Image: MOBFD

Comedy writers have kind of a rough time. They’ve pretty much got to write in a new joke every 60 seconds, otherwise their show ceases to be a comedy and becomes a pseudo-comedy, like a dramedy, romantic comedy, or some other weird half-breed.

Particularly uninventive writers have come up with ways to cheat with jokes. Basically, they use these dumb little techniques to trick you into thinking something is funny, or to just make their jobs easier. Here are a few of the worst comedic clichés and the shows that overuse them.

1. The Laugh Track

Offenders: The Big Bang Theory, Seinfeld, Friends, every single sitcom made before 1995.

Image: MovieBuzzers

Laughing is a social activity. Want proof? Think about when you laugh and when you don’t laugh while watching TV. You are significantly more likely to laugh when you’re watching TV with friends than if you’re watching alone. The more people there are, the more likely you are to laugh. Watch a stand-up comedian and pay attention to the audience. The comedian will probably make you laugh, sure, but in all likelihood the audience will laugh at every single joke while you’ll only laugh at maybe half.

Comedy shows try to trick you into laughing along with them by adding comedy tracks. It’s the most ham-fisted attempt at creating humor by telling the audience in not-so-subtle terms, “That was a joke. It was funny, as indicated by this pre-recorded laugh. Commence laughter now.”

I honestly thought that the laugh track was mortally wounded in the 90s, and was taking its final, pre-recorded breaths in the first decade of 2000, but Big Bang Theory brought it back for no good reason.

The editing isn’t perfect, but look at how unfunny a lot of the jokes are when the editors aren’t directly telling you want to laugh at.

 2. The Shaky Camera

Offenders: Arrested Development, Modern Family, 30 Rock, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

The shaky camera is actually a rather incredible cinematic technique, assuming that you use it correctly. In a show like COPS, a shaky camera puts you in the action because it is an unavoidable aspect of the show. In some shows, purposefully adding a shaky camera can be quite effective, because it replicates a sort of reality show feel, or it can make it seem like the show is actually a documentary. In general, it’s supposed to make you feel like this is real life. It’s not people on a set, it’s just a hilarious family that’s being followed by a camera guy.

The thing is, the shaky camera doesn’t really do much for comedy. It’s great for action shows, and certainly appropriate for select comedy shows like Reno 911, but what does it add to shows like 30 Rock? Watch a clip and try to figure out how the camera man standing on one leg makes this joke any funnier.

Notice the transition between scenes? That brings us to:

3. The Jump Cut

Offenders: Family Guy, 30 Rock

All of the writers for a show decide that they’re going to do an episode where the main characters go the beach. One of the writers comes up with a great joke that involves one of the characters talking to a doctor. Rather than writing a doctor scene into the plot, the popular technique nowadays is to just add the sentence, “Like that one time when I went to the doctor.”

Cut to: Protagonist speaking to a doctor. Doctor makes joke. Play laugh track.

Cut to: The beach. Resume story as normal.

Just about every comedy show has done this once or twice. The problem with the jump cut is that it essentially has nothing to do with a story. It’s just a 10 second joke that is completely meaningless and could be removed without affecting the plot at all.

I mean, that’s OK. You can do comedy like that. If that’s what you want to do, though, you should just ditch the plot and write a sketch comedy show. It’s kind of a lazy way to write if you only stick with the plot when it’s convenient, and then cut to wherever and whenever you want just because you have an unrelated joke to tell.

If you want to tell an unrelated joke, there are more graceful ways of doing it:

You see? By fleshing out the transition they actually managed to add like 3 or 4 more jokes.