From left, Tony Hale, Marshall Manesh, Andy Richter, Clea Lewis and Harve Presnell star in NBC's new series "Andy Barker, P.I." From left, Alec Baldwin, Tina Fey and Tracy Morgan star in "30 Rock." The comedy will return to NBC's Thursday lineup on April 5.

Thursdays just aren't feeling like Thursdays right now. And it has nothing to do with the demise of "The O.C." (I'm almost over that, though. Thanks for asking.)

"Comedy Night Done Right" -- NBC's ratings-be-damned approach to rubbing some of TV's finest writing in the face of ratings monsters from "Grey's Anatomy" to "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" -- has become one of the year's true joys.

You can have your highly trained experts. Keep your attractive people and their interesting lives to yourself. I'll take my Thursday TV ugly, weird and painfully awkward.

From top to bottom, "My Name Is Earl," "The Office," "Scrubs" and "30 Rock" form the most enjoyable comedy block in at least a decade. And I'll admit, some of that appeal comes from each show's scrappy underdog status. (The ratings range from "30 Rock's" 4.2 million viewers to "Earl's" 6.5 million, while "CSI" and "Grey's" each pull in 14 million.)

But when the network swapped out "30 Rock" for "Andy Barker, P.I." (9:30 p.m., KVBC-TV, Channel 3), it just wasn't the same.

To steal a quote from Tracy Jordan -- Tracy Morgan's blistering take on the worst aspects of black Hollywood, mixed with some serious Martin Lawrence-style crazy -- I love "30 Rock" so much, I wanna take it behind a middle school and get it pregnant.

The series, like the rest of the lineup, showcases the true beauty that's possible when writers aim for greatness instead of popularity.

In a recent episode, Tracy admitted he was afraid of hosting the Source Awards. "Shooting people at the Source Awards is a tradition," he complained. "It's like Christmas. Or shooting people outside of Hot 97."

That's the line of the year in my book. But I'd be floored if more than a dozen viewers in the Heartland recognized the history of violence at both the hip-hop honors -- which were shut down and banned from Pasadena after a brawl -- and New York radio station WQHT -- where the entourages of 50 Cent, the Game and Lil' Kim have been involved in shootouts.

A Hooters ad during "The View" would target more viewers than that joke, and I love "30 Rock" for ignoring the mainstream. Trying to keep up with its punch lines is like trying to follow Dennis Miller -- back when he was funny and hadn't yet sold out to Fox News.

"Andy Barker," despite fewer laughs, nearly fits in with the rest of the night just based on its limited appeal.

Andy Richter stars as the title character, a "Judging Amy"-watching accountant who's mistaken for Lew Staziak, the crusty investigator whose office he's now renting. Andy's not the most exciting guy -- milquetoast would kick sand in his face -- but once he stumbles onto his first case, he's hooked.

"You know that feeling that I get when I hit the equal sign on the calculator," he tells his nervous wife, "and the number on the calculator is the same number that was on the worksheet? It felt like that."

For his new side job, Andy relies on Staziak (Harve Presnell), who's so full of antiquated ideas about hippies and Russkies, he makes Grandpa Simpson seem like a voice of reason; Wally (Marshall Manesh), an overly patriotic Afghan restaurateur whose window proudly boasts "MSG No! USA Yes!"; and Simon (Tony Hale), who runs the video store downstairs.

With the exception of Hale, who's doing a more confident take on his beloved Buster from "Arrested Development," "Barker" is more silly than funny.

Co-created by Conan O'Brien, the comedy feels less like a series than an extended sketch from the time Richter spent on "Late Night" -- mostly that pitiful early period when the show was being renewed in paltry 13-week increments.

I'll always admire Richter's fearlessness. That "Late Night" bit where he mistakenly walked naked onto the "Today" set as an uneasy Matt Lauer looked on should be preserved in an underground bunker.

But after failing with "Andy Richter Controls the Universe" and "Quintuplets," Richter has become the Chicago Cubs of situation comedy -- either you fervently believe that each season will be the one that finally makes a winner out of him, or you wrote him off as a loser long ago.

Perhaps sensing this, NBC is bringing back "30 Rock" on April 5, two weeks earlier than planned.

Until then, I'll make do with Richter.

I may not want to get his "Andy Barker, P.I." pregnant, but I'd definitely go to second base with it.

Back for more: The fifth season of "Penn & Teller: Bullshit!" kicks off Thursday (10 p.m. on Showtime).

Christopher Lawrence's Life on the Couch column appears on Mondays. E-mail him at clawrence@reviewjournal.com.