:33:46 -0800, "osmium" wrote:

I have never seen that! What episode?

Tomas Stockholm

On Wed, 04 Feb 2004 21:27:43 +0100, [email] wrote:

The Chaperone

      +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
   +      The News Guy(Mike) - Seinfeld Lists
   +            (two mirrored sites)
   +        http://membres.lycos.fr/tnguym
   +        http://waveprohosting.com/tnguym
   +    All things Seinfeld; scripts, trivia, lists,
   +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

On Thu, 05 Feb 2004 00:24:40 GMT, [email] (The News Guy(Mike)) wrote:

Oh The Chaperone. One of the few I do not have. I may actually never have seen it. There are a still few pristine for me.

Thanks.

Tomas Stockholm

The Kavorka!

I enjoy watching the first season because when I do, I like seeing how much the characters and the timing changed over time, and the fact that as I followed the show the first time, it wasn't as obvious to me how much had changed, but when I saw season one as a rerun for the first time, it was staggering.

"Johnny Dupe" wrote in message news:bnfk0v$qid$[email]...

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This was the pilot, _The Seinfeld Chronicles_.

I always sensed a disconnect between the portrayal of the characters in the pilot and the rest of the first and remaining seasons. It was almost as if the writers had decided "[they needed] a new format. [They] should shut down and re-tool."

• Mark

"Mark Mellin" wrote in message news:[email]...

where he

lovable,

i guess they really hit rock bottom!

What about a guest-host?

"Chris" wrote in message news:xOaqb.2092$[email]...

i'll pretend i didn't hear that.

On Sat, 25 Oct 2003 23:53:52 -0500, "Johnny Dupe" wrote:

All of the 1st episodes were far and away superior to that sorry last episode. In the last one, the actors and writers seemed tired and bored.