Pilot Watch: I Hate My Teenage Daughter

by Kelly Bedard

Fox's newest sitcom balances on a premise that has hilarious truthful potential. Almost all teenage daughters are monsters, but to former geeks who grow up to mother girls just like the ones who tortured them, the trauma is all the more potent. It's a tricky concept, but such a universal and generally untouched one that executed well it could have been great.

The cast tasked with bringing the concept to life is an outstanding one. Jaime Pressly has excellent timing as Annie, a claustrophobically sheltered kid who married a musician, had a beautiful daughter whom she proceeded to spoil bitchy, got divorced and is now crushing on her former brother in law. Her best friend is Nikki, the far inferior character, an insecure former fat girl who screams at her comparatively rational ex-husband about stupid things like the money to get her even-more-spoiled daughter a limo to her first school dance. So far Nikki is insufferable, but she's played by the incredible Katie Finneran, so I've just got to believe she'll get better. Kristi Lauren and Aisha Dee are fun, if simple, as the titular daughters, but the writing has simply got to step up if this show is going to go anywhere.

The pilot featured a decent story about the girls locking a handicapped boy in the girls bathroom that was made silly by their mothers' insane ineptitude. Awkward "fuck, what do I do?!" mothering can be funny, but these people are just helpless- never fun to watch. The twist wherein Sophie (Annie's daughter, Lauren) incited a heartwarming moment by telling her mom that they were cruel to the boy because he's racist and made MacKenzie (Nikki's daughter, Dee) cry, was kind of fun and I do always enjoy a good punishment via embarrassment like the ending where Nikki and Annie take to the school dance floor. But the characters of IHMTD need to smarten up and maybe pity themselves less if we're expected to actually care that their daughters are mean to them.

Pilot Watch: Allen Gregory

by Kelly Bedard

FOX's newest animation offering is right up my alley. The Jonah Hill-headed Allen Gregory is a quick-witted and sarcastic satire of pretension, a wonderfully clever addition to a Sunday night lineup largely headed by dodo patriarchs.

Pilot Watch: Once Upon a Time

by Kelly Bedard

Of the many promising new shows premiering in this well-above-average fall season, ABC's Once Upon a Time was one of the ones I was looking forward to the most. The fairy tale twist stars Ginnifer Goodwin, one of my favourite actresses whom I'm shocked is returning to TV so soon after the finale of the brilliant Big Love, and the show comes from proven genre scribes Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz (not to mention co-producer/Whedonverse goddess Jane Espenson). And while it proved an entertaining hour, the exposition-heavy and somewhat confusing episode was somewhat of a disappointment.

Pilot Watch: Last Man Standing

by Kelly Bedard

ABC was very "man"ly this week with the premiere of the atrociously sexist (or, rather, atrociously bad and offensive to all well-rounded and sensible people) Man Up!, a pretty-great-actually male-centric Grey's Anatomy that contradicted Man Up's theories of Neanderthal superiority and the premiere of Tim Allen's new show, complete with trademark grunts and "I'm a man!" humour. And while Last Man Standing isn't nearly as offensive as its Tuesday night programming buddy, it's still pretty misguided and almost as badly executed.

Pilot Watch: Man Up!

by Kelly Bedard

Every once in awhile I'll be watching TV late at night, computer shutdown for the day, when something makes me react so strongly that I come downstairs, restart my laptop and set about writing a very early morning review. The pilot episode of ABC's new Tuesday night comedy Man Up! was such a show, and not in a good way.

Man Up! is somehow both derivative and shocking. Retreading the boring comedy ground of marriage, bromance and the plight of the modern man-child, the new show is essentially last season's very hated and early canceled Traffic Light, except I actually thought Traffic Light was underrated- its relationships were believable, its actors were engaging and it explored the stages of courtship in entertaining and new ways ("new" being a relative term). Man Up!, meanwhile, presents 3 childlike grown men, none of whom are remotely charming or likable in any way, a three-sided friendship that seems to have no roots, a boring portrait of marriage and fatherhood, an even less interesting take on bitter divorce and a condescending view on sentimentality in singledom and a point of view that seems unclear whether the men's gaming habits are fun or deplorable. It's also got Teri Polo, who I've never really warmed to, and a weird second rate Isaiah Mustafa substitute doing a sort of long form Old Spice shtick.

But it's one thing to be predictable, boring and uninspired. It's another thing altogether to get the majority of your comedy from men insulting each other with feminine comparisons. Ooh you did a kind and generous thing, you showed an artistic impulse, you just shared a feeling- you must have a vagina! HAHAHAHA! Add to that the fact that the show outright stated that spending an afternoon trying to think of a special birthday present for your son is somehow beneath a "real man" and you've got a show that's really pissed me off.*

Pilot Watch: Revenge

by Kelly Bedard

Do you remember Amy Abbott? I do. She was sweet and funny, good natured and forgiving. Do you remember Rebeca Harper? I do. She was smart and self-assured, easy going and charming. Now, the woman who gave life to both is back on network TV in a dark show about the need for ruthless revenge. And who is Emily Thorne? Well she's actually Amanda Clarke, but she's also smart, self-assured, easy going, charming, sweet, funny and good natured. She's every Emily Van Camp character, sort of. I left out one important adjective, the absence of which undermines all the others, because, as we're told at least twice in the pilot alone, "this is not a story about forgiveness".

Pilot Watch: Charlie's Angels

by Kelly Bedard

The new Charlie's Angels has more problems than anything that should ever have made it to series.

First there's the simple issue of the outdated premise- one Hollywood seems to think is "classic" and everyone else knows to be played out. There's the tone- the franchise thrives as a comedy (see the tongue-in-cheek films and their surprising success), as a drama it feels lightweight, in a bad way.

Pilot Watch: How to be a Gentleman

by Kelly Bedard

Watching the CBS Upfronts last May I was really impressed by 2 Broke Girls and thought How to be a Gentleman looked pretty darn stupid. But as 2 Broke Girls enters its third week of existence I'm disappointed to find it going down in quality pretty quickly (though I am enjoying this Johnny character and Caroline is still enchanting, even if the dialogue is overwrought). Whitney Cummings' other show Whitney, on the other hand, is so far getting better. Meanwhile, back on CBS, I was surprised to find the premiere of How to be a Gentleman thoroughly enjoyable, if not particularly groundbreaking.

Pilot Watch: Unforgettable

by Kelly Bedard

The inherent empathy of someone who remembers every detail she ever learns about someone makes for an intriguing concept. But Unforgettable never makes good on that promise. The Poppy Montgomery-led CBS drama is as typical as it is procedural.

Perhaps based on the high enjoyment factor of Without a Trace, CBS has put a lot of stock in the Australian actress, but I'm not sure her leading lady chops have the weight the network was expecting. She struggles with covering up her accent for the NY-based role and brings limited sparkle to a part that doesn't allow her much help in the way of witty writing or palpable relationships. I enjoyed the addition of her mother- a good Alzheimer's-stricken parent story always bring a character some much-needed empathy- but even that plot is long past fresh.

Ultimately there is nothing new or particularly intriguing about CBS's new police drama (like they needed another one of those!). In fact, if I could pick just one word to describe it, I would happily embrace the little bit of entertainment I can get out of this boring show by choosing the word "forgettable".

Pilot Watch: Ringer

by Kelly Bedard

Apologies for the delay on this one. As major Buffy fans, we at My TV have been somewhat timid when it comes to jumping into Ringer. Turns out, trepidation was the right instinct.

The CW mystery has perhaps the worst production values I've ever seen in primetime. The overuse of cheap green screen in the pilot alone is shameful and sets the audience up to not take the series seriously as it moves forward.

Pilot Watch: Pan Am

by Rachael Nisenkier

The two tv shows debuting this fall season that deal with the sixties are implied to be something of Mad Men clones. But the truth is, as far as period pieces go, the fifties and sixties are pretty much the best of places to hang out. Change was in the air, and the constant motifs of oppression (be it in the form of racism, sexism, or communism) contrasted with the growing bubbling of liberation provides a perfect back drop for personal stories of self realization and pressing against societal expectations. It’s part (though not all) of what makes Mad Men, and specifically Don Draper’s identity crisis in Mad Men, so damn compelling. It’s also a large portion of what works so well about the Pan Am pilot.

Pilot Watch: A Gifted Man

by Kelly Bedard

A Gifted Man is not a new show. I mean, it is a new show- a CBS Friday night experiment in unconventional procedural drama- but it adheres to a formula that's been produced three notable times before. Wonderfalls, Joan of Arcadia and (most similarly) Eli Stone are all what I call "prophet shows": client/case/patient-of-the-week agnostic faith-based stories of redemption and connection with strong ties to the ether. A Gifted Man is a more dramatic (and less George Michael-full) take on the same thing, though vaguer with the mythology (and God vs. ghost clarification) behind its ethereal messages. Each time I've seen a new prophet show I've liked it a lot and it's been canceled quickly. Here's hoping, as predictable and slightly Ghost Whisperer-y as it might be, A Gifted Man doesn't suffer the fate of the three great prophet shows.

Pilot Watch: Whitney and 2 Broke Girls (aka Whitney Cummings' shows)

by Rachael Nisenkier

Whitney Cummings was not a name most of us knew before this TV season. Now, thanks to the annoying and ubiquitous ads for her eponymous new show Whitney, she feels like a familiar and annoying relative.

Still, Cummings is the driving force behind not one, but two new shows starring women and about women, and as such, as My TV’s resident feminist theory devotee, I can’t help but wish her some measure of success. So let’s look at her efforts.

Pilot Watch: Up All Night

by Rachael Nisenkier

I had a lot of goodwill going into the pilot episode of Up All Night. All three major stars of the show (Christina Applegate, Maya Rudolph and Will Arnett) are hard working, seriously funny actors who deserve a hit (especially after the disappointments too often suffered by them). And the premise was a fun twist on standby tropes. It looked at the phenomenon of slightly-later-in-life parenting.

But I'm still surprised how much I loved it. First and foremost, I loved Christina Applegate. Her character Reagan was a hard drinking, totally fun television producer. Her relationship with her lawyer husband (as told in the pilot by montages and flashbacks, mainly) was all about extending the good times they had together. And Arnett and Applegate have fantastic chemistry. In any show that's going to ask you to follow the life and times of a couple, you need to instantly believe in them, and Arnett and Applegate sell that.

Even better is Reagan's relationship with her offspring. Applegate brilliantly captures the mixture of fear, love, excitement and just the tiniest bit of resentment that this awesome woman feels at having to mix motherhood, working, and a personal life. It's nothing new, but it still feels fresh.

Mostly, the fresh feel of the script comes from taking quality comedic actors and pairing them with language and situations that feel authentic. From Arnett's stay-at-home daddy malaise, to the genuine pull and tug that carries Applegate to and from the office, this show has managed to craft familiar characters with top notch writing to make for a definite must-see on NBC Wednesday nights.

Pilot Watch: Free Agents

by Kelly Bedard

One of the worst promoted shows of the new fall TV season is Free Agents, a silly-looking, offensively marketed story about a workplace hookup. But even with a poster that "cleverly" hints a storeroom blowjobs, Free Agents snagged me with the promise of a weekly dose of the endlessly awesome Hank Azaria. The charmingly neurotic and inescapably intelligent actor has always been a favourite and any show with him at the centre deserves at least a 3 episode sampling. Kathryn Hahn, a perennially underused but excellently charming actress, was also a promising get in the female lead, as was Natasha Leggero as a difficult executive assistant (I'd grown quite fond of the comedienne during her stint as one of Last Comic Standing's best judges). Add in Giles (Anthony Head, reprising his role from the Stephen Mangan-starring original version of the series) and of course I'm watching this show, no matter what brainless things the NBC promotional department has done with it.

Pilot Watch: New Girl

by Rachael Nisenkier

Great pilots are hard to find in any genre (the recent Alphas was an exception). Great pilots for comedies- especially fairly generic comedies about twenty-somethings learning to deal with life and love- are really hard to find. Nearly every one I’ve seen over the past 5-10 years has been trying so desperately to distinguish itself from the many, many shows that came before them, that they end up playing to the wacky and weird end of the spectrum, or just sort of sitting in the doldrums of “been there done that.”

New Girl, the new Zooey Deschanel vehicle in the genre, somehow manages to seem both mundane and way too cutesy. It tells the story of Jess, who despite her Zooey Deschanel good looks, is a total weirdo and therefore repellent to men. Convincing anyone that Deschanel is repellent is a hard enough task, so the show sticks her with too-cute dork glasses, constantly messy (but sexy) hair, and enough personality quirks to fill a thousand wacky best friend characters in a thousand romantic comedies. Unfortunately, all these quirks and weirdnesses serve to make her not resemble a human being so much as an amalgamation of every original nerd chick ever. I don’t believe when Jess is crying and screaming at her Dirty Dancing marathon any more than I believe that she can quote Lord of the Rings.

Pilot Watch: Alphas

by Rachael Nisenkier

From the start, it’s kind of hard to peg down what kind of a show Alphas wants to be. It has whip-smart writing and glorious one liners (see Random Thoughts, at the end) that seem to lend themselves to a wisecracking action comedy. It has a complicated mythology filled with good, evil, and mind control, which seems straight out of pulp comics. And it has the snap cuts, musical cues, and overall tension-filled explorations typical of procedural cop shows.

MTV gets Awkward

by Rachael Nisenkier

Never one to shy away from TV shows ostensibly written for people about half my age, I approached the watching of MTV’s Awkward with a mixture of excitement and shame. I should be finally watching Breaking Bad or The Wire, not indulging in the newest output of teen angst-laden ridiculousness.

However, about halfway through the first episode of Awkward, I stopped feeling guilty. If the awesome story of Jenna losing her virginity in probably the least after school special-approved way possible didn't win me over, by the time she accidentally tried to commit fake suicide I was head over heels.

Pilot Season

Now is that time of year in TV when news of what could be happening next year starts leaking out. It's pilot season, a free-for-all of brilliant concepts and derivative sure-things battling it out for precious few primetime spots.

My picks for the possible best of 2011's fall season?

In the top spot, obviously, it's Aaron Sorkin's return to TV. The cable news-set drama is sure to be a winner and (as much as it pains this network-devotee to say it) the fact that it was HBO that picked up the pilot not NBC or ABC gives me hope that Sorkin will get to do it his way. That means he'll most likely play up the idealism, play down the romance and spend a lot of time on a soapbox- sounds perfect. The Oscar he's about to win (or absolutely should be winning) will undoubtedly help push the show to quick success. Call Tommy Schlamme and Josh Molina- there's work to be done.

The other pilot that looks particularly promising based purely on concept and writing pedigree is a new NBC pickup called Grimm. It's a cop drama (a very hit or miss category) but lives in a world where the tales of The Brothers Grimm can come true. It's an intriguingly high concept, perhaps a bit too high for the desperate network, but it sounds pretty cool. The fact that it comes from Jim Kouf and David Greenwalt gives me hope too. The former Whedon scribes know their clever fantasy writing and know how to make a high concept show work on network- if anyone can do it, it'll be them.

Thoughts on The New Fall Sitcoms

We're two weeks into the new television season, just far enough to start really forming opinions about the new shows. This season has 6 new network sitcoms on the docket and their quality to junk ratio is sadly low so far. Here's the low down on all 6, including a surprise hit and a whole lot of misses.


The Surprisingly Good
Raising Hope (FOX). This quirky offering is the last thing I thought I would like. I wanted to turn it off 10 minutes into the pilot but I didn't, and it grew on me. The characters are engaging and well-meaning, even if they are crazy urban hillbilly-like folk; the problems are relatable, even if the premise is outlandish; and though shrouded in hipster shock-value crassness, the show is ultimately very sweet. I'm shocked that this is true but Raising Hope may be the best new sitcom of the fall.


The Merely Mediocre
Better With You (ABC). This sweet and silly sitcom isn't as clever as its company on ABC Wednesdays (Cougar Town shout out!), but it's got an interesting premise and a promising cast. It will never be groundbreaking but it could be a little bit funnier.


The Depressingly Bad
Mike & Molly (CBS). Mike & Molly is a whole lot of not-funny wrapped in cliche with all the tact surgically removed. Seeing Melissa McCarthy suffer at the hands of such bad writing just makes me want to cry.

Running Wilde (FOX). This has all the ingredients for greatness (a showrunner and star from Arrested Development, just for starters) but is really pretty terrible. The potentially adorable Keri Russell brings back that holier-than-thou attitude that made me hate Felicity and uses it as a premise for an entire sitcom. The whole thing is aggravating.

$#*! My Dad Says (CBS). The crime of $#*! is not that developing an entire sitcom out of a twitter feed is idiotic (thank you Community, for pointing that out in your season premiere), it's that it's just not very funny. Unlike some of the others, it's not offensive or annoying, it's just not funny, at all. But also unlike some of the others, that's not surprising or upsetting, just predictable.

Outsourced (NBC). The show that bumped Parks & Rec from the fall schedule (NBC, you need a new brain), however, IS offensive AND annoying. I've already written about it so I will refrain from ranting here. But MAN, this show is everything that's wrong with everything. It's ignorant, showy and boring all in one.