20 thoughts on “The Big Bang Theory”

    1. Who is pretending to be a waitress/actress? Sounds like the perfect set up to a spin off show where she becomes a super hero thanks to some “unorthodox” experiments.

    2. Because she went to Caltech.

      No, she didn’t. She didn’t even finish community college.

      So you know as little about popular culture as you do about everything else?

      1. That also wouldn’t be a MacGuffin, and you can’t have a secret MacGuffin because it couldn’t advance the plot. The show itself uses MacGuffin’s constantly, often in the form of some rare comic book or toy that Sheldon and the gang must acquire.

        A well kept secret (at the time) was that Kaley Cuoco was dating Johnny Galecki (Leonard) for two years.

  2. I have the opposite problem with the scientists across the hall. It seems to me that they should be living in a better place (like an actual house) than a small apartment.

    1. Houses require a lot more upkeep than geeks like to deal with, even if you’re renting. You would think that they could afford an apartment with a working elevator, though.

    2. The elevator worked fine when they moved in, but then Leonard incorrectly mixed some rocket fuel, which started smoking, and in a panic he put it in the elevator, which then exploded. Season 3, episode 22, “The Staircase Implementation.”

      1. Yeah but that doesn’t explain why a group of geeks (one of whom is a mechanical engineer) haven’t actually tried to fix the thing. Going up all those flights of stairs can’t be much fun and it sounds like a really cool weekend project for guys who like to use lasers to pop balloons.

        1. They’re too geeky to do the work, that’s why. In the episode where someone broke into Sheldon’s WoW account, their car broke down and they talked about how simple an IC engine is, but then nobody would/could actually get out of the car to fix it.

      2. I’m guessing the broken elevator is just a plot device so we can watch Penny walk up the stairs – a lot.

        Odd fact: Kaley Cuoco was a nationally ranked tennis player when she was younger. She probably looked spiffy in a tennis dress. Her new husband is a professional tennis player, so inviting them over for mixed doubles probably isn’t for the faint of heart.

      3. Actually it was Sheldon that put the fuel on the elevator, after calmly informing Leanord he had made an error in his calculations. Just long enough before it started venting to give Leanord time to derisively ask Sheldon how the hell he knew that. When it started venting Leanord was so surprised he was momentarily incapacitated, giving Sheldon the opportunity to act decisively to prevent catastrophe.

        And yes, I watch way too much TV.

  3. My girlfriend tells me, “YOU GOTTA watch this show it’s so funny!.”

    So I watch it a few times and I don’t think I’ve chuckled once.

    Just not my style of humor I guess.

    1. I thought so too. “Hey, let’s make fun of nerds and throw in every possible nerd stereotype!” Replace the word nerd with Black. Or Jew. Or Homosexual. Or woman.

      I kind of want to slap Sheldon.

        2. But nerds and geeks can interbreed and produce hybrid offspring who are themselves potentially fertile if they can find a willing mate. I saw a program about it on some nature show.

          1. Would they be neeks or gerds?
            Or are we talking some kind of Mendelian thing where one strain is recessive, so a few generations down the line a geek family brings a surprise nerd baby home from the hospital (or vice versa)?

          2. Back in the late 1980s, I served with a young LT (electrical engineer) who was an ubergeek. We were controlling military satellites and truth be told, we were (and are) all geeks but Aaron took it to a whole new level. One of the scariest things in my life was when my carpool partner had to leave early and Aaron gave me a ride home. He employed the binary braking method – the brakes were either all on or all off and he didn’t apply them until the last second or when reminded that he had to stop. Teaching both my sons to drive wasn’t nearly as scary as that one ride with Aaron driving. To give you an idea what kind of guy he was, he actually managed to stab himself in the chest with a large pair of scissors (and he was walking!). It happed at shift change and he didn’t tell anyone. Instead, he walked down to the clinic by himself and said “I’ve been stabbed.” He didn’t mention that he’d stabbed himself until the Sherriff came out. He actually stabbed himself deep enough to collapse a lung.

            True love is a wonderful thing and I guess there’s someone for everyone. Aaron married a woman who was just as big a geek as he was. Not long before I transferred to a new job, she gave birth to a son. I don’t know who gave them permission to breed but the kid (if he survived his childhood) would be about 24 or 25 now. I shudder whenever I think about him. Geek squared. Or, in a fit of adolescent rebellion, he could be perfectly normal. Or not.

      2. Too precious.

        There’s a lot of (in my opinion) good humor that plays on exaggerating the traits of some group or other, or assigning traits that don’t comply with stereotype.

        If it’s done well, people in the featured group will be laughing as hard as anyone else.

        Here’s a clip from the British comedy ‘allo ‘allo, which features a typically gormless Brit pretending to be a gendarme in occupied France during WW2 (he’s supposedly speaking mangled French):
        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CziOVXFhwQY

        The film “You don’t mess with the Zohan” took the mickey out of everyone.
        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCcK-QYJcSU

        But obviously these comedies wouldn’t appeal to you, as they might hurt other peoples feelings.

    2. Don’t forget the stereotypes of Penny (dumb blonde), Walowitz (Jewish), and Koothrappali (Indian). I dont’ think Amy Farrah Fowler qualifies as a Jewish neuroscientist stereotype because Mayim Bialik has a PhD in neuroscience along with a degree in Hebrew studies.

      I have no idea what made them try to connect comic books and fandom to science and engineering.

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