Category Archives: Comedy
‘Mom’: “Loathing and Tube Socks” Review
Believe it or not, Mom is the best new sitcom. To be honest, I didn’t have high hopes for the show and really thought it would be cancelled at this point. Well, I was wrong. Shows that I had much higher hopes for, such as We Are Men and The Michael J. Fox Show, have either crashed and burned or their cancellation is only a matter of time. Mom has improved. Stepping back from the show and not reviewing it for a week has made me see that.
In “Loathing and Tube Socks,” Christy comes to terms with the fact that she is the problem in her life, which is only slightly the case. Christy’s attitude doesn’t help matters, but how would you feel if your teenage daughter was pregnant and your mother would make you her fall guy? Granted, Bonnie only made her daughter the fall guy in Christy’s dream, which had them smuggling drugs from Mexico. However, it was clearly a little too real for Christy. Christy even called her mother to yell at her. Bonnie didn’t take to well to this, but Bonnie has little more than a superficial love for her daughter and thinks she’s a crazy person.
‘Hello Ladies’: “The Date” Review
Hello Ladies is tiresome. All the characters are pathetic. It’s no longer funny.
Out of all the characters, Stuart Pritchard is the worst. Stuart thinks he’s a player, but he doesn’t even know when a woman is hitting on him. When Jessica does point it out, Stuart awkwardly tries to act cool, which demonstrates exactly how uncool he is, yet sometimes he gets the girl. “The Date” had him ask a girl from his gym’s smoothie bar appear clearly interested in him, but Stuart thinks she’s just making fun of his Britishness because she says things like “top of the morning to you” and “cheerio.” Once Stuart understands the situation, he ends up knocking over all the drinks in the refrigerator. In his head, leaning against the fridge is cool. Everyone else knows attempting to look cool only makes you look clueless.
‘Sean Saves the World’: “Busted” Review
Sean Saves the World’s second episode, “Busted,” is much better than the pilot. The writers still appear to be behind the times because this episode makes a big deal about Sean’s daughter’s first bra. With the exception of Sean being a gay father, the show could have taken place in the 1980s.
The entire episode revolved around Sean’s daughter, Ellie (Samantha Isler), trying to find the perfect first bra. Since her mother isn’t around, Grandma Lorna (Linda Lavin) and older sister figure Liz (Megan Hilty) both want to take Ellie bra shopping. Let the wacky antics begin!
Liz takes Ellie shopping first. Liz doesn’t realize that Ellie is a sensible 14-year-old. All Ellie wants is something to keep her breasts from jiggling. However, Liz has other plans. She even asks Ellie, “Are you sexually active? Do you want to be?” It’s a little disturbing that Liz wants Ellie to sleep around like she did. After browsing the store, Liz buys Ellie a bunch of sexy bras and a piece of lingerie, which Sean doesn’t have a problem with because Ellie makes it clear she is unhappy with Liz’s choices.
‘Parks and Rec’: “Doppelgangers” Invade Pawnee
Early Leslie Knope was not always pleasant. She was sometimes selfish, a little narrow-minded, and always allowed her passion to cloud her judgment. Her semi-temper tantrum after Ann revealed her plans to relocate in “Doppelgangers” definitely hearkened back to that. This is not to say I don’t love Leslie because believe me, I DO LOVE LESLIE. But girl needs to think before reacts sometimes. Ann, smartly, tried to absorb the shock with waffles and a shirtless photo of Joe Biden before she confessed, but Leslie saw right through it and stalked off on a loyalty tangent. She’s actually kind of intolerable for much of the episode, trying to force everybody to sign legally-binding friendship contracts after other Pawnee employees hinted at leaving because “No one around here understands loyalty.” After (another) enlightening conversation with Ron, though, she realizes her mistake and tells Ann she’s ready to talk.
‘We Are Men’: “We Are Dognappers Review”
We Are Men is probably going to be cancelled soon. The show is only mildly entertaining, which is never a good sign.
Two of the four main characters, Frank Russo (Tony Shalhoub) and Stuart Strickland (Jerry O’Connell), are total morons, who show few signs of character development. Frank’s aging Casanova ways show no signs of stopping. If anything, Stuart looks up to him and wants to live the same way. Frank still parties like a college student. His idea of a good party is one you can’t remember, which is why he loves Tiki Night. Stuart goes along with it as long as his second ex-wife, Amy, isn’t busy trying to empty his bank account.
It’s clear that Frank leads the group. In the episode “We Are Dognappers,” Stuart has the chance to finalize his divorce as long as he’s willing to give his ex-wife his dog, which he has had longer than his wife. Stuart gives in, but finds out that his wife ignores the dog. Frank’s solution is to have the group steal the dog. For some reason, the entire group agrees to this idea. Even Gil Bartis and Carter Thomas, who are the sane ones, don’t bring up the myriad of problems with this solution. Grown men try to go threw with a plot that a thirteen year old wouldn’t do because it’s stupid.
‘Hello Ladies’: Same Schtick Over and Over Again
Hello Ladies is mildly entertaining and kind of sad. The show relies too much on Stuart Prtichard, who is a fish out of water and a jerk.
Stuart Pritchard doesn’t deserve his friends. For some reason, Wade puts up with Stuart’s wannabe Casanova lifestyle and allows Stuart to control his life, even though all Wade wants is his wife to take him back. In “The Limo,” Wade rents a limo, so that he could take his wife, who he is currently separated from, on a special date. Wade’s wife tells him to get lost. Instead of having Wade cancel the limo, Stuart decides to have a party in it on Wade’s dime.
Pawnee and Eagleton: Together Again on ‘Parks and Rec’
Leslie Knope would sooner give up waffles at JJ’s before making peace with Eagleton, Pawnee’s wealthy, Michael Buble-listening archrival, but in “The Pawnee-Eagleton Tip Off Classic,” that’s exactly what happened. Let’s go by character to see how we got there.
Leslie, Ben, and Chris
Leslie is one of the most lovable characters on television. She’s kind and tactical and loving; when it comes to her nemeses in Eagleton, though, she tends to throw all of that out the window. The episode opened with a press conference led by Leslie and Ingrid de Forest (Kristen Bell), her Eagleton counterpart. Deep in the trenches of the recall election, Leslie tries to win over her fellow Pawneeans in the only way she can: by cracking jokes at Eagleton’s expense.
Meanwhile, the dream team is back. Ben and Chris’ superiors over in Indianapolis enlisted the pair to help solve a budget crisis in Eagleton. AUDITING BROS! Leslie, who can’t pass up an opportunity to see Eagleton’s demise, tags along. The town is going bankrupt and Leslie likely hasn’t felt this much joy since meeting Joe Biden. She makes a great, predictable Good Will Hunting joke, and Ben seems to already be regretting his decision to let her join.
‘Mom’ Has To Deal With “A Pee Stick and an Asian Raccoon”
Is it possible for a show to jump the shark at the beginning of the second episode? Yes. Mom can now claim that award.
It’s official, Christy’s daughter, Violet is pregnant. (The pee stick in this episodes title is a pregnancy test. Oh, the writers are so mature.) Considering, Violet’s grandmother and mother both had children in their teens, it was likely, but it didn’t have to happen. Violet could have been the odd woman out in her family. She could have gone onto college and not followed in Grandma “Aunt” Bonnie and Christy’s footsteps. Instead, Violet thinks her life will be fine because the baby isn’t due until after she graduates.
Violet’s life may workout because Bonnie and Christy want to be a better great-grandmother and mother, respectively, than they were a mother, but that’s not guaranteed. Her boyfriend, Luke, is a moron. He’s the guy who’s too stupid to realize that when your girlfriend only has sex with you, you have to be the father of her baby. Luke doesn’t comprehend that and thinks receiving the “iffy” burgers at his fast food job is a perk. He has no future, yet Violet is head-over-heels in love with him. Fortunately for her, Luke’s to stupid to conceive of running away from his pregnant girlfriend.
Stephen Merchant is Delightfully Awkward in ‘Hello Ladies’
Hello Ladies may take place in Los Angeles and air on an American channel, HBO, but it is a pretty standard modern British sitcom. Every character is an awkward person, who doesn’t know how to function in normal settings. In this case, Stuart Pritchard (Stephen Merchant) leads his group of awkward male friends around LA nightlife as an attempt to pick up women. Spoiler alert, it doesn’t have the outcome they wanted.
Stuart’s best friend is Wade, whose wife recently left him. Wade somehow manages to walk into doors that don’t exist. This is a man who introduces himself to women in a bar as Wade as in Roe vs. Wade. As if that wasn’t bad enough, he then goes on to remind the women- he and Stuart barely know, yet want to have sex with- that it was the court case about abortion. Stuart digs the hole deeper by saying, “Let’s not talk about abortion before we have to.” That line pretty much sums up Hello Ladies‘ premise in a blunter fashion: men looking for cheap meaningless sex. You could easily think of Stuart as a gawky unsuccessful Joey Tribbiani.
‘The Crazy Ones’ Is A Half Hour Ad
Do you want to watch a half hour long McDonald’s ad? Of course, you do. Nothing’s better that 30 minutes of trying to convince a celebrity to sing “You Deserve a Break Today.”
Not really.
CBS needs a reality check. No one wants to watch a sitcom length ad, even if it stars Robin Williams. And yet, The Crazy Ones is just that: an ad disguised as a sitcom starring Robin Williams. Since the show does take place at an advertising agency, many viewers may be generous enough to give the show a pass on using real brands because it adds realism. The problem with that is the show isn’t realistic at all.
Wait! What's A Dial? 