TV reviews

Bored to Tears By Super Fun Night

Super Fun Night: Wednesdays at 9:30 Eastern On ABC

Super Fun Night has an interesting development history. The show was originally shopped to CBS last year, only for the network to pass on it, only for ABC to swoop in and pick up the series. While this would normally seem like the sort of sign that would doom a show, ABC has shown a surprisingly high amount of confidence in the show, giving it both plenty of hype and the strongest possible comedy lead-in one will find on the network: Modern Family.

Super Fun Night was predominantly conceived as a vehicle for Rebel Wilson (Bridesmaids, Pitch Perfect), who plays Kimmie Boubier, a shut-in junior attorney, whose weekend routines always involve her friends Marika (Lauren Ash) and Helen-Alice (Liza Lapira). The three typically take the introverted route, and don’t go out much until they feel compelled to do so to celebrate Kimmie’s promotion. At that point, as she meets Royce (Kevin Bishop), a British attorney. From there hijinks ensue as the three introverts are thrust into new social situations.

So, is this show worth the hype? In short: an unequivocal no. However, since the whole point of a review is for me to tell you why Super Fun Night is lacking, let me count the ways. First and foremost, this show is not funny. This is due to a reliance on banal jokes, hacky and physical comedy (oh my god, someone had an elevator door eat their clothing? I’ve NEVER seen that before!). When it doesn’t rely on those dated premises, it instead tries to rely on going to a well of awkwardness that falls flat at every turn.

On top of not being funny, the show seems to rely on a lot of clichés to fill out the plot, which fits the arc of every underdog story ever. This is made even worse by the fact that Kimmie’s rival, Kendall, is the one stuck behind the 8-ball. The closest analogy to this sort of awkward plotting comes from the world of professional wrestling whenever John Cena is forced to play the underdog while being the dominant champion. It doesn’t play well with WWE audiences and it doesn’t really play well here. I also wasn’t thrilled at the lack of a real B-plot, as a show built around a group of three friends didn’t really spend any time with Marika or Helen-Alice.

There are some positives that the show can build on. In particular, the one-upsmanship that occurred during the musical number at the end felt stronger than the rest of the show. Additionally, while the writing felt off, it seemed like the cast did the best it could with the material, with Kate Jenkinson in particular really standing out as Kendall Quinn, seeming to love every super-villainesque moment thrown her way.

The Final Verdict: It’s pretty clear why CBS ended up passing on Super Fun Night. This pilot felt half-baked and the writing seems sloppy, laser-focused on an A-Plot that felt very mundane. While normally with a sitcom it takes a few weeks to get into a groove, even a fully realized version of Night would be unappealing. Skip this one, Wednesday is a strong enough comedy night right now that you can find something funnier anywhere else on the dial.

A Heavy Hand On The Premise Sinks We Are Men

by Michael Tyminski

We Are Men: Mondays at 8:30 Eastern on CBS

It seems like more often than not, there’s often some rhyme, reason, or pattern of what makes it to air, especially on the big four networks. Either the network execs are cashing in on a current cultural trend, a hot-button issue, trying out some new revolutionary concept, or just blatantly aping what CB—ahem, lead dog is doing to get its’ ratings edge. However, occasionally we see a show slip through the cracks that seems to exist solely as some sort of weird outlier that seems out of place both on the air and on it’s place in the network schedule (the clearest example of this being last fall when Whitney was stuck between two other shows that clearly share an audience in Dateline and Grimm). This year, that outlier seems to be We Are Men.

We Are Men picks up when Carter (Chris Smith) is left at the altar by his bride, only to move into a short-term housing complex in order to pick up the pieces of his life. While there, he befriends three other men in similar predicaments: Gil, a small business owner (Kal Penn), Frank, a middle aged clothier (Tony Shalhoub), and Stuart, an OB/GYN who’s going through his second divorce (Jerry O’ Connell). Together, these men try to mentor Carter through his situation while hanging out poolside.

This pilot feels like a tale of two pilots, there’s the overwrought origin story where Carter is under the thumb of his domineering fiancee’. This pilot is kind of a mess, as it forces us to go in the same circle twice: once in speed mode in the first five minutes, and then seemingly out of nowhere a second time over the back end of the show. Unfortunately, the whirlwind retelling of the story feels incredibly plodding leaving to an overwrought scene at the chapel where we for the second time have it repeatedly beaten into our head how lousy Carter’s relationship really was.

The second pilot is a show about nothing, and this angle is considerably more enjoyable. While Gil, Frank, and Stuart, aren’t particularly well filled in (it is a pilot, after all), We Are Men shows more promise when our principal characters are bouncing off of each other, and the cast does an excellent job displaying that easy rapport. It’s the little moments in general that are We Are Men‘s strength, most notably a cameo by Dave Foley as Carter’s father, a man who truly appreciates his hard-boiled eggs.

The Final Verdict: Many sitcom pilots tend to be fairly well removed from the original pilot by the middle of it’s first season, and We Are Men is no exception to that rule. In this case, it’s probably for the best, as there isn’t much of a story in this origin and the premise is pounded into you from the pilot. I also think this show could benefit from a potential mid-season schedule swap with The Crazy Ones, as We Are Men makes more sense with a Two and a Half Men lead-in. Overall, I’d probably skip this one for the time being, but wouldn’t be surprised if it became a sleeper hit should it survive past mid-season.

Fox Makes A Triumphant Return To TV in His New Show

by Michael Tyminski

The Michael J. Fox Show: Thursdays at 9:30 p.m. Eastern on NBC

So far many of the comedies I’ve reviewed in the fall season have followed one trend (that of parents and their adult children forced together by circumstances), however, there’s also a second key trend that’s floating around: after a weak 2012-13, it’s very clear that the big four are reaching back for big names from the 80’s and 90’s in the hopes of bolstering their network’s success. CBS goes to this well tonight with Robin Williams and Sarah Michelle Gellar’s The Crazy Ones, but it’s NBC who goes all in on this concept, dragging James Spader out for The Blacklist, and Michael J. Fox for tonight’s offering: The Michael J. Fox Show.

The Michael J. Fox Show follows Mike Henry (Michael J. Fox), a retired reporter with Parkinson’s disease who happens to want to jump back in to the fray after being bored at home. Luckily, his old boss Harris (Wendell Pierce) needs Mike as much as Mike needs NBC (it’s meta, get it?). Now with him back at work, he’ll have to juggle all of the usual day-to-day activities at work and at home while also dealing with his ailment.

In a lot of ways, The Michael J. Fox Show feels like a throwback to other things, synthesizing many surface elements of sitcoms past: works as a newscaster, a loving wife and 2.5 kids, doting in-laws (who double as the wacky next door neighbors), even sibling rivalries! However, where in most cases such tropes would be called cliché, the true beauty in this show lies in the way that these stock tropes deal with the obvious elephant in the room: Fox’s very real health condition. The first episode aired tonight deals with that head-on, but the second episode allows it to slip into the background, allaying fears that it would be dropped like an anvil.

The show maintains a certain sweetness, and that’s courtesy of the dynamic of the show’s central pairing: Mike and his wife Annie (Betsy Brandt), both perfectly nail the married dynamic, driving each other crazy while still showing a clear love for each other. A large amount of that is courtesy of the writing, which could have easily veered into the maudlin, but ultimately aims straight for establishing each of its’ characters (and particularly Mike’s) flaws early on (particularly his vanity, though it also pops up in every character but Annie by the middle of the second episode) and letting those drive the plot.

I think there are a few minor flaws with the show, as there tend to be with many sitcoms coming out of the gate. First and foremost, while the talking heads are often funny, they feel out of place in a show that seems to have a classic feel. This is made worse by the fact that the cutaways are explained away and plot-relevant in the first episode, only to persist in the second. Secondly, it seems like many of the secondary characters don’t have much to do at times, with both Kay (his assistant), and Leigh (his sister) both feeling very ancillary to the first two episodes.

The Final Verdict: In a lot of ways, The Michael J. Fox Show feels like a throwback, but it adds a few wrinkles here or there to keep the show from feeling truly cliché. Additionally, while sitcoms tend to not truly find their voice until midway through the first season, it seems like the show has found it’s voice very early on, looking for a healthy mix of both heartwarming with a little bit of sass to keep it from venturing too far into saccharine territory. Check it out, there’s pretty strong odds this is the best new sitcom of the season.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D is Worth the Hype

by Michael Tyminski

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D: Tuesdays at 8p.m. Eastern on ABC

Premiere week is in full swing, and that means an opportunity to look at the big four’s most hyped new shows for the fall, with a healthy mix of new high-concept dramas (Sleepy Hollow), stars making a triumphant return to television (The Michael J. Fox Show), and new shows from familiar faces (Dad, Mom). For me personally, I think there was, however, no new show that was more hyped or will dictate its’ network’s fortunes more than Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. ties very closely with the Marvel movie universe, which should come as no surprise as ABC and Marvel share a common parent company in Disney. Joss Whedon once again gets the keys to the car, and he picks up right where The Avengers movie left off, starting with the seemingly unexplained resurrection of Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg), a secret agent working for the super-spy group whom died during the Avengers movie. Coulson recruits a new team in order to deal with the villain group the Rising Tide. However, the true promise this series has will be later on, as S.H.I.E.L.D. interacts with the larger movie universe.

ABC blew up it’s Tuesday night reality block to build around this show, so I guess the real questions are: does this show justify the hype, and will this show ultimately provide the sort of return on investment that ABC needs in order to keep this show on the air? Well first and foremost, let me say that the show definitely succeeds in giving off that blockbuster feel. The action scenes are slick and well choreographed, and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D doesn’t shy away from showing off the toys from minute one (both of the action figure variety, and the super-spy sort as well).

Tonight’s episode also features some fairly tight writing, deftly weaving exposition into moments that also allow for character dynamics to further development or push the plot along. Furthermore, the twists in the plot line are well executed and set up in a reasonably logical manner (that is to say, you don’t see the twists coming the first time, but when you look back after the fact, it all comes together). Finally in true Whedon-esque (and for that matter a common feature in spy movies as well), we get a fair amount of comedy in our action soup, including one funny visual of a guy getting tossed 50 feet in the air after hitting someone with superpowers in the head with a pipe.

The acting, is what ultimately holds this all together. Particular kudos are to Gregg’s ability to capture Coulson’s unorthodox leadership skills in a manner that maintains a likable manner. Equal praise should be given to J. August Richards, whom in his guest stint in the pilot tears the house down as a desperate man who took to desperate measures and gives a powerful speech in the episodes climax that could have very easily been hammed into super-villainy and add an extra level of humanity that allows for some true empathy from the viewer.

The Final Verdict: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D is the sort of blockbuster event show that ABC has yet to find since the finale of Lost. Whedon and company find an ability to juxtapose large effects and small stories to create a series that could sufficiently anchor the Marvel movie universe (and of course throw out cameos for sweeps), but also manage to keep the show light and fun. As a whole I’d recommend checking it out, but I think if you’re into geek culture (as I am prone to be) this can be safely bumped up to almost must watch territory.

Mom Feels Like A Work in Progress But Shows Promise

by Michael Tyminski

Mom: Mondays at 9:30 Eastern Time on CBS

Last week, when I reviewed FOX’s abomination Dads, I mentioned how it jumped on part of a very common premise for sitcoms in the past year: adults and their parents living together under one roof due to the shaky economic time we’re in. We saw it with ABC in April when they debuted the flop How to Live With Your Parents (For the Rest of Your Life), This season we get even more of the trope with FOX’s Dads, and CBS, who has not one but two shows using the trope with The Millers,and tonight’s debut: Mom.

Mom, which comes from the same Chuck Lorre brain trust responsible for half of CBS’ comedy lineup features Anna Faris playing a single mother trying to stay afloat and care for her two kids. However, when her mother (Alison Janney) returns to her life, they immediately start butting heads. Along the way she must deal with her two kids, her hectic job, and her recovery from alcoholism. Needless to say, the show is a natural pair with current CBS’ sitcom 2 Broke Girls.

So, does this show fare any better than the other similar shows I mentioned? Well the handful of times I laughed over the course of the hour is already a handful of times more than I laughed watching Dads, (and How to Live) for that matter. Allison Janney in particular lights up the screen as Bonnie, playing the mother figure to Faris’ Christy and showing a soft touch that you typically don’t get out of a Lorre show. Faris’ does an equally serviceable job as Christy, who has to do some emotional heavy lifting as the shows first segment does not hesitate to pour gasoline on the fire of her unhappy life.

If there was a clear weakness to Mom, it’s that this episode (which admittedly is the pilot) tries to jam in way too many angles for it’s own good. Within 15 minutes we discover that Christy works as a waitress, she had at least one of her children in high school (ruining her ability to graduate and killing her hopes and dreams), her teenage daughter is sexually active, she’s sleeping with her boss, she’s in alcoholics anonymous, her kids truly hate her, that’s she’s actually the affair in that love triangle, and that it’s somehow all Bonnie’s fault. The show then struggles to revisit all of those angles over the back half of the show, creating a very overcrowded story arc that struggles to come together when the show jams them in the same place in the episode’s climax.

As a whole, the show is pretty typical Chuck Lorre fare in every respect: multi-camera, tons of laugh track, the obligatory bawdy and easy jokes, and a blue collar setting. As a result, your final opinion of the show is going to revolve around whether you tend to like most of the current CBS comedy lineup that is modeled in his image.

The Final Verdict: Mom seems to fall into the trap that many sitcoms have in the early going: there’s a ton of unpacking and it ends up hurting the precious timing that comedy relies on. However, there seems to be some bright spots, particularly between the show’s central pairing in Christy and Bonnie (which I’m sure we’ll see in larger doses than in the pilot). As a result, I see this being a wait-and-see proposition for most people, with a bump up to check it out for those who happen to have a fondness for CBS’s brand of comedy.

Dads Might Be the Worst New Show of the Season

by Michael Tyminski

Dads: Tuesdays at 8 p.m. On FOX

Normally, when I look at a show, I open with a little context about the TV landscape it’s coming into. I do this normally to give not only a little context, but to highlight trends in new TV so you know what’s competing for the eyeballs and attention of a given market segment (there’s a lot of TV out there and precious little time after all. While this show is one of many comedies built this year around adults and their parents cohabiting as the end result of a stagnant economy, (and I’ll discuss this more next week when I look at CBS’s Mom) I think the best place to start any discussion of Fox’s new sitcom Dads is with the negative buzz that has surrounded this show.

Simply put, many of the critics who have seen advance screenings of Dads have found the show to be complete and utter dreck, both unfunny and morally reprehensible (particularly in matters of race, but I defy you to find a Seth McFarlane show that believes in holding back). Fox in turn, has started an ad campaign telling America to ignore these fine people who get paid to watch TV and to watch their controversial new show. Needless to say, for the purposes of this one show, with as much vigor as I try to answer the question “Should I watch this show?”, I’m also going to try to answer “Did this show deserve the heat it got from critics in screenings?” (By the way, I feel like some marketing guy at Fox is going to completely take that last question out of context).

That being said, Dads follows the lives of two best friends: Warner, played by Giovani Ribisi and Eli , played by the hardest working man in McFarland: Seth Green. Their lives are simple and straight forward until their dads, played by Martin Mull and Peter Reigert unexpectedly move in. From there, hilarious hijinks ensue as generations clash under one roof!

So, is it as bad as those who got to screen this at the TCA’s claim it is? In one word: Yes, just yes. Dads is the sort of tired, hacky, TV that takes the worst elements of every sitcom you’ve ever seen and churned them into a blender of pure unfunny the likes of which I’ve never seen. Warner and Eli’s dynamic is ripped straight from The Odd Couple without any of the heart. The jokes, are hacky, cliché, and stretched past the point of any credibility, and delivered with excessive mugging and an almost playground bully-esque cadence (seriously, try plugging in “Smooth Moves, Ex-Lax into any line delivered by any lead in the show, and you’ll probably laugh harder). Making matters worse is the omnipresent laugh track that laughs at every. single. line. The end result is the sort of show that looks and feels like a sketch from Tim and Eric Awesome Show, down to the very cringing you’ll be doing while watching it.

As for the racism and sexism, it’s not nearly as atrocious as people hype it up to be, but the fact that they went for the most base, lowbrow, and least innovative way to address the topic is revolting. Worse yet, any potential irony or opportunity to leverage the joke as a function of someone’s ignorance is erased by the (even more moronic) laugh track. With no seeming hypocrisy, subtlety, or even something as simple as a generational divide (a golden example in using the mechanism of turning the joke back on the oppressor is Pierce Hawthorne) the race jokes feel empty and more like cheap shots than they probably would anywhere else, particularly when it is established immediately that our younger leads are no more enlightened than their fathers on the topic. The end result are jokes that are more like **ha ha, [insert group here]**, which is the sort of sensibility that leads to this sort of sociological criticism of Dads, even if the jokes themselves seem way too dumb and unfunny to actually do real damage.

The Final Verdict: Dads is the sort of show that seems like it would show up inside another show as a parody of a cliché, trite show. It definitely takes a sloppy hand with the racial humor and sexist humor, but it’s not nearly as morally reprehensible or mean spirited as it was initially perceived– just mind numbingly ignorant. Skip at all costs, this show is the sort of soul crushing utter garbage that should it ever get a fan base, they will be about as reviled as Juggalos.

Next Time: This Sunday is the Emmy Awards! I’ll be here on Manhattan providing live coverage!

Sleepy Hollow Is Fun If You Just Stop Thinking

by Michael Tyminski

Sleepy Hollow: Mondays at 9 p.m. Eastern Time on Fox

After a couple of weeks of false starts and some minor premieres on cable, the fall premiere season kicks into full gear tonight. First up is some new television from Fox, who provides us with an offering that jumbles up period pieces and modern crime dramas in it’s newest show: Sleepy Hollow.

Sleepy Hollow mostly takes place in the present day, when law enforcement resurrects Ichabod Crane (Tom Mison) in order to help solve mysteries in the titular town on the Hudson that are believed to have a supernatural bent (due to a certain Headless Horseman). He is teamed up with current cop, Abbie Mills (Nicole Beharie) who also happens to have personal experiences with the paranormal. During these mysteries, we flash back in time to look in on 1776, where the horsemen is believed to have come from and learn more about Crane’s past including his wife Katrina (Katia Winter).

So how is this new offering? Well uneven (as one would expect from a pilot of a fairly complicated drama) on every account. Visually, the show looks pretty good, with the Headless Horseman being suitably intimidating, and opening on a pretty awesome revolutionary war battle scene. However, for every scene that looks awesome, we get hokey special effects, such as the obviously wax modeled sheriff’s head and the background effects during Ichabod’s dream sequence. Finally, I hope you love the fish eye lens, because this show is completely infatuated with it.

This unevenness also affects the writing. While the show tends to master keeping it’s exposition brief, to the point, and in a manner that doesn’t feel redundant (not like it truly can because this is decidedly NOT Washington Irving’s Ichabod Crane), it also tends to float all over the place in a manner that will leave you scratching your head. For example, there was one point where a priest that we at that point twice in passing is dueling with our headless horseman in a manner that would be more befitting of Harry Potter or Dragon Ball Z than modern day Hudson Valley monsignor vs. supernatural being of death incarnate. Similar logic seems to make one question the major mid-episode twist that Lt. Mills could have a complete demon launched nervous breakdown and be well adjusted enough to pass not only a local police but FBI psychological exam.

Speaking of Mills, she is however the sort of protagonist that we do not see enough of on TV, being a strong female who does not devolve into a caricature, with bonus kudos to Beharie’s performance, which sanded down some potential rough edges of the character (as cop banter potentially could play into some unfortunate consequences). Orlando Jordan does a surprisingly strong job playing the no-nonsense police captain, while John Cho’s minor character Officer Brooks being equally entertaining (especially in the closing moments). Really the only character, I thought was off was Crane, whom aside from being really dissonant from the traditional version seemed really hammy at points, especially early on.

The Final Verdict: Sleepy Hollow is an incredibly uneven show, however, that doesn’t show the whole picture. What Sleepy Hollow is in actuality is the sort of show that becomes exponentially better if you’re willing to turn your brain off for an hour, sit back, and let the ridiculousness watch over you while the headless horseman runs around with a machine gun and Ichabod Crane is less nebbish professor and more revolutionary war bad ass who happens to have a cute witch wife and runs around sounding like Dr. Orpheus. Check it out if you can turn your brain off, but if you’re the sort of person whose going to worry about things like logic and consistency wait and see.

Million Second Quiz Ratchets Up the Intensity

by Michael Tyminski

Million Second Quiz: 8p.m. Eastern this and next week on NBC

Since 1999, when Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? made it’s way across the pond to America, we have seen a fundamental shift in the way that the game show has been presented over the airwaves. Once built to be cheap staples of daytime (often morning) television, the genre often is now home to seven-digit grand prizes, prime-time specials, and typically treated closer to sporting events with cutaway interviews. No network has leaned harder on the genre since its’ revival than NBC, which has had considerable success with Deal or No Deal, 1 vs. 100, and The Weakest Link. It is with those three shows in mind that they launch their new big money quizzer: Million Second Quiz

Million Second Quiz is a test of both general knowledge and endurance. One lucky contestant is placed in the money chair inside a giant hourglass set in Manhattan’s Rockerfeller Center. Here, the contestant earns $10 for every second they survive in the chair while being bombarded by questions and challenges from across the country. Once unseated from they money chair, they spend time in winner’s row, hoping that their winnings will hold out. Once the clock hits zero (estimated to be sometime next Friday afternoon), the top four will battle it out for the top cash prize. Hosting the proceedings is veteran emcee Ryan Seacrest (Click, Wild Animal Games, Mid-days on Z-100, he also did some show on Fox for a few years but I don’t think anyone’s ever heard of it).

The quiz battles are interesting, mixing elements of the ABC show Duel, the dare mechanics from Double Dare (though sadly not the physical challenges), and the speed round mechanics of just about hard quizzer ever (albeit with increasing point values as the battle goes on). Seacrest does a surprisingly strong job handling the question reader side of the show, nimbly adapting between asking questions, kicking to a video screen for video questions, and dealing with the Doubler (which admittedly was not explained before the first bout) and even managing to interrupt a battle for commercials (right before the big final third).

In between these bouts, we get to look in on the various larger aspects of the Million Second Quiz, including meeting the “line jumper” a strong performing online player whom is flown in to play for the money chair. We also check in on Winner’s Row, where the four top performing players try to survive long enough to make it to the final battle for the big prize. We also learn about “the winner’s defense”, where the winner’s circle send of their own in a risk to add to their total. If the Winner fails however, they are out of the game.

If there is one glaring issue with the show, it’s the relentless cross promotion that occurs during the course of the episode. Our winner’s row is sponsored by Subway. Our line jumper gets an interview on NBC’s Today Show. We get guest appearances by Blake Shelton of The Voice and Heidi Klum of America’s Got Talent. Multiple questions referenced NBC’s two football games over the past week. While I get that promotion has long been a part of the show, it feels very blunt and inelegant on Million Second Quiz.

The Final Verdict: It’s a large expansive game with it’s tentacles everywhere, and I think I can safely say that Million Second Quiz is the next evolution of one of television’s oldest formats, mixing truly interactive at home play seamlessly with the on-air show. Seacrest has the chops to host, the format is both very simple and strategically deep, and the format allows for the tension to mount over the course of the game. Watch it, it’s a solid event show and a great way to spend the 8 p.m. hour before the fall season kicks into full gear.

Cold Justice is Under Cooked and in Dire Need of Seasoning

by Michael Tyminski

Cold Justice: Tuesday Nights at 10p.m. On TNT

It seems like one of the trends that is starting to gain steam (at least on basic cable) is the proliferation of reality content on networks that up to this point had hung their hat on scripted series. Just this year alone, we’ve seen USA pick up Summer Camp, TBS debut it’s reality series King of the Nerds, and AMC trot out Owner’s Manual. One of the most pronounced shifts towards reality TV, however, has to be TNT, which went from being exclusively devoted to dramas (hence the tagline: We know drama) to unleashing both the Dwayne Johnson vehicle The Hero, as well as tonight’s offering, Cold Justice.

Cold Justice, comes from the brain of Law and Order mastermind Dick Wolf, and unsurprisingly, takes a similar tack to the iconic series. Former crime investigator Yolanda McClary and prosecutor Kelly Siegel travel around the country digging up unresolved cold cases (cases that have been dormant for years) in the hopes of bringing justice to the families of murder victims. The cases themselves range from about five to thirty years old and span from Ohio to Arizona.

So is the real life Law and Order as compelling as it’s drama counterpart? The answer to that question is the most emphatic of nos. While I laud the work that McClary and Siegel do, it’s very clear that the same factors that make them great at solving cases make them incredibly weak TV personalities. Both of them speak with the same clinical monotone, and neither shows a hint of personality at any point (even during their own introductions). This nondescript matter-of-factness extends to the narrator, who speaks in the same exact Ben Stein-like tone.

Similarly, the show relies on a very bland visual palate. The bulk of the show seems to take place in the same one office room, with white walls, white tables, and papers huddled all around. The closest the show does give to a solid visualization is a quick scene involving a turned shoulder in the dingy trailer bathroom that is the scene of the crime. However, the show seems perfectly content to tell (which as mentioned above with the leads– not so much the show’s strength) when it could show, something even most low budget true crime shows manage to find space for in the hour (even a cheesy re-enactment or lazy CGI modeling would do). When it does use visual effects, it mostly comes in the form of a nauseating (and unnecessary) 3-D effect to make words and still photos look like they were literally ripped forward out of the photo and/or page they came from.

To the shows credit, Wolf creates a very realistic depiction of the criminal investigation process. Unfortunately, since the criminal justice process involves a heavy amount of fairly mundane tasks, Cold Justice doesn’t seem to possess any of the interesting qualities that turn procedurals into hits and make the fine people at CBS lots of money. This would be fine if it built to any sort of confrontation, but the shows potential big moments (the interrogations, the DNA results, the big sell to the DA) ultimately fizzle out, thus making for a completely drama free and remarkably unexciting hour of watching people sit in an office and sputter the same points over and over again.

The Final Verdict (no pun intended this time around): Cold Justice is a bland pastiche that quite frankly had me ticking down the minutes to the end of the show. While there have been shows in the past that have offended my sensibilities (LA Shrinks), made me question the logic of the producers (Blood and Oil), and have been comically incompetent (Cult and Zero Hour), this is the first show that I found boring enough that I had to force myself to keep watching it. Skip at all costs and watch grass grow, it will be more entertaining.

Tamra’s OC Wedding Is Middling at Best, Vapid at Worst

by Michael Tyminski

Tamra’s OC Wedding: Mondays at 8 p.m. Eastern on Bravo

Happy Labor Day everyone! We are in September, which means tons of new TV around the corner (most of it hits around the middle of the month). Tonight we get the first show that could be plausibly called “new fall TV”, and it’s in the form of a spin-off of the series that has it’s long tentacles fully wrapped around Bravo TV.

Tonight marks the debut of Tamra’s OC Wedding. It follows Tamra Barney, one of the Real Housewives (Orange County edition) as she prepares for her upcoming nupitals to Eddie Judge. Presumably, like other similar spin-off series, this show will take us from engagement to wedding and will find at least six quality hours of looking for dresses, photographers, honeymoon destinations, wild relationship threatening bachelor parties, and of course, the big day at the end.

So, does the long elaborate process that comes with planning a wedding turn into compelling TV? Well luckily, Tamra tries to squeeze a level of grandiosity in such a short time frame (five weeks) that it feels like the Iron Chef of wedding planning. Luckily, her planner Diane Valentine is game for a ridiculously extravagant wedding. Needless to say, Eddie’s cries for simplicity will fall plaintively (though when you consider it’s his second and her third wedding, he kinda has a point).

While the dynamic that occurs between Tamra and Eddie works, it also ends up exposing the sheer vapidity of Tamra’s cause for the most elaborate wedding ever. This is particularly notable whenever a price tag comes up, showing Tamra’s desire for $2,500 wedding cakes, $100 hand delivered invitations with glasses of champagne, and an anticipated expenditure of $60,000 for food. Conversely, when a story from Heather’s bachelorette party ends up , it was amazing to see Eddie try to carve out some space to screw up later that night.

Needless to say, when Eddie tangentially screws up that night (someone buys him a lap dance, during which he commits the capital offense of being aroused while being ground up on), we see a total role reversal, with Tamra going berserk (because the takeaway of this whole show is that the wedding is to be entirely about her and not a partnership) and flipping out at Sapphire’s (the aforementioned strip club).

A pleasant surprise is the considerable restraint used on many of the production aspects of the reality show playbook. It’s tracking shots are used judiciously, it doesn’t seem fluffed to death, and any manipulative editing feels considerably less noticeable. Unfortunately, much to Bravo’s fiercest attempts otherwise, I felt much more likely to sympathize with Eddie at every turn over the very egocentric rantings of Tamra.

The Final Verdict: At it’s best, it can be light, empty, entertainment, but unfortunately Tamra’s OC Wedding often feels vapid and convoluted. As much as it tries to play Eddie as an affable antagonist, at no turn are you convinced that Tamra’s trials are the fault of anyone but herself, whether it’s blowing the budget or feeling the need to know what nasty lap dance her fiancee is receiving. While it’s no worse than many of it’s contemporaries, that doesn’t necessarily make it good. Check it out if you’re really into Real Housewives style drivel, otherwise skip it– there’s enough on Monday nights now that it’s the fall.

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