Search

The writers' room table is pretty big, yet Colonizers of Lamar takes up nearly the entire surface

From Queen of Jordan II: Mystery of the Phantom Pooper: https://funcooker.fun/Episode/6/20/257

Disclaimer: This is all just my own personal opinion.

For the DVD release of each season of 30 Rock, a handful of episodes would have an optional audio commentary track. One or more people involved with that episode would talk about what was going on onscreen, mention some behind-the-scenes trivia, and sometimes just joke around. I did not like them as much as I have liked commentary for other shows that I have seen, so I decided to rate each one, from 1-5, based on the following qualities:

::: spoiler Categories

1. Insightful
   • How insightful the comments would be, i.e. not just sharing opinions or jokes
   • Mentioning how much they enjoyed working with a particular actor or making a joke about a prop may be factual/topical/humorous, but I am not really learning anything from those comments
   • This is probably my favorite aspect of audio commentary, and the lack of insughtful commentary is likely why I was generally not very fond of 30 Rock's commentary
2. Factual
   • Whe

30 Rock, S1E16 "The Source Awards"
Brooklyn Nine-Nine, S7E12 "Ransom"

S1E11 "The Head and the Hair"

Liz: "Why do you have a picture of my great-aunt Dolly?"

Gray: "No, that's my grandmother's cousin Dolly."

S5E13 "¡Qué Sorpresa!"

This image is a template with the Blabar cut out so you can easily place something underneath it. Get creative!

Season 5 Episodes 20-21 is a two-part episode titled "100". When it was originally broadcast, both parts were shown on the same night. I presume this is the cut that is included on the Blu-ray that I have: both parts combined into one long (42:18) continuous episode. But on other home media (including streaming services such as Peacock), and presumably in syndication, each of the two parts is instead recut into an individual episode with a running time of about 21:25 each. It seems that part one was originally a minute or so longer than part two, so part one had some jokes cut out and part two had some added in.

So, I nerded out a bit and played both versions side-by-side, taking note of the differences. Here are my findings:

::: spoiler Part one differences

No, not in that order. Hot take

Image source:

S6E22 "What Will Happen to the Gang Next Year?"

30 Rock S4E5 "The Problem Solvers"

Modern Family S5E24 "The Wedding, Part 2"

I think this is the only scene in Modern Family in which these characters are both onscreen at the same time. Until this point, I had thought that Claire/Sal were both portrayed by the same actor, and that it was a joke that the rest of the characters did not see the resemblance.

S06E19 "Live from Studio 6H"

This ashtray was not present on the table there at all until about two-thirds of the way through the episode. It just inexplicably appears in this scene which begins with a close-up of the table. This same thing happens in both the east coast and west coast versions. It must be intentional.

My first thought was that they are related to the earlier scenes in which clips from old NBC shows depict the actors/hosts/anchors smoking a lot. Maybe these are the IRL "butts" from the prop cigarettes they had gone through during dress rehearsals and such, but those prop cigarettes they used did not have the orange filters that we see here.

Excuse me, it seems someone has spilled some Photoshop on your right arm there

S4E21 "Emmanuel Goes to Dinosaur Land"

S7E5 "There's No I in America"

I presume it is freely available there because of all the pos-mens and product integortion. It's sort of just one big advertisement disguised as a 30 Rock episode.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/30_Rock:_A_One-Time_Special

S3E19 "The Ones"

S3E2 "Believe in the Stars"

I do not skip the entire episode, but I always skip the last few minutes of "Kidney Now". The musical number was not interesting to me the first time, and it doesn't get any better on rewatches.