Tweet
So, I've just gone through and watched three of the new mid-season replacements, and am offering my opinion on them all. In case anyone is really wondering, that is.
1. Free Ride: Fox, Sunday 9.30p ET.
A show about the post-collegiate, rudderless, directionless slacker. Young man, fresh from UC-Santa Barbara, drives all the way home to Missouri to live with his parents. Once there, he finds his parents are in their middle-age crises, connects with some long-lost friends, and pines after a girl he used to know. Hijinks ensue.
Sound familiar? It should. Even though this show is partially improvised, every character, every major bit of this show is regurgitated from some show that came before, many of them better: the rudderless slacker archetype, for instance, was done so much better in the sadly underappreciated Wonderfalls, while the going back to a small hometown bit is lifted straight from the quirky and enjoyable Ed. While the borrowing of ideas isn't necessarily a sign of mediocrity and lack of creativity, the show's construction isn't nearly as fresh and hip as the network executives would like it to seem. From stale middle-aged parents, who in comedies tend to talk about their sex lives to the discomfort of their children (American Pie), to the ignorant, wild, immature ******* friend (Futurama, Seinfeld), everything about this show screams that it's been assembled like clockwork.
That said, the show isn't without heart; the actors (with the exception of Dave Sheridan's character, Dove) are all charming and fresh-faced. The comedy is occasionally there; this isn't painfully unfunny conventional tripe like Crumbs or Out of Practice. Worth watching? Sure, if there's nothing else on.
Rating: [2/5]
2. The Loop: Fox, Thursday 8.30p ET.
Set in Chicago, it's a sitcom about a young, twenty-something executive at a major airline who tries to balance his job with his party-animal lifestyle at home with his friends and roommates. Hijinks ensue.
In an attempt to be cool and edgy, Fox has created this mess of a sitcom--nowhere is this more evident than in the second episodes, where the CEO of the airline bluntly and repeatedly makes the point of trying to go after a younger, hipper demographic. The show isn't terribly good; the plots are hackneyed (hero meets attractive party girl--lolz!), the one liners aren't great, and the characters are a bit too predictable. Our hero, Sam, (a point made with text on screen in the pilot) is your good guy with little willpower and blessed by insane luck; he lives with three other attractive young people, his older, slacker brother (the required ignorant slacker ******* friend), his unrequited love interest (naturally attractive and brainy), and a ditzy blonde bartender (the dumb one that helps start all those wacky and zany situations). He works with a man-eating businesswoman (whose attraction to him is more disturbing than amusing), an over-the-top boss (it'd be funny if the character wasn't so forcefully bombastic), and an attractive yet cynical secretary who attaches the phrase, "...and I went to MIT." to everything she says.
Where the show fails is in its dialogue and presentation: in the quest to be fresh and new, the situations are non-sensical; when it tries to gain street cred by using buzzwords, it misuses them entirely or flat out gets them wrong (the repetition of "Outlook Express" comes to mind). Alas, I really tried to like the show, largely because of its Chicago setting and Joy Ozmanski's adorably bitter secretary, but it's terrible--instead of taking flight, this comedy crashes and burns.
Rating: [1/5]
3. Sons and Daughters: ABC, Tuesday 9.00p ET.
A mostly improvised comedy focuses on a very extended, somewhat dysfunctional family.
Take the unscripted nature of Curb Your Enthusiasm, the awkwardness of The Office, and the family goofiness of Arrested Development, mix them together, and tone it down a bit. While the show is far superior to the other two I've reviewed, the show's quality is far more uneven as well. Because much of the dialogue is improvised, one can get lovely gems of conversations like the Cameron-Wendal discussion at the end of the pilot episode while having stinkers like a similar one they had at the beginning. Just who are Cameron and Wendal? If it weren't for the brief bits of text on screen, I'd've never known. The show is phenomenally busy, with an enormously large cast; trying to keep track of them all is an exercise in frustration for the first few episodes, leaving you feeling more like a detached observer of a hive than a patron at a bar where everyone knows your name.
That said, the show definitely shows some promise--instead of being unfunnily bizarre like The Loop or too predictable like Free Ride, it seeks to be a different spin on the traditional family sitcom. If the cast can gel with each other, and work on their improvisational skills, we might have a winner. A winner, of course, destined for cancellation due to low ratings, while shows for idiots, like Free Ride, will succeed.
Rating: [3.5/5]
1. Free Ride: Fox, Sunday 9.30p ET.
A show about the post-collegiate, rudderless, directionless slacker. Young man, fresh from UC-Santa Barbara, drives all the way home to Missouri to live with his parents. Once there, he finds his parents are in their middle-age crises, connects with some long-lost friends, and pines after a girl he used to know. Hijinks ensue.
Sound familiar? It should. Even though this show is partially improvised, every character, every major bit of this show is regurgitated from some show that came before, many of them better: the rudderless slacker archetype, for instance, was done so much better in the sadly underappreciated Wonderfalls, while the going back to a small hometown bit is lifted straight from the quirky and enjoyable Ed. While the borrowing of ideas isn't necessarily a sign of mediocrity and lack of creativity, the show's construction isn't nearly as fresh and hip as the network executives would like it to seem. From stale middle-aged parents, who in comedies tend to talk about their sex lives to the discomfort of their children (American Pie), to the ignorant, wild, immature ******* friend (Futurama, Seinfeld), everything about this show screams that it's been assembled like clockwork.
That said, the show isn't without heart; the actors (with the exception of Dave Sheridan's character, Dove) are all charming and fresh-faced. The comedy is occasionally there; this isn't painfully unfunny conventional tripe like Crumbs or Out of Practice. Worth watching? Sure, if there's nothing else on.
Rating: [2/5]
2. The Loop: Fox, Thursday 8.30p ET.
Set in Chicago, it's a sitcom about a young, twenty-something executive at a major airline who tries to balance his job with his party-animal lifestyle at home with his friends and roommates. Hijinks ensue.
In an attempt to be cool and edgy, Fox has created this mess of a sitcom--nowhere is this more evident than in the second episodes, where the CEO of the airline bluntly and repeatedly makes the point of trying to go after a younger, hipper demographic. The show isn't terribly good; the plots are hackneyed (hero meets attractive party girl--lolz!), the one liners aren't great, and the characters are a bit too predictable. Our hero, Sam, (a point made with text on screen in the pilot) is your good guy with little willpower and blessed by insane luck; he lives with three other attractive young people, his older, slacker brother (the required ignorant slacker ******* friend), his unrequited love interest (naturally attractive and brainy), and a ditzy blonde bartender (the dumb one that helps start all those wacky and zany situations). He works with a man-eating businesswoman (whose attraction to him is more disturbing than amusing), an over-the-top boss (it'd be funny if the character wasn't so forcefully bombastic), and an attractive yet cynical secretary who attaches the phrase, "...and I went to MIT." to everything she says.
Where the show fails is in its dialogue and presentation: in the quest to be fresh and new, the situations are non-sensical; when it tries to gain street cred by using buzzwords, it misuses them entirely or flat out gets them wrong (the repetition of "Outlook Express" comes to mind). Alas, I really tried to like the show, largely because of its Chicago setting and Joy Ozmanski's adorably bitter secretary, but it's terrible--instead of taking flight, this comedy crashes and burns.
Rating: [1/5]
3. Sons and Daughters: ABC, Tuesday 9.00p ET.
A mostly improvised comedy focuses on a very extended, somewhat dysfunctional family.
Take the unscripted nature of Curb Your Enthusiasm, the awkwardness of The Office, and the family goofiness of Arrested Development, mix them together, and tone it down a bit. While the show is far superior to the other two I've reviewed, the show's quality is far more uneven as well. Because much of the dialogue is improvised, one can get lovely gems of conversations like the Cameron-Wendal discussion at the end of the pilot episode while having stinkers like a similar one they had at the beginning. Just who are Cameron and Wendal? If it weren't for the brief bits of text on screen, I'd've never known. The show is phenomenally busy, with an enormously large cast; trying to keep track of them all is an exercise in frustration for the first few episodes, leaving you feeling more like a detached observer of a hive than a patron at a bar where everyone knows your name.
That said, the show definitely shows some promise--instead of being unfunnily bizarre like The Loop or too predictable like Free Ride, it seeks to be a different spin on the traditional family sitcom. If the cast can gel with each other, and work on their improvisational skills, we might have a winner. A winner, of course, destined for cancellation due to low ratings, while shows for idiots, like Free Ride, will succeed.
Rating: [3.5/5]
Comment