At face value, the logo is very clean. Who decides what modern is and what the 21st century is supposed to look like, I'm not sure. (Actually, I am - it's the Tavistock Institute.)
However, the logo could also represent a law firm, a transport network, a museum, or a designer fashion brand.
The copyright symbol is a litigious warning sign which is ubiquitous with officialdom and therefore inappropriate for the context. Comedy's fun; copyright warning symbols and serious-looking fonts are not.
For those reasons, I think the logo is a branding calamity.
I of course respect your opinion, but I think it's quite wrong.
Many logos, taken in isolation, could be applied to any number of different industries; unless you fastidiously design an airline logo with wings and clouds, or a television network with an actual television integrated into the logo, or any other example of that kind of very literal branding, you will find that there are more examples of a 'disconnect' between the logo itself and the industry that its company represents. There is nothing inherently media-related, televisual or communicative of entertainment, education or information in the BBC logo, nor that of ITV, Sky, NBC, FOX, TVE or any number of media giants. There is also nothing inherently amusing or communicative of comedy roots in the current Comedy Central building-with-vague-allusion-to-speech-bubble logo.
Additionally, you've very much missed the point of branding if you really believe that brand design must be so literally interpreted and confined to such narrow parameters as "this is an official-looking sign; this is a sombre-looking font; therefore it must only be attached to official and boring things". A logo rarely stands in isolation; it is presented in a broader branding context, whether that's a billboard advert, a trailer or ident on TV, a leaflet or poster; but the number of applications where a logo stands completely isolated from other branding elements is very limited. Colour, background and peripheral elements, characters, animation, and any number of other tools can help to bring what, in isolation, may appear to be a relatively sober design, to life and create any number of impressions that develop and reinforce what you want people to feel and remember about your brand.
So to judge a logo's success on nothing more than the logo itself - which is what you've done in critiquing the symbol and font in isolation - betrays a lack of understanding about how a successful brand is put together.
It also suggests a lack of understanding of 'ironic branding', where there is far more to a brand than meets the eye at first glance, and where often a dubious first impression can be completely turned around when you experience the brand in its wider context. They may well, for example, wish to present a relatively simple and sober logo design as a counterpoint to an altogether wackier and more explosive brand ecosystem. They may also wish to play on the idea of 'taking ownership' of the whole concept of comedy, the implication being that they 'own' comedy, and that if you want to get the bona fide comedy experience, there's only one place to get it, and that's Comedy Central; or that they're the genuine comedy article, and all other comedy outlets are mere pretenders to the throne, etc.
There are many more aspects to a successful brand than just looking at the symbol+font choice as the totality; to write this off as a 'branding calamity' for the reasons you've stated is very narrow-minded.