I came of age in the 70s, and to me the Anchorman franchise presents the best of all Will Ferrell movies. He is uniquely suited to playing the clueless 70s open-polyester shirt/medallion male. The thing was, some high-minded women would sometimes fall for that guy eventually despite his cluelessness (today's clueless male has learned to better hide his cluelessness?) The jazz-flute thing was also funny if you grew up in the 70s (a nod to the "artsy" clueless male, who also quoted Rod McKuen and Jonathan Livingston Seagull?) The mid-90s "Brady Bunch Movie" also more or less nailed 70s cluelessness. Also notable to older generations...the rise of sensationalist/gratuitous news reporting, which didn't exist in the old days (we only had Cronkite, Huntley-Brinkley, etc). Maybe all this is why younger audiences don't appreciate the "Anchorman" movies as much?

In addition, both movies' have those network news gang fights, which are classic (Recall Jim Carrey, head of the extremely polite Canadian News Team..."we're gonna mop the floor with ye, put the boots to ye...sorry!")

When anthropologists dig up our cultural artifacts in the year 3000, will the Anchorman movies be their "Rosetta Stone" of American cluelessness?