Gearing up for the end of 30 Rock, rewatched a few Season 1 episodes last night. You know, as much as people like to complain about the late-season stuff being mean and fractured and pointedly unconcerned with characters, the early episodes are far worse. Theres the syrupy sitcom writing I have blocked out Liz and Jenna are wacky squabbling equals – in “Rural Juror,” they literally learn a valuable lesson and hug; ill-advised impressions the 30 Rock that I love goads someone like Barbara Walters into doing a self-immolating cameo, not has her impersonated by Rachel Dratch. In every episode, you can just see the writers naturally absurdist sensibilities strangled by the pressure of being a Thursday Night NBC Sitcom back when it still sort of meant something. Remember, when 30 Rock got greenlit, Friends and Frasier were barely off the air. The later seasons, conversely, have a drive-this-thing-off-a-cliff exhilaration that can come only from a brush with oblivion – a feeling that, I suspect, was condoned if not cheered in the boardroom as well, because the suits themselves are feeling it: appointment TV is dunzo, BET has just beat all four major networks in prime time on early 30 Rock, this could have been a comic plot point, 4 million viewers is a megahit. In short, network TV died so that 30 Rock could get better.