"But what puts “Parks and Rec” over the top for me is the sheer level of happiness it creates in me as I watch it. It’s a political comedy with a fundamentally optimistic viewpoint. It generates most of its comedy not by mocking its characters for being inept (though when they’re inept, they are epically inept, as in everything to do with Entertainment 720), but by showing the ways in which they are incredible. It’s a show that’s overflowing with love and understanding for all of its characters (except maybe poor Jerry, but at least it pities his suffering), one that can be unbelievably romantic and sweet about things that would be so easy to just mock, whether it’s Leslie and Ben’s shared love of a particular bench in City Hall or April and Andy’s impulsive, reckless, immature decision to get married on a day’s notice."