Why It’s So Cool To Hate The Big Bang Theory

1. It Laughs At, Not With, Geek Culture

When it debuted, the hook of The Big Bang Theory was that it was a hangout sitcom, much like a Friends or How I Met Your Mother, but where the lead characters were all (save for Penny, the 'cool girl) geeks.

There's a lot of potential in that, especially in giving so many of the people who obsess over TV shows characters who love the same nerdy things that they do, but all-too-often the show goes squarely for the lowest common denominator kind of humour, placing geeks as the butt of the joke rather than the ones making them, or at least laughing with them.

Whether it's how it makes fun of fandoms, or reduces scientists or people who enjoy what were once considered the 'uncool' things like comics or Star Trek to objects of ridicule and stereotypes of being socially awkward. This has coincided, over the years of its run, with the rise and rise of geek culture; superhero movies now reign supreme at the box-office, and being part of a fandom, attending events, cosplaying etc are all now much broader. But for anyone watching The Big Bang Theory, it still comes across like they're punching down, siding with those who would (and in some cases, did) bully the geeks.

The show's brand of 'geek' humour is part of the problem here, too. So much of the time it's referencing things for the sake of having a reference, without actually using it to make a joke or a point. When done right, dialogue-heavy on pop-culture references can be brilliant - see how shows like Buffy and Gilmore Girls perfected the model - but TBBT simply names a thing that people like, end of - as this tweet so nicely captures"

What do you think of The Big Bang Theory? Share your thoughts down in the comments.