Some of them are. 30 Rock is pretty damn witty.
Arrested Development suffered for many reasons.
1) As mentioned, it is too involved to get into mid-season. I'm 'ead 'erious.
2) Suffers with commercial breaks. They kill the flow. DVD is the best format.
3) FOX did move it all over the frickin' place. They also preempted it for baseball all the time too.

Nobody knew when it was on. And if you missed an ep, you are out of the loop bigtime. Moreso than with other shows.
4) More than anything, Americans are dumb and Arrested Development is smart.