Paper #2

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My Theory

The Big Bang Theory, which first aired on CBS in 2007, depicts the

collision of the lives of four geeky friends with that of a pretty, blond waitress

named Penny who moves in next door. The blossoming of an unlikely friendship

between the nerdy CalTech scientists and Penny provides ample space for

comedic dialogue. The characters in The Big Bang Theory affirm American

stereotypes – Penny fits neatly into the stereotype of a mainstream American

with her blond hair, consumerist tendencies, and ignorance about themes of

import and the group of nerdy scientists, Leonard, Sheldon, Raj and Howard,

mold to common stereotypes of nerds – comic-lovers with little social aptitude.

Yet while the show’s characters play into familiar stereotypes, the show’s

creators cleverly use visual indicators as well as dialogue between these

representatives of vastly different worldviews to question both the folly of

mainstream American culture, in its consumerist values and superficiality, as

well as that of stereotypical geek culture, in valuing people based on intelligence

and completely ignoring social norms.

One of the most visible social commentaries executed by the show’s

creators is in regards to Penny’s consumerism, as representative of American’s

materialistic obsessions. In Episode 1 of Season 1, Penny is introduced as the

new stylish neighbor who dyes her hair, wears short shorts and brings to mind a

model from mainstream American retailers such as Abercrombie and Fitch. She

has recently moved to Los Angeles to pursue her aspirations of becoming an

actress. To make ends meet she waits tables at the Cheesecake Factory, but

frequently runs into financial troubles because of her tendency to go on

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shopping sprees that she is unable to pay for. While later in the series Penny’s

consumerism becomes even more apparent and seemingly excessive, even in the

first episode it is clear that the creators intend for Penny to serve as a symbol of

the excesses of mainstream consumerist values. Despite Penny’s expansive

clothing and perfect body, she still is unhappy with her life, which is why she

bursts into tears in Episode 1 of Season 1. In this way, not only do the creators

show that Penny’s actions, and more generally, those of mainstream America are

not only financially irresponsible but provide little meaningful value. This social

commentary by the creators of The Big Bang Theory is particularly relevant as

the show first aired in 2007, just at the beginning of a financial crisis caused in

part by ballooning consumer debt.

In addition, to using Penny as a medium to mock American consumer

tendencies, the creators use Sheldon and Leonard to call into question the

mainstream’s worshipping of pop culture. For example, in Season 1, Episode 1,

Leonard and Sheldon invite Penny for dinner and Leonard encourages her to tell

them about herself. She says, “I’m a Sagittarius, which probably tells you way

more that you need to know” to which Sheldon replies,

“Yes, it tells us that you participate in the mass cultural delusion that the sun’s apparent position relative to arbitrarily defined constellations at the time of your birth somehow affects your personality”

This dialogue reveals both Sheldon’s disdain for people who he perceives as

unintelligent, but also mocks mainstream America’s imparting of value to

unscientific worldviews. His condescending tone is reinforced by the

sophisticated vocabulary he uses, presumably to make Penny feel even more

simpleminded. Sheldon’s biting commentary forces the audience, supposed to

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identify more closely with mainstream culture, to question its own means of

explaining the world. In this way, the creators suggest that the archaic nonsense

worldviews like astrology hinder the general public’s scientific literacy.

The creators are even-handed in their mockery, revealing that strains of

stereotypical geek culture are just as abhorrent as the materialism and

superficiality of mainstream American culture. For example, in Episode 1,

Season 1, when Sheldon and Leonard go to donate sperm, Sheldon points out

that they are committing fraud because there is no guarantee that there sperm is

going to generate high IQ babies. Sheldon laments, “some poor women is

pinning her hopes on my sperm. What if she winds up with a toddler who

doesn’t know whether an integral or a differential is used to solve for the area

under a curve,” to which Leonard replies, “I’m sure she’ll still love him,” followed

by Sheldon’s reply, “I wouldn’t.” This exchange clearly reveals Sheldon as

someone who values other humans based on their perceived intelligence. His

scoffing of any toddler who does understand high-level calculus is both comedic

for the audience but also disgusting. To him, if someone does not have an

excessively high IQ, they are not worth interacting with. In other words, in his

mind, people are not complex beings, but rather can be rated by one standard

metric – intelligence. This attitude of Sheldon’s is reinforced by a second scene

in the same episode where Sheldon scoffs at Leonard’s assertion that they need

to widen their social circle:

Sheldon: “I have 212 friends on myspace”

Leonard: “You’ve never met one of them”

Sheldon: “but that’s the beauty of it.”

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To Sheldon, interaction with people of average intelligence is a waste of time.

The audience quickly relates that friends on myspace are not equivalent to true

friends and that Sheldon’s assertion that keeping people at arm’s length is not

healthy human behavior give that we are social beings. In other words, to the

audience Sheldon’s rejection of socialization seems ridiculous. In this way the

creators use the show to deride both Penny’s anti-intellectualism with Sheldon’s

hyper-intellectualism.

The show also reveals as problematic the geeky guys’ social ineptitude

and lack of common sense. For example, in Episode 1, Season 1, when Penny

comes to Leonard and Sheldon’s apartment for lunch, she is struck by the

whiteboard full of Feynman’s diagrams of quantum physics. As Sheldon explains

“this is just some quantum mechanics with a little of string theory doodling

around the edges.” Penny obviously does not understand a single word of what

Sheldon has said, and Sheldon is completely unaware of his inability to relate to

someone of average intelligence. The scene continues with Leonard and Sheldon

arguing about the calculations on their respective whiteboards – Penny is

temporarily completely forgotten, indicative that social norms, such as that of an

attentive host, are completely lost on the pair.

Leonard, while at least attempting to follow social norms, reveals that he

also lacks social aptitude. In the same scene, when Penny breaks down crying

about her boyfriend whom she still loves, but who cheated on her, Leonard tries

to comfort her by explaining to her that the fact of loving and hating a person

simultaneously is a natural paradox like the duality of light. He then attempts to

expand on the strange metaphor, explaining that light behaves both as a wave

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and as a particle. To this statement, Penny responds with a gesture of confusion

suggesting that geek culture is unable to partake in conversations without calling

on scientific facts. At the same time, the creators suggest, through Penny’s

absolute ignorance about the topic, that the mainstream culture has less than

little scientific literacy.

In this way, the creator’s of The Big Bang Theory utilize the characters to

problematize two contrasting social stereotypes. Penny is mocked for her

consumerism and subscription to pop culture, while the group of geeky friends

are mocked for their valuing of people based on perceived intelligence as well as

their utter lack of social skills. In this way, the audience is forced to see the raw,

ugly underpinnings of both mainstream American culture and stereotypical geek

culture.