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Techtite's TV Reviews! |
"Many of the best sitcoms needed spit and polish before they became mega-hits. With such spit and polish, this could be the next big thing. Without it...well..." ---from the review
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Romantically Challenged
Can a sitcom concept work, even if it is a shameless Xerox of a former hit? Absolutely. However; just like any Xeroxed copy, you have to make sure you are copying one item at a time. How illegible would it be if a Xeroxed copy was attempted of three separate stories all at once? The result would be a jumbled mess of 1/3 this, 1/3 that, and 1/3 of something else entirely. A copy of one sitcom formula is great. 3 at once...? Well... Such is the case with Romantically Challenged, which starts off as an obvious "Friends" clone, then adds one too many sitcom formulas to the plot. This is surprising, when as clichéd as the first minutes are; the idea of cloning Friends was working surprisingly well. However; yeah, the homage to Friends is glaringly obvious. Over at Central Perk a nameless coffee shop, Chandler Perry and Joey Shawn sit with Monica Lisa, as they help Rachel Rebecca cope with being a runaway bride divorced, in an episode directed by James Burrows. Sure; we've seen that all before. Though if you are going to re-imagine Friends, this series' first minutes did a fine job of it, with a well chosen cast. Rebecca is played by the adorable Alyssa Milano, who is perhaps one of the most under-appreciated TV starlets of our time (Who's The Boss, Melrose Place, and Charmed were all successful, long-running series, and in at least two cases: entirely thanks to Alyssa). Perry is played by Kyle Bornheimer, who you may remember from the far worse and gratefully cancelled Worst Week, though in this sitcom he is finally given actual jokes to work with. Josh Lawson (Shawn) is one of those comedians who has been in half a dozen projects by now though has yet to get his "groundbreaking" role yet; here's hoping this is it. Rounding out the lead quartet of characters is Kelly Stables, an adorable comedienne who is best known for her hilarious role as Alan's lovelorn office assistant in the two recent seasons of Two and a Half Men. Frankly; getting her was quite a coup for this show...and quite a loss for Men. If someone let well enough alone; I could give this Friends clone a "B" grade on escrow and call it a day. Unfortunately, someone decided to clone multiple sitcom plots at once, many of which have no relation, rhyme, or reason to one another. Here's the most peculiar of them: apparently, the series wants to portray Rebecca as a "cougar." Isn't a 30-something Alyssa Milano a bit young to be the focus of a "Cougar Town" clone...? This is made even more obvious, when Rebecca tries to pass off her son as her "ex" to a blind date. The problem: her son is 15! What's worse: her blind date falls for it(!), only to seem "shocked" when he hears the barely-teenage boy refer to her as "Mom." In what universe would any simpleton ---even a mentally unstable simpleton--- expect a 15 year old boy to be a 30-something's "ex lover"...?!? There are moments when inane imbecilic idiocy can be funny. This is not one of them. Fortunately for the premiere, veteran sitcom director James Burrows was at the helm. Burrows has contributed to any number of memorable sitcom episodes, including the best of Cheers, Frasier, Laverne & Shirley, Taxi, The Bob Newhart Show, Will & Grace, and yes, Friends. Clearly Burrows borrowed strongly from the latter, especially with the characters of Perry and Shawn. Perry is Rebecca's friend since childhood. Shawn is Perry's rent free roommate and best friend. In short: they are trying to be the next "Chandler and Joey"...and so far, they are doing quite well. Here's one example. Perry wants Shawn to go with him to a cooking class, for no other apparent reason than to meet girls. He meets an attractive girl who dates him, lets him take her to his place, and promptly wants to be blindfolded and spanked. Perry blindfolds the girl and then sneaks out of the bedroom to ask Shawn what to do with a girl who, quite frankly, scares the heck out of him. Shawn's "solution" is penned right out of the Joey-from-Friends date book: let him go into the bedroom and spank the blindfolded girlfriend. "You'd do that for me?" says Perry. The moment loses a little in the translation, though the delivery of the dialog is hilarious. In fact, it's the funniest part of the series premiere. If only all moments were as golden. In a later episode, Rebecca is about to go out on a date. She asks whose car they will use. Says her date: he rode his bike to get here. Clearly miffed, Rebecca says, "Mine it is, then!" While this joke would've been perfect in the vain You-are-what-you-drive 1980's, it lacks any humor in the financially unstable, You-paid-WHAT-for-a-tank-of-gas? world of 2010. We are supposed to think the guy is a "loser" for not driving a car everywhere he goes. Yet what kind of loser does not also own a bike? Would it have killed Rebecca to blow the dust off her Shwinn and go on a pleasant bike ride with the guy? It's daytime, it's a date...so why not? The problem with reviewing sitcoms like this is that there is a lot of potential here. Only a little "spit and polish" is needed. Hey; where have we all heard that before? Only for every major hit in sitcom history. Simpsons, Seinfeld, and yes even Friends needed a little retooling in their freshman seasons before they became major hits. The cast of this series is well chosen. The setting is well chosen. All that is needed are brilliant scripts to put them in. Here's hoping they receive such scripts...soon.
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