30 Rock has its moments, but it's overwritten. When you're watching, think to yourself, "Is this line of dialogue necessary?" and you'll see what I mean. Everything that is obvious visually from the actors gets stated in dialogue anyway. It's like the writers think it's a radio play.
This means that the setups get explained, the jokes get explained, and the reactions get explained. That makes the show less funny. Music is also overused and heavyhanded, as though they don't trust their own script and actors to tell the audience what's funny.
Like Saturday Night Live, they beat a joke to death. For example, it's hard to pronounce "The Rural Juror", which could lead to a comic misunderstanding. But is it funny? So funny that the same joke is repeated 15x and then explained, "It's hard to pronounce!... I don't understand what you mean!"
Now try watching Malcolm in the Middle, and you'll see better acting, better pacing, they don't saturate jokes with dialogue and music, and the plots are more character driven.
Why is 30 Rock like this? Perhaps the sketch writers and sketch cast from Saturday Night Live didn't adapt enough for a sitcom.
Finally, I guess the writers didn't know that the best way for a show to age poorly is commenting on current events. What's sad is that the topical humor is unnecessary to the plot, and could easily have been cut.
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