‘Big Bang Theory’ fan no more

“The Big Bang Theory” has about as much to do with nerds as “Breaking Bad” has to do with a league of evil pastry chefs.

I used to love “The Big Bang Theory.” Here was a show with characters I could relate to. They loved a lot of the same things I love. They had social issues, just like me. They bickered about pop culture like it actually matters — just like my friends and I do. “The Big Bang Theory” was, I thought, the best show about nerds on TV.

Unfortunately, I was deceived by a lie. “The Big Bang Theory” has about as much to do with nerds as “Breaking Bad” has to do with a league of evil pastry chefs. I only wish it didn’t take me so long to figure out what was really going on. I wish I could have unraveled the truth a lot sooner.

Let’s start with the premise of the show. “Big Bang” is about a group of science geeks. Two of them, Leonard and Sheldon, live across the hall from Penny, a pretty waitress who longs to be an actress. As the series moves along, Penny is integrated into Leonard and Sheldon’s group of friends. In fact, Leonard and Penny eventually fall in love.

Let’s start by recognizing that nothing in this situation really calls for nerds. You could essentially replace Leonard and Sheldon and their buddies with any group of friends with any number of personality quirks and nothing would really change. That means that all the nerdy stuff in the show is really just window dressing for formulaic “relationships-between-friends” stuff.

Since the nerdy themes aren’t essential to the show, why are they there? Because nerdy stuff is huge right now, and a sure-fire money-maker. And it’s working. “The Big Bang Theory” is currently the highest-rated sitcom on TV, allowing its network, CBS, to charge exorbitant prices for ad time during the show’s weekly running time. “BBT” is riding the nerd zeitgeist, exploiting the popularity of geek culture without bothering to dig deeper than the surface.

The show was created by Chuck Lorre, a guy who’s about as nerdy as Batman is cheerful. Lorre is also responsible for “Two-and-a-Half Men,” a show completely made out of dirty humor and men-behaving-badly-type antics. We’re supposed to buy that this dude has the slightest inkling about how nerds actually behave? That he has any insight into true nerdy characters?

And what of the characters? The “nerds” in “Big Bang Theory” aren’t really nerds, at least not as I’ve ever experienced. The “Big Bang” nerds are obsessed with EVERY SINGLE geeky thing there is, from vintage video games to sci-fi films to every comic book character imaginable.

In my experience, nerds are passionately dedicated to their favorite characters. But their dedication is limited to their favorite characters. A Batman fan may like other characters, but their love is reserved for Batman. A “Star Trek” fan may like “Star Wars,” but not with the same intensity. I consider myself a nerd, but I don’t love everything nerdy. I like “Firefly” and Doctor Doom, but I couldn’t care less about “Farscape” or Nightwing. Nerds don’t have all encompassing love for everything nerdy. That’s inaccurate.

On top that, one of the show’s central flaws is that it keeps dragging its quirky character toward the boring miasma of the normal. Leonard, Sheldon, Howard, and Raj all start out as odd ducks out of place in the normal Muggle world. Then they meet Penny, and every single one of them becomes more normal, more functional and less special and interesting as a result. Do we really wanna see Sheldon “mature,” get married and have kids? I, for one, do not.

This brings me to the biggest flaw in “Big Bang.” Although the show purports to be about nerds, it’s really about Penny. And the audience enters the show’s world through Penny. That means we’re expected to see the nerds the way she does. We’re supposed to think they’re as goofy and idiosyncratic as she does. We’re expected to relate to Penny. That may work for the general audience, but it doesn’t work for nerds.

Here’s the truth: “Big Bang” is a show made by non-nerds that exploits nerds for the benefit of non-nerds. You don’t have to be a nerd to spout one-liners about Green Lantern or “Battlestar Galactica.” You don’t need to know much about sci-fi to reference Han Solo or Mr. Spock. The makers of “The Big Bang Theory” have given us guys who look like nerds on the surface, but ultimately have nothing nerdy on the inside.

In the end, “The Big Bang Theory” is just another show about how nerds need to be more like the rest of society.