Watching: Cheers

I finally finished watching Cheers. I started watching it, I believe, when I first moved to Austin in 2013. Thirteen years ago which is two years longer than the original run of the show (11 seasons). I’m not really a binge watch guy. I watched it through my 20s, across two streaming services, and multiple cities. I started watching the show because I read it was a big influence on Mike Schur and Mike Schur’s a cool writer so I gave it a go.

Mike Schur on Cheers:

The thing that made it so great is it has a giant cast of incredibly great characters and they would get immense mileage out of just having them talk to each other. It wasn’t fancy or tricky, they didn’t have crazy plot moves. You just watched these amazing characters slowly change and evolve over eleven years.

(Coincidentally, when I first moved to LA I went to a live taping of a show Mike Schur produced about a backyard bar called Abby’s. I forget what the episode was about but I got a free sandwich.)

List of things I like about Cheers:

1. Cliff

2. Norm

3. Woody

4. Coach

5. The cold opens

6. The set

7. The theme song

8. The writing

9. The low stakes

10. The warmth

11. The live post-finale Tonight Show where the cast is all super drunk and Steven Wright is there for some reason

That’s like basically everything.

I also enjoy that it’s set in Boston and the city becomes so much a part of the general vibe. I always wished there was a cool show set in Houston that made people like Houston more. No shade to Reba. But maybe we could get a show set on a tug boat or a chemical plant or a parking lot? I think that could be huge.

Cheers get’s TWO THUMBS UP from Lee. Ok, time to watch Fraiser. Will report back in thirteen years.