5 Sitcoms Way Better Than Friends

Once upon a time, "Friends" was the very biggest thing on television. Created by David Crane and Marta Kauffman, this sitcom, which ran from 1994 to 2004 and spanned ten seasons on NBC, made its six lead actors — Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, David Schwimmer, and the late Matthew Perry — into global superstars thanks to the snappy, quippy show's depiction of six friends finding love, getting into shenanigans, and drinking gallons of coffee in New York City. The show begins when Aniston's spoiled, pampered Rachel Green suddenly shows up at Central Perk (home of the aforementioned gallons of coffee) in a wedding dress after running away from her own ceremony. There, she reunites with her old friend Monica Geller (Cox), Monica's lovestruck brother Ross (Schwimmer), and their buddies Phoebe Buffay, Joey Tribbiani, and Chandler Bing (Kudrow, LeBlanc, and Perry), becoming a sextet and embarking on increasingly goofy adventures together.

With the utmost due respect to "Friends," a cultural juggernaut that paved the way for a ton of other sitcoms like it, it just isn't the best example of the "buddies hang out and get into scrapes" format. Since "Friends" — and even during its run — other shows have improved upon this basic formula, making "Friends" look practically subpar. So what shows took influence from "Friends" (or competed against it in the ratings way back when) and surpassed it? Here are five sitcoms that absolutely blow "Friends" out of the water.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that laugh tracks suck, so in the era after "Friends" ended, it was a relief for most sitcom fans to see the TV genre move into a single-camera setup after years of multi-camera shows being shot in front of live studio audiences. One of the funniest and most glorious examples of a single-camera sitcom — which also centers around six friends, though the number sometimes dips to five — is "New Girl," the unfortunately named but absolutely brilliant comedy from the mind of Liz Meriwether. When quirky, "adorkable" teacher Jess Day (Zooey Deschanel) finds her live-in boyfriend with another woman, she finds an online listing for a free room in a Los Angeles loft ... a loft occupied by Nick Miller (Jake Johnson), the fashion-obsessed and haughty Schmidt (Max Greenfield), and, at first, Ernie "Coach" Tagliaboo (Damon Wayans Jr.). When Wayans Jr. needed to return to a different professional obligation on a different sitcom (which appears elsewhere on this list), he was "replaced" by Lamorne Morris' wonderfully neurotic Winston Bishop, and eventually, Wayans Jr. rejoined the ensemble in later seasons.

The dynamic between Jess, Nick, Schmidt, and Winston is an absolute joy, and from in-universe games like "True American" to Jess' messy love life to the romance between Schmidt and Jess' best friend Cece Parikh (Hannah Simone), you'll wish the group from "New Girl" was real so you could hang out with them. Also, one time, Prince and Taylor Swift appeared on "New Girl." If Prince and Swift being fans of "New Girl" isn't reason enough for you to love it, we don't know what to tell you.

If you've ever watched "Friends" and wished that every single character on the show was a borderline sociopathic piece of crap, you should probably give "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" a try. One of the longest-running TV shows in the history of the medium, "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" was initially made on a shoestring budget after Rob Mac (the artist formerly known as Rob McElhenney) came up with the concept and brought his friends, fellow struggling actors Glenn Howerton and Charlie Day, on board. The concept? It's simple: five dirtbags operate Paddy's Pub, a grimy dive bar in Philadelphia, and get into shenanigans.

Those five dirtbags — Ronald "Mac" McDonald (Mac), illiterate piano prodigy Charlie Kelly (Day), twins Dennis and Dee Reynolds (Howerton and comedy powerhouse Kaitlin Olson), and Dennis and Dee's erratic father Frank (living legend Danny DeVito) — run constant schemes, write musicals to try to win over objects of their affection, stage horrifying children's beauty pageants, and even destroy a family's home in a deeply misguided and frankly horrifying attempt to recreate "America's Next Home Makeover." Mac, Charlie, Dennis, Dee, and Frank are genuinely disgusting people, and the wonderful thing about "Always Sunny" is that it never makes any attempt to truly rehabilitate any of them; it just lets them be dumb and awful. So why should you watch this? It's hysterically funny. Every single member of the main cast is unbelievably talented, the chemistry between them all is unmatched, and if nothing else, "Always Sunny" is a chance to see DeVito inexplicably dressed in makeup applied by a mortician.

Remember how Damon Wayans Jr. had to leave "New Girl" after the pilot episode due to a previous commitment? That commitment was, specifically, about "Happy Endings," a genuinely wonderful sitcom that was canceled too soon and created by David Kaspe. At the start of "Happy Endings," Alex Kervovich (Elisha Cuthbert) and Dave Rose Jr. (Zachary Knighton) invite their friends Penny Hart (Casey Wilson), Max Blum (Adam Pally), Brad Williams (Wayans Jr.), and Brad's wife and Alex's older sister Jane Kerkovich-Williams (Eliza Coupe) to their wedding. Unfortunately, it does not go as planned ... because Alex runs away with a guy on rollerblades before the ceremony can even begin, leaving Dave rejected and heartbroken and the friend group in unexpected shambles.

This is a pretty bold way to start a series, and it's even bolder that, in the pilot, Dave retaliates by accidentally dating a high school student, Alex returns from their planned honeymoon begging for Dave back, and Penny's birthday party gets ruined by all of that stuff (and the fact that she's lying about her age, to be fair). Frankly, no other show would let Pally's Max ask a question like, "If Mary Tyler Moore married and then divorced Steven Tyler, then married and divorced Michael Moore, then got into a three-way lesbian marriage with Demi Moore and Mandy Moore, would she go by the name Mary Tyler Moore Tyler Moore Moore Moore?" That should be enough to hook you on "Happy Endings," but in case that didn't do the trick, the show's guest stars include Megan Mullally, Michael McKean, Rob Corddry, and even Damon Wayans himself. What are you waiting for? Go experience "Happy Endings."

Unlike "Friends" (and several other picks on this list), "30 Rock" doesn't center a group of buddies who always hang out in specific locations — but thanks to Robert Carlock's involvement in both shows, it's easy to view "30 Rock" as a pitch-perfect evolution of the sitcom style that "Friends" pioneered. Crafted by Tina Fey and based (hopefully loosely) on her experience working as a writer and performer on "Saturday Night Live," "30 Rock" gives Fey the role of a lifetime with Liz Lemon, a harried and overworked New York woman who loves cheesy snacks and hopes to find love, but is constantly occupied by the increasingly absurd demands of her job running a sketch comedy series called "The Girly Show," or "TGS." (One of the funniest and best things about "30 Rock," by the by, is that whenever we see sketches from "TGS," they're horrible.)

As Liz tries to "have it all," she works alongside her wealthy, haughty, and hysterically funny corporate boss Jack Donaghy, portrayed to perfection by Alec Baldwin. (When Liz asks why he's wearing a tuxedo for no apparent reason, Jack retorts, "It's after six [at night]. What am I, a farmer?") Add in career-defining turns from Jane Krakowski as the abjectly insane "TGS" diva Jenna Maroney, Tracy Morgan as the wonderfully erratic but big-hearted Tracy Jordan (the actual star of "TGS"), and Kenneth McBrayer as Kenneth Parcell, an overly enthusiastic NBC page who may or may not be immortal. If you haven't watched "30 Rock" yet (somehow), you're in for the time of your life; it's one of the funniest TV shows ever made, and the sheer volume of jokes alone will have you wheezing with laughter.

Pretty much every entry on this list is a modern sitcom, which feels unfair; parts of "Friends" look and feel dated simply because times have changed. In the interest of fairness, then, we had to include one sitcom that's a true contemporary to "Friends" that absolutely blows it out of the water — and that sitcom has to be "Seinfeld." Created by misanthropic mastermind Larry David, "Seinfeld," named for its star — stand-up comedian Jerry Seinfeld — is, famously, a "show about nothing," but that moniker does seem unfair because it does the exact same thing as "Friends" ... which is to say, it shoves its main characters into entertaingly dumb situations and lets them react. On "Seinfeld," the eponymous comedian, who plays a fictionalized version of himself, ends up in those situations with his on-again off-again flame Elaine Benes (the incomparable Julia Louis-Dreyfus), his hapless friend George Costanza (Jason Alexander, ably playing a fictionalized take on David himself), and the erratic, wild-eyed Cosmo Kramer (Michael Richards).

"Seinfeld" is a show where a lot happens despite it being about "nothing," whether the main foursome engages in a contest of strong wills (watch "The Contest" to see what we're talking about), gets lost in a mall parking lot, or attends a party to watch a marathon. "Seinfeld" is one of the best sitcoms ever made, without question ... and it is better than its contemporary "Friends."

As for "Friends," it's streaming on HBO Max now.