Weekly Comedy Rankings- Why Is The Rum Ham Gone?

So earlier this week our good friend Jaydon came up with the idea to do weekly comedy rankings on Friday of each week of the upcoming television season. His idea was to do it on Twitter, and yesterday that is what the two of us did. I'd love to get more people involved if we continue doing it, but in the meantime, I'm going to start documenting the results here on the blog.

Unlike my Bi-Monthly Power Rankings, these Weekly Comedy Rankings will only take that week's episode into account. So if Community has an absolute dud of an episode in a given week, I don't keep it near the top of my list simply because it is still my favorite current comedy. In addition to simply rankings the shows, Jaydon also had the idea to give an MVP and funniest moment award, so we'll do that as well.

Feel free to join the fun on a weekly basis on Twitter with the hashtag #WeeklyComedyRankings or #WCR. For now, let's take a look at the debut edition of the rankings from both Jay and myself...

Dan

1. It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia - "The Gang Goes to the Jersey Shore"
2. Modern Family - "When Good Kids Go Bad"
3. The Office - "The List"
4. Modern Family - "Dude Ranch"
5. Community - "Biology 101"
6. iCarly - "iCan't Take It"
7. Up All Night - "Cool Neighbors"
8. Parks and Recreation - "I'm Leslie Knope"
9. New Girl - "Pilot"
10. Raising Hope - "Prodigy"
11. The Big Bang Theory - "The Skank Reflex Analysis"
12. The Big Bang Theory - "The Infestation Hypothesis"
13. Two and a Half Men - "Nice to Meet You, Walden Schmidt"
14. Whitney - "Pilot"

MVP of the Week was Phil Dunphy of Modern Family. Funniest moment was a ties between Stanley Hudson's "shove it up your butt" on The Office, and anything new Lilly said on Modern Family.

Jaydon

1. It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia - "The Gang Goes to the Jersey Shore"
2. Modern Family - "Dude Ranch"
3. The Office - "The List"
4. Parks and Recreation - "I'm Leslie Knope"
5. Community - "Biology 101"
6. Archer - "Heart of Archness: Part II"
7. Modern Family - "When Good Kids Go Bad"

MVP of the Week was Phil Dunphy of Modern Family. Funniest moment was a tie between anything to do with the Rum Ham on It's Always Sunny, and Perd Hapley's interview on Parks and Rec.

Emmy Submission Mission- Supporting Actor in Comedy

The 2011 Emmy Awards will be hosted by Jane Lynch and air on September 18. Over the weeks leading up to the event, staff writer Dan Forcella will watch every episode submitted by various actors in various categories and present to you his analysis on each contender.

It's the TV Fanatic Emmy Submission Mission, readers, and it started with Lead Actor in a Comedy, continued with Lead Actress in a Comedy, and now, we're on to Supporting Actor in a Comedy, which feature FOUR men from one show...

Stonestreet and Ferguson on Modern Fam

Ty Burrell has been the favorite to take home the crown for the past couple of months, but that's mostly because of his performance over the entirety of season two, and pundits figure the voters won’t give Stonestreet back-to-back wins. Burrell’s submitted episode, “Good Cop, Bad Dog,” certainly is a strong showcase for him.

He's funny while having a difficult time trying to be the bad cop to his children, but then becomes hilarious as he turns into an evil monster of torture upon getting sick of Haley and Alex’s behavior. The problem for Burrell is that Jesse Tyler Ferguson is even better in the episode.

Ferguson, who surprised many by making it into the field for a second year in a row, kills in “Good Cop, Bad Dog,” with all of his efforts to make it to the one gay cliché he allows himself, a Lady Gaga concert. Of the four Modern Family men nominated, Ferguson’s Mitchell has been my least favorite over the first two seasons, but in these four episodes he may be the best. In his own submission, “Halloween,” he gets to don a Spider Man costume, hide on top of a toilet, and then climb down the side of his building to escape the horror of being seen in said outfit at work.

Also with a couple of highlights in “Halloween” are Burrell and Eric Stonestreet. Phil gets bad news about a neighbor getting a divorce, which forces him to be as awkwardly romantic as ever with Claire. Meanwhile, Stonestreet’s Cam spends the entire episode complaining about how Halloween was ruined for him as a child, which crescendos with Cam spewing out the story of how it was ruined in front of a bunch of children at the haunted house.

To read the rest of my Emmy Submission Mission for Supporting Actor in a Comedy, head over to TV Fanatic.

The Cory Matthews Award- Lead Character Comedy

Named For: Cory Matthews played by Ben Savage in Boy Meets World
Awarded To: The best lead character in a comedy series from
June 1, 2009 - May 31, 2010
Last Year's Winner: Tracy Jordan- 30 Rock

Place. Character (Show) Points (My Vote)

10. Jonathan Ames (Bored to Death) 0 points

9. Dwight Schrute (The Office) 7 points

8. Tracy Jordan (30 Rock) 7 points (5th)

7. Jack Donaghy (30 Rock) 9 points

6. Charlie Kelly (It's Always Sunny) 13 points (4th)

5. Jeff Winger (Community) 15 points

4. Cameron Tucker (Modern Family) 18 points

3. Michael Scott (The Office) 20 points (3rd)

Runner-Up
2. Phil Dunphy (Modern Family) 28 points (2nd)

and the Poolie goes to...
1. Larry David (Curb Your Enthusiasm)
48 points (1st)

Here with his thoughts on Larry David is Poolie voter, T-time...

Larry David's run in this category is similar to Shaq's in the early part of this decade. He dominates the field but when it comes to collecting votes for MVP, he is competing not only against the other characters, but against his own prior performances. It may not be fair to hold him to this higher standard, but it is the way of the world. We, as voters, look for reasons not to give the award to Shaq, to Jordan before him, and now to Larry David. We expect greatness and refuse to reward him unless he surpasses his own lofty standards.

Having said that, the highlight of season seven was the interaction between LD and Jerry Seinfeld. The pairing provided a glimpse of what must have been going on behind the scenes at Seinfeld for years. After witnessing the two of them discuss the minor details of human behavior, it's easy to see where many of the plotlines from two classic shows came from.

Even before that, Larry was having a season for the ages. We learned he knows all the words to West Side Story and that he enters names into his cellphone with descriptors such as Denise Handicapped. We watched him kill a swan, protest tipping and berate a 9-year old for over-texting. In the most exceptional Larry move of the season, he launched a Seinfeld reunion, involving all the stars of the show, in an effort to win back Cheryl. He began by attempting to break up with a cancer-stricken Loretta and ended with a hilariously-off attempt to play George. Everything in-between was gold.

by Tim Forcella