Pilot

I thought this was a very shaky pilot episode with some flaky characters.

30 Rock was written and created by Tina Fey. I very much assume that it was based on her own experiences in the entertainment industry.

Fay is Liz Lemon the head writer of the sketch show 'The Girlie Show'. We first see her arguing with a guy who pushes in a line for hot dogs. Liz ends up buying all the hotdogs.

When Liz arrives to the studios she meets Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin) the new head of the television network and microwave programming. Jack is brash, knows marketing and wants to retool the show. This includes hiring loud and unpredictable movie star Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan.)

As 30 Rock lasted for 7 seasons, I guess it improved. In the first episode only Fey and Baldwin's rivalry register. Morgan's character is irritating to the extreme. A bad black stereotype. I wonder if he was based on Eddie Murphy or Martin Lawrence?

I hear that 30 Rock is a pretty funny show with a solid cast. I knew that it had always been consistently nominated for awards, so I decided to check this show out. This first episode is not bad. I found it to be amusing and somewhat funny. I could have used more laughs, but some of the jokes are quite good.

We meet Liz for the first time working as an NBC producer for the show, "The Girlie Show." She meets her new boss Jack and he wants her to try to get a famous, if not somewhat crazy actor, Tracy to be on their show in order to draw in the 18-34 male demographic.

This show has a very talented cast. Tiny Fey is usually quite funny, even though she wasn't here. Alec Baldwin is the man and I loved his performance. Some people may find Tracy Morgan annoying, but he had some wicked one-liners in this pilot.

Overall, this is a decent beginning to the episode. I'm hearing the future episodes get better so I'm excited for the show. I rate this episode 8/10.

The pilot was very weak compare to the other episode in season 1. It was misplaced, in constructed and poor writing/directing. The cast save the pilot. I almost off my TV and regret buying the first season of this show, but Thank God the rest of the episodes were hilarious and totally different from the pilot.

The cast: Tracy Jordan who plays Tracy Morgan was very annoying in the pilot, if you compare with the rest of the episodes which he is bearable and have a heart (or maybe we are just getting used at him?). Tina Fey plays Liz Lemon perfectly, but even her character has the 'dim' part, surprisingly only Alec Baldwin's character stays true and unchanged through out the season since the pilot. And I need to mention the amazing Jane Krakowski, she is entertaining to watch at. The other supporting cast were good, but nothing great.

In 1992, Larry David came up with one of the most brilliant conceits in TV history: the fourth season of Seinfeld would have a 22-episode story arc (a major departure from the show's usual plotting technique, or lack thereof) in which NBC asked Jerry Seinfeld to write a sitcom for them. That self-lampooning premise spawned the series' finest year, justly rewarded with the Best Comedy Series Emmy. Fourteen years later, Tina Fey, former head writer of Saturday Night Live, created a similar show, with the same results: 30 Rock.

The autobiographical aspects of the series emerge in the first few minutes of the pilot, when we're introduced to Liz Lemon (Fey), head writer of NBC's hit sketch program The Girlie Show. Thanks to a solid partnership with her producer Pete Hornberger (Scott Adsit) and best friend Jenna Maroney (Jane Krakowski), who's also the star of TGS, and with valuable help coming from her writing team (porn-obsessed Frank, Harvard graduate Toofer and others), no one's ever had any reason to complain. Now, however, there's a new network executive, Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin), who insists Liz should hire up-and-coming movie star Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan) to boost the program's ratings, despite objections about the comedian's alleged insanity (he once ran half-naked in the middle of a highway screaming: "I am a Jedi!").

This opening episode is a very traditional pilot, in the sense that it introduces the various main characters, the environment where they work and the overall madness that surrounds them. Thanks to Fey's extraordinary writing, that madness doesn't need another couple of shows to emerge, and so these first 22 minutes of the series are already a pitch-perfect sample of classic 30 Rock moments: remarkably witty dialogue exchanges (Pete: "Oh, we own K-Mart now?" ; Jack: "No. So why are you dressed like we do?"), great physical gags (Liz getting drunk and dancing with strippers) and adorably larger-than-life individuals (Tracy: "I'm not on crack! I'm straight-up mentally ill!").

Most of the roles were reportedly written specifically for the actors playing them, a fact that shows throughout the episode: every cast-member has a deep understanding of his or her part from the moment he or she starts speaking or moving. From the goofy Krakowski, previously seen doing similar things on Ally McBeal, to the dim Judah Friedlander through the downright psychotic Morgan, everyone has a spot-on comic timing reminiscent of the likes of Seinfeld, Friends or Frasier at their very best (although, given the lack of canned laughter, the best comparison would probably be the superb Arrested Development). Still, the supporting wouldn't be able to cover any missing chemistry between the leads. No need to worry in that department: Baldwin has the time of his life doing his first regular comedy, and any time he interacts with Fey (the 2006-2007 TV season's comedic revelation alongside Ugly Betty's America Ferrera) there's a spark that reminds of Mulder and Scully from The X-Files – minus the will they/won't they tension, of course.

In short: as a comedy about the making of a comedy, 30 Rock has no rivals. Along with The Office and Arrested Development, the essential mainstream sitcom of the 2000s.

Tina Fey, a woman who knows her way around comedy, was the brainchild of this series which tells the story of a 'Saturday Night Live' type comedy / variety series, 'The Girlie Show', forced to undergo some changes by an interfering network executive Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin, in typically fine form). Jacks' big idea is bringing in flaky movie star Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan, another SNL alumnus) to appeal to the "males from 18 to 49" demographic.

Personally, I thought this debut episode was pretty good, although I can believe that the series would only get better from here. I still find a fair amount of the lines & bits genuinely worthy of laughing out loud, although I can sense that this *was* a series trying to find its footing at this point.

Overall, the cast is great, especially Baldwin, who's perfected this sort of act for years. Jane Krakowski is of course very gorgeous and easy to watch as the star of this 'Girlie Show'. Rachel Dratch, who was originally supposed to play this role, and dumped after the first attempt at a pilot, gets relegated to "guest star" status as the cat expert. Tina herself is great as the head writer forced to deal with all of this chaos.

Again, I actually enjoyed this pilot for what it's worth, and look forward to more laughs in the future.

Seven out of 10.