John Mulaney is not the new Jerry Seinfeld — but he is ready to face the inevitable comparisons his new Fox sitcom, Mulaney, will draw to NBC's iconic comedy Seinfeld. Not only do both star stand-up comedians playing versions of themselves and revolve around the daily insanity spurred on by a group of oddball friends dominating his life, but each episode opens with him performing stand-up.

After the show's first trailer was released, Twitter exploded with 140-character comparisons. "Is Mulaney supposed to be like Seinfeld?" The Hollywood Reporter's Tim Goodman tweeted. "Mulaney is to Seinfeld as Muppet Babies is to The Muppets," Pajiba posted. And Time.com wrote a story titled, "8 Ways The Trailer for Mulaney Resembles Seinfeld."

Mulaney was nonplussed. "I was well aware from the beginning that people would make comparisons," Mulaney told BuzzFeed while promoting the fall comedy — which he created and executive produces — at the ATX Television Festival. "It would be absurd to say Seinfeld wasn't an influence on me growing up, and I would be lying if I said I wasn't a fan. But the most egregious [similarity] is that I also do stand-up on the show."

He added, "If the audience thinks it's too similar, that's what they think, but I don't think there's any point in distancing myself; if we're even a tenth as good as Seinfeld, we'd be lucky."

That hopeful fraction is one reason why Mulaney had no problem with Kevin Reilly, Fox's now-ousted chairman of entertainment, saying Mulaney was "Seinfeld for a new generation" at the network's upfront presentation to advertisers in May. The other reason lies in the purpose of the event.

"That's a sales presentation," he said of the yearly gathering of advertisers, where they're exposed to — in the span of one week — every new show the broadcast networks plan to roll out. "They're just trying to get people to buy ads so that is a totally acceptable thing to say to sell a show. It's like saying something is 'the next Coca-Cola.' If you watch Shark Tank, you know you have to use whatever you have to sell something to people. Now, when it comes to marketing the show, the billboards are not going to say, 'We're as good as Seinfeld.' I was well aware from the beginning that people would make comparisons, so it's like we did it before anyone else could do it."