30 Rock has been acclaimed for its comedy and also embroiled in controversy for its racial humor, with Tina Fey herself wryly referring to it as the most racist show on TV at the time. My opinion of the show has definitely shifted from defense to criticism over time, though I won't speak to either as correct.
The show is absolutely brilliant when it goes meta. Fey casts herself as Liz Lemon, a showrunner for a sketch comedy TV series that has an unbearable diva star in her best friend Jenna Maroney and soon gets a network-enforced rebranding and second problem star, Tracy Jordan, when the new executive Jack Donaghy steps in. Tina Fey is very directly writing what she knows in discussing the behind-the-scenes of a sketch show, and there's some genuinely brilliant comedy when the show makes fun of TV cliches and production hassles. Advertisements are mocked and simultaneously played straight by the show, the quality of the sketch show is frequently shown to be horrible with egregious and stupid sketches, and actors and producers are lampooned all over the place. That stuff is great.
The social commentary tries to be great, and frequently seems to be. Tracy is a Black man with a starkly different life experience to Liz, and his viewpoints and treatment by the white people around him get some smart satirical exploration where he has agency to call out the leads' racism or microaggressions and the way the media perceives him. However, it can be argued that stereotypes are played straight often enough to not be successfully undermined, though the show could also just be saying they're based on a valid reality that doesn't need to be looked down upon. The show can be clumsy and sometimes outright counterproductive, however. Several episodes explore the idea of pulling out the "race card" being just as harmful as bigotry, and while some of the white awkwardness presented is authentic, I don't know if this "race card bad" approach is done quite as nuanced as it should be. There are also several cases where I think the show contributes to bigotry as well, which undermines the message. In two cases, blackface is used as a joke without serving very pointed commentary, there are cases where other cultures are stereotyped pretty much at face value, and there are times Liz displays bigoted opinions without repercussions. Those are uncomfortable and confusing in a show that often aims at progressive racial satire. I think there's a lot of the expected offensive "edge" of 2000s-era comedy which really ages poorly, especially with Pete Hornberger, a miserable married man whose exploits were amusingly horny and desperate as written, but horrifying, criminal, and disgusting to my ear today.
Maybe this was the right show written at the wrong time, since a lot of the political zeitgeist and comedy style hasn't held up today, but there's still good jokes and performances that are worth seeing despite the messiness of the whole.
Series Excellent TV meta-humor with messy social commentary.
30 Rock has been acclaimed for its comedy and also embroiled in controversy for its racial humor, with Tina Fey herself wryly referring to it as the most racist show on TV at the time. My opinion of the show has definitely shifted from defense to criticism over time, though I won't speak to either as correct.
The show is absolutely brilliant when it goes meta. Fey casts herself as Liz Lemon, a showrunner for a sketch comedy TV series that has an unbearable diva star in her best friend Jenna Maroney and soon gets a network-enforced rebranding and second problem star, Tracy Jordan, when the new executive Jack Donaghy steps in. Tina Fey is very directly writing what she knows in discussing the behind-the-scenes of a sketch show, and there's some genuinely brilliant comedy when the show makes fun of TV cliches and production hassles. Advertisements are mocked and simultaneously played straight by the show, the quality of the sketch show is frequently shown to be horrible with egregious and stupid sketches, and actors and producers are lampooned all over the place. That stuff is great.
The social commentary tries to be great, and frequently seems to be. Tracy is a Black man with a starkly different life experience to Liz, and his viewpoints and treatment by the white people around him get some smart satirical exploration where he has agency to call out the leads' racism or microaggressions and the way the media perceives him. However, it can be argued that stereotypes are played straight often enough to not be successfully undermined, though the show could also just be saying they're based on a valid reality that doesn't need to be looked down upon. The show can be clumsy and sometimes outright counterproductive, however. Several episodes explore the idea of pulling out the "race card" being just as harmful as bigotry, and while some of the white awkwardness presented is authentic, I don't know if this "race card bad" approach is done quite as nuanced as it should be. There are also several cases where I think the show contributes to bigotry as well, which undermines the message. In two cases, blackface is used as a joke without serving very pointed commentary, there are cases where other cultures are stereotyped pretty much at face value, and there are times Liz displays bigoted opinions without repercussions. Those are uncomfortable and confusing in a show that often aims at progressive racial satire. I think there's a lot of the expected offensive "edge" of 2000s-era comedy which really ages poorly, especially with Pete Hornberger, a miserable married man whose exploits were amusingly horny and desperate as written, but horrifying, criminal, and disgusting to my ear today.
Maybe this was the right show written at the wrong time, since a lot of the political zeitgeist and comedy style hasn't held up today, but there's still good jokes and performances that are worth seeing despite the messiness of the whole.