Ellen

In my opinion, the show was a bit boring at the beginning. Just another comedy that tries to be funny. (this time with a book shop as setting)But after Ellen´s outing quite much has changed, the stories have become really intresting, and in general the show has turned to something special and unique now. The difficult (???) topic has been presented in a very sensitive way and besides the´ve tried to fight against all the silly prejudices which are in the heads of too many people.Furthermore I like that we can laugh with Ellen, not about her. (that´s quite unusual for gay characters on TV). I´m impressed of her honesty and strength to share a part of her private life with the public. ELLEN- YOU`RE GREAT!!! Of course,I love the rest of the cast as well (JOELY,CLEA,JEREMY,DAVID)They´re like everyone´s friends. They get on your nerves, tease you, know everything better - but nevertheless you can´t live without them. In the meantime, I must confess that I hardly can´t live without Ellen and fortunately, it´s back on German TV!

Together with Seinfeld and Friends, it's another top American comedy show that we are viewing frequently in the U.K. recently. When I say "top", I mean "top notch". In the 70's and 80's I was used to switching off American comedies, but these 3 shows have made me reconsider my bias! I particularly like the way Ellen introduces so many irrelevancies into her dialogue, she kind of says what other people would only think but not dare say for fear of being boring. At some point in the series she declares herself to be gay, and while it obviously changes the direction of the show a little, it doesn't get heavy going about it and is still as funny as ever no matter what your tendencies. I love all the other characters too; the show was better for the entry of Audrey, Paige and cousin Adam - they each have their own very identifiable traits that enrich the plot. The cousin is particularly funny, especially in scenes together with Paige.

I didn't rate it because I have no idea how to rate this series.

Season 1 was pretty solid, and my personal favorite. The style was close to Friends', and it was pretty fun. Anita and Holly and Adam were all fun and ordinary nice people. They're like your best friends - fun and nice and when you're together you just have these sort of silly funny moments. It wasn't as good as Friends, and also a bit inferior to the first few seasons of How I met your mother, but it was quite good. A 7 or an 8.

The following seasons had a different gang, and it really seemed that they tried to be funny simply by giving all the characters some rare and annoying qualities. After a few episodes, it really gets boring watching Audrey's weirdness and Spence's bipolar disorder. But they did this for the entire length of the show's existence, which gradually dropped the show from 7 to 4. I think 7 was when Adam was still on the show, and 4 was towards the end of season 4.

Season 5 was a complete disaster. I have nothing against gay people. And I'm okay with Ellen DeGeneres' decision, even though it was a bit inconsistent since her character was perfectly straight in the first few seasons. But the show just became super boring and annoying when everything had to revolve around Ellen's sexuality. I get it that LGBT equality is important to you, but nobody's watching a comedy to get educated about civil rights. Seriously, Ellen, your show did not get cancelled because you came out. It got cancelled because it was boring and annoying. I hate to be mean but it really became a 1 or a 2 at the end of the show.

Ellen was one of the most retooled series ever made, I think, and every change made the show worse. It was very funny in its first year, when it was called These Friends of Mine. Then some perfectly good cast members were swapped out, the premise changed, it became less ensemble style and more star driven, and it was weaker. When Arye Gross was subsequently swapped out for a grating Jeremy Piven, the show started getting very bad.

When Ellen came out as gay, my mom complained that it ruined the show, but for me, the show was already bad, and her coming out was just more poorly conceived retooling that ultimately made it worse. Although the actual coming out show was brilliant, the best episode of the series, and made me briefly believe that the show had finally turned around. But it hadn't, it just kept declining.

Fortunately Ellen moved on to her talk show host role, which fits her like a glove, so it's a story with a happy ending. But I wish they'd kept doing These Friends of Mine; that was a really good show.

If there was ever a true American heroine it is Ellen. This great woman puts the c in courage, the d in dignity and the g in great. That she is a warm, wonderful human being and side-splittingly funny is just so much gravy. She and her great ensemble cast made every episode first class. Ellen's character was always so good-hearted, thats what I liked the most about her.