Even though
The Simpsons was my first and favorite foray into the world of non-children's television,
30 Rock always feels like my first real sitcom. Oh sure, I watched reruns of
Seinfeld,
Everybody Loves Raymond and, uh,
The Nanny in syndication, but
30 Rock was the first I actually followed while it was airing. It was just about the funniest live action TV show I'd ever seen in my life. I grew up loving cartoons (still do!) and steadfastly refusing to really watch any non-cartoon TV shows going into high school. With this in mind, of course
30 Rock was going to be the show to hook me, because it's probably the closest a show can get to being a cartoon, minus the animation.
Obviously I have a lot of nostalgia about this show, which is why tonight is kind of bittersweet. After 7 seasons and 136 episodes,
30 Rock is finally hanging it's slogan bearing trucker hat. Originally a critical and ratings failure, it's hard to believe the show was not only able to hang around for such a long time but be consistently really funny, give or take a season four. Not only that, I would go so far as to say that it's final season has been one of the strongest runs of television in the past couple of years, up there with season two of
Community and season five of
Mad Men.
