Monumental television sitcoms can often describe what an entire generation is going through, from the suburban sprawl and tight nuclear families of Leave it to Beaver and I Love Lucy in the 1950s, to the new feminism of Mary Tyler Moore, Rhoda, and That Girl in the 1970s.
Millennial-focused sitcoms are on almost every major network today: New Girl, Broad City, Girls, Love, Crazy Ex- Girlfriend, You’re the Worst, Master of None, and Man Seeking Woman, to name just a few.
Jenny Jaffe of Vulture described millennial sitcoms compared to “classic sitcoms” as more self-absorbed, better at explaining sexual experiences, and dealing with characters looking for purpose in their lives.
Gen-Y characters are much different from the ’90s-based characters of Sex and the City, Friends, and Will and Grace who were looking for marriage, better careers, or children. New sitcoms show millennials looking for a purpose. They have more non-committal relationships, and float between jobs looking for something that fills their passion.
Many of these shows have main characters with similar profiles and living situations: A semi-stable financial situation, living in a major city, and battling through an existential crisis over purpose, passion, money, and relationships.
“On Master of None, Dev and Alan grapple with the fact that their immigrant parents struggled so that they could chase their dreams — and yet they’re too existentially confused to even fully figure out what those dreams are,” said Jaffe.
Each show has a character who appears not to be tethered to much besides the other characters in the show and their own self-involvement.
While there’s some truth to the notion that many millennials are like balloons with the potential to fly away unless they’re tightly gripped to something, it hardly speaks for the generation as a whole.
If storytellers want to be more honest about the millennial experience, they’re going to have to tell more stories with different characters — we’re not all hipsters living and freelancing in Brooklyn.
Jaffe concluded that millennial sitcoms are destined for a time capsule in the generation’s development, as the concerns portrayed will be unable to stand the test of time. If that’s true of the television shows that describe the millennial generation, is it also an accurate description of the generation as a whole?
Will millennial storytellers be so self-absorbed that they’re unable to create a narrative that transcends the limits of our own stories? Will we become the forgotten generation?
