The Age of the Traum-com

There are some beautiful, heartfelt, hilarious comedies streaming right now that are also sad as hell. I weep-watched my way through both the second season of Apple TV+’s Shrinking, and the final season of HBO’s Somebody Somewhere. I cry-consumed Netflix’s A Man on the Inside and am still working through a bawl-binge of season two of Apple TV+s Bad Sisters. Yep, I sure do love a comedy. There’s nothing like feeling your stress level recede from chortling at those rib-tickling bits woven in around all the emotional horror. Let’s face it, the collective has entered the era of the traum-com.

For years, true crime and HBO’s Euphoria seduced us with trauma porn in a way that felt fairly self-contained.  Maybe the alchemy that combined Steve Martin and death for Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building released a wacky but emotionally scarred muse who brought tons of super messed up friends. It’s almost like we, as a society, went through something major and world-altering that messed up our emotional compartmentalization. Now that sad feeling is all over the place, even in the spaces once reserved for hilarity, whether we want it or not.

At a glance, it might seem like traum-com comes from the freedom of streaming. Artists formerly confined to the boom-pat-setup-joke of traditional television get to create work that aims to keep people hooked on the story rather than keeping them around during the commercials (as long as they’re paying for the right plan). That’s part of the change, especially regarding the aforementioned shows. But the old fogey networks feel sad too, and it’s not only because their ratings will never match the Must-See heyday again.

Take CBS’s new (and already renewed) sitcom, Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage. As part of the Big Bang Theory Universe, it entered the scene with permission to be standard network fare. And it is, but it’s also a show about a young father who lost his beloved parent. The hilarity in the second episode involves Georgie visiting his dad’s grave to tell him how hard life is. My side already hurts from all that laughing. Get me a tissue to wipe the tears from my eyes. Because of the laughing.

CBS’s other hit sitcom, Ghosts, is more genteel than sad, but one glance at the title points to the inherent undercurrent of grief it inherently brings to the table. Every character haunting the country estate is trapped there until they can reach their rightful afterlives. They’re aware and pained by their limits and stuck with no idea how to move on. No matter how harhar any particular situation may be, there’s a bittersweet component in the show’s DNA.

Over on NBC, Reba McEntire is back with her aw, shucks schtick in Happy’s Place. She plays a woman grieving the loss of her father at the bar she inherited from him that she must run with her estranged half-sister. Though its creators didn’t mean for Happy’s Place to offer the world the same thing a show like Shrinking does, it still grew from a similarly sad soil.

The traum-com is everywhere. It could be that ongoing worldwide upheaval makes humor less hilarious. Or there’s truth to the idea that we’re all connected, and when one butterfly flaps its wings in sadness, a comedy writer’s tears fall on their screenplay. Perhaps, as jaded Gen-Xers morph from Fierce Young Subversives into the Olds in Charge, they’re unleashing their unresolved emotional issues all over their art. But then again, instead of being introspective, we could always blame the emergence of traum-com on Hulu’s The Bear. Its copious comedic accolades in no way align with that show unless getting adrenaline sweats from watching something makes you laugh.

Having said all that, the pure comedy of the world hasn’t vanished forever now just because FX’s What We Do in the Shadows is over. HBO still offers up raunchy giggles with The Sex Lives of College Girls, even though it’s not quite the same since Reneé Rapp left. ABC’s Abbott Elementary remains politely amusing. And then, there’s St. Denis Medical on NBC, which is already legitimately funny and feels like it has the potential to grow into something HAHAHA hilarious. Given the social climate and the sadness infecting myriad other shows, a healthy dosage of traditional sitcom may be just what the doctor ordered.