“Parks and Recreation” is a television sitcom that revolves around political satire in the United States. The show aired between 2009 and 2015and was made by Michael Schur and Grag Daniels (Moyer). It is centered on star Leslie Knolpe with the plot set in the fictional town located in Indiana. From the face of it, “Parks and Recreation” appears just like other situation comedies (sitcoms) since it has lots of wacky characters. Also, the sitcom has lots of love triangles which makes it a hilarious sitcom. Apart from that what makes the show even more interesting is the full-throated protection of the government. The shows is so full of significance and could only arise from the same time and place that it arose, considering that it is a sitcom that among other things addresses the answers to the Tea Party. Apart from that, the show often gets its storylines from some of the modern political occurrences. It even goes beyond just the politics of the day by merging it with the social happenings in the contemporary society.
The show talks about feminism to the viewers. Even though one would expect such a show to talk about such an issue overtly, the show talks about it without blatantly without boring the audience. For instance, in the show, all the female characters love one another and at the same time support one another in a healthy way. A lot of the shows that have come up before the “Parks and Recreation” have showed women as catty towards each other. It is offensive as it stereotypes women as people who cannot love and support one another. Also, the diverse women in the show make people especially the women proud of the show. The friendship between the women is more like the kind of friendship that the women have in real life. Thus showing the same in “Parks and Recreation,” makes the audience relate more easily with the sitcom. The sitcom is packaged such that even without the engaging so much thoughts in what the actors are doing, one can easily see and understand.
Based on my observation of the show, I can conclude that “Parks and Recreation” is a wonderful comedy. The characters featured in the show are just so nice to one another and as a person who not only love peace, I also love friendship. Apart from that, the exciting mix of the characters that act in the sitcom make the show one of a kind. On the same note, the claim that has currency to the audience is the shattering of the stereotypes. The creators of the show use humor to shatter the stereotypes in a very clever way. Even though the whole show is scripted, the characters give their best in terms of internalizing their roles and playing them like it is a reality show. It makes the show interesting since one can watch it and get so much entertained while at the same time exposing the person to the complexities of the society.
Analysis of the themes
Most shows often have a “moral of the story” that are normally brought out in every episode. In “Parks and Recreation” some of the theme in the play include jealousy, political commentary, social commentary, and friendship. Whenever a creator includes a moral to whatever story they are telling through art then it shows that they feel that the morals are important. The creators of “Parks and Recreation” too felt that the themes were important to the viewers and so they exhibited them through the film. However, for them, the mode that they chose to pass the morals is through jokes or comedy that leaves the viewers not only happy but also educated or informed. When including educative information in a sitcom, it is important to never let the audience get so much engaged in the funny jokes till they fail to take note of the important and educative information that it seeks to relay to its audience.
Most of the time when moral lessons are shown through comedy, then the audience may fail to get the moral and instead just laugh to the jokes since they find the show to be a source of entertainment. For instance, the theme of political commentary that the creators show in the film carries a lot of moral lessons. The most vital jokes that the characters make of the Town of Pawnee is the question of any other thing that the government department that socializes would probably do. Thus, the creators of the sitcom show the people of Pawnee as citizens who are not only naïve but also misguided and lack information on several issues. Thus the creators include several departments such as the Animal Control Team.
Therefore, it is clear that in the sitcom, the creators make an honest effort of educating the viewers. Even though they are using comedy as a vehicle to relay the lessons that they are trying to pass through the show. Often such shows are created to pass a moral story; I do not know of any shows that lack any “moral of the story.” Therefore, for the shows that I have watched, they have rather the same way of showing a moral of the story even when it is in a sitcom. The moral in the shows may be different, in terms of their relevance to the modern society but regardless of the significance, all shows that I have watched have a “moral of the story.” Probably without it there would be no storyline and therefore, there would be no show altogether.
The Unintended vs. Intended
In some cases, shows become explicit with whatever they are communicating. In some cases what is missing is not really as significant as what is there. Looking at a show such as “The Bernie Mac Show,” it is easy to see that the show features a lot of blacks unlike many others that do not have blacks but just many whites. Perhaps when it comes to this show, then one may ask where the Whites are. However, it is okay for such a show considering that the show revolves around Bernie Mac and his family and since he is a black, having his relatives as blacks too makes the show a lot more sensible. Even though such things such as race, gender and makeup may not look like a big deal, when the audience view the shows and notice that some of these things are missing in the film, then one may not only question the show but also criticize it.
Works Cited
Moyer, Justin. Remembering when ‘Parks and Recreation’ was terrible. 25 February 2015. Web. 5 April 2018.
