Posted Nov 26th 2009 12:40PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E09) Two things I'm starting to realize about
Cougar Town:
1) The more the show concentrates on the ensemble and less on Jules, the funnier it is, and
2) We really need to see more interaction between Courteney Cox and Dan Byrd.
This episode had essentially the same formula as the barbecue episode from a few weeks ago: bring everyone together under Jules' roof and let them bounce off one another. And it worked once again. Instead of a barbecue, of course, the occasion was Thanksgiving (in Florida can you have a barbecue three weeks before Thanksgiving). There's only one slight, itty-bitty problem with what went on this week. But it's a problem that I hope leads to some good things.
Continue reading Review: Cougar Town - Here Comes My Girl
Posted Nov 25th 2009 4:04PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: OpEd, How I Met Your Mother, Reality-Free, Mad Men, Community, Cougar Town, Modern Family
You know, it's funny. When I started here I was a lowly IT guy with no girlfriend and lots of time on his hands to watch TV, even on Thanksgiving. Now I'm engaged, the editor of this site, and have to run around to so many family and friend-related events this weekend my head's already spinning just thinking about it. So I have a lot to be thankful for (and I just realized how friggin' long I've been here... wow).
But TV has always been a part of that equation, and it had no less of a role for me this year. So, in the TV world, here is what will make me thankful as I dive into the turkey tomorrow:
ABC's Wednesday comedy line-up: Against all trends, ABC rolled the dice and started a whole new night of comedy on Wednesdays. And while
Hank flamed out,
The Middle, Modern Family, and
Cougar Town look like they have staying power, both from a quality and a ratings standpoint.
Continue reading What Joel is thankful for
Posted Nov 19th 2009 12:05PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E08) It does seem like we're still in the "unsteady footing" stage of this series, doesn't it? For every episode like "Don't Come Around Here No More," which shows the cast gelling and gives us the glimmer of hope that the show will become a really good ensemble, we have episodes like this one, which are at times funny and at other times irritating.
Commenters have told me to stop obsessing over the fact that Courteney Cox's character of Jules is at her most annoying when she's dealing with her "over 40" issues. But I just can't; that's when the show is at its most sledgehammer-in-your-face irritating, with Cox acting to the rafters. This episode showed that quite a bit -- I could have used less of Jules desperately trying to convince people she could pass for 34 -- but it also showed that, when Jules isn't worrying so much about her age, Cox does a pretty nice job of making Jules less of a cartoon.
Continue reading Review: Cougar Town - Two Gunslingers
Posted Nov 5th 2009 11:35AM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E07) For the first half-dozen episodes of
Cougar Town, legions of watchers have been wondering along with me what would happen when a) Courteney Cox remembers she's not playing Monica Gellar anymore and dials it down a notch and b) the ensemble starts melding with each other a bit more. Well, we seemed to get that in this episode, and it made for a funny and engaging half-hour.
Do I still have issues with the show? Sure. But this episode was the best sign I can think of that Bill Lawrence and company are going to get the show on a funny footing by the end of the season.
Continue reading Review: Cougar Town - Don't Come Around Here No More
Posted Oct 29th 2009 11:33AM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E06) I've been trying to figure out why I'm not connecting with Courteney Cox and her
Cougar Town alter ego, Jules Cobb. It's not just about Cox overacting her role; if that were the case, I would have gotten tired of Monica Geller at around season five of
Friends. No, it was something else, something that I couldn't put my finger on.
But after enjoying the male side of the show more than the female side for the second week in a row, the reason has become clear: I might be the wrong gender. I'm neither getting nor caring about why Jules has so many issues with dating young'uns or the process she has to go through as a "woman of years" in order to do that.
What's ironic about that is that I had problems with the pilot because it felt like it was too frat-boy sounding. So maybe
I don't know what I want out of this show. It's not the first time that's happened.
Continue reading Review: Cougar Town - A Woman In Love (It's Not Me)
Posted Oct 22nd 2009 12:32PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E05) Much better.
Much better.
Those are the words that kept popping into my head as I watched this episode. Courteney Cox dialed it down a notch. The characters melded together a bit more. We explored the lives of the guys a little bit, seeing a side of each we haven't seen yet. And finally, the show wasn't about Jules Cobb pointing out how she's 40 all the time; it was more about how her experience comes out in her relationships with the young'uns, whether it's her boy toy Josh or her assistant Laurie.
And, it was funny. Especially when there was an apple involved.
Continue reading Review: Cougar Town - You Wreck Me
Posted Oct 15th 2009 10:29AM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E04) First, let's get a mystery out of the way: the Tom Petty centric titles. I shot off a note to Bill Lawrence asking about it, and he Blackberried back to me that it's because a) Tom Petty is from rural Florida and b) he's Bill's favorite singer. So there you have it.
Now, on to this episode. We've all seen Courteney Cox play neurotic; she played neurotic for ten seasons on
Friends. But we've also seen her play tough, confident and warm, whether it was on
Friends or any of her other roles. Right now, either via the writing or the way she interprets the role, she's playing Jules Cobb as a purely neurotic mess, and a loud one at that. It's not endearing, it doesn't help me connect with Jules' plight, and, most importantly, it's not funny.
Tonight's episode was Jules at her most neurotic, and it made for the least funny episode of the first four. It's a bad trend that's starting to make me worry about the overall health of the show.
Continue reading Cougar Town: I Won't Back Down
Posted Oct 9th 2009 8:37AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: OpEd, Reality-Free, Cougar Town, Modern Family
I've always heard that three out of four ain't bad. But if you're Kelsey Grammer, it's a whole different ball game. While there's been no word on the horrid
Hank, ABC has ordered
full season pick-ups for the rest of their Wednesday comedy block. At this point, I'd say that was inevitable. ABC's bold experiment of a whole new night of programming seems to have worked out.
Early buzz on
Modern Family particularly brought people to sample the wares, and luckily that show delivered.
The Middle has been impressive as well, and would probably fare even better if it switched places with
Cougar Town. Courteney Cox's latest vehicle is much better than I expected, but not up to the creative caliber of its lead-ins.
As for
Hank? Well, it is the only multi-camera comedy on the night, so it stands out a bit in that respect. Oh, and its derivative and lacking in any originality or, and this one can be a bit of a problem, comedy. So there's that to deal with as well.
Posted Oct 8th 2009 9:42AM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E03) Interesting trend with this show: The episode titles have so far been titles of Tom Petty songs. Take a look at the
names of the upcoming episodes and the pattern continues for the forseeable future. Wonder how long they can hold on to this convention, especially as linking the episode to a title of Petty song they haven't used before gets harder.
That's the best thing I can say about this episode, to be honest. This one was less funny than last week's episode, which was less funny than the pilot. At least last week's episode had some heartfelt emotion behind it, so the lack of laughs could be excused. But this episode didn't even have that, which made most of what was supposed to be funny fall flat.
Continue reading Cougar Town: Don't Do Me Like That
Posted Sep 30th 2009 10:01PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E02) I'll say this much about the second episode of
Cougar Town: It didn't make me laugh as much as the first did. But I feel a whole lot better about the show's future after seeing it.
Sometimes that happens, and it happens a lot with Bill Lawrence-led shows. Sometimes it's not wall-to-wall laughs, but the story is satisfying enough that you don't care. In this episode, we see some more humanity behind Jules and her quest to finally have a life even though she's in her forties... and we see the consequences of trying to pursue a life in your forties. We also got a little more out of Ellie than just the bitter wife we saw in the pilot. We also see the beginnings of a weird flirtation between Jules and Grayson that most people figured would happen from the first three minutes of the pilot.
Continue reading Cougar Town: Into the Great Wide Open
Posted Sep 24th 2009 11:01AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Celebrities, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
Some of you may think that TV Squad is filled with cheerleaders, that we all love TV so much that we rarely pull out our swords and skewer a show. Well, this should change your mind. I tuned in to
Cougar Town last night and, I have to say, I was appalled. I thought I had seen what is likely the worst sitcom of the season --
Accidentally on Purpose -- but
Cougar Town has surpassed it in badness.
Let me preface the rest of this criticism by saying that I was a loyal viewer of
Friends. I liked Bruce Springsteen's video
Dancing in the Dark.
Scream was a hoot! I've been following Courteney Cox's career for years and I think she's terrific. She's funny and pretty and self-deprecating. I went into
Cougar Town with high hopes. In other words, I have good will for Courteney Cox, like Jenna Elfman.
Continue reading The women of Cougar Town are obsessed with sex
Posted Sep 23rd 2009 10:01PM by Joel Keller
Filed under: OpEd, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
(S01E01) I have faith in
Bill Lawrence. I know that he's a guy who doesn't want to put out shows that are crap, and that if something he produces is crap (hello, sixth season of
Scrubs), he cops to it and vows to improve.
That being said, I really, really hope he has the time to work his magic on
Cougar Town. Because what I see from the pilot are the bones of a good show, but one that's going to need some time to develop.
I like the actors. I like the premise. There were a lot of funny lines. I even like the fact that Lawrence re-shot certain scenes to make them sound like they're from a more female point of view. But even in the pilot, you can see signs that this show can devolve into something more cartoonish than real, and right now it's a 50-50 shot that it'll do just that.
Continue reading Cougar Town: Pilot (series premiere)
Posted Sep 23rd 2009 11:04AM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Industry, Scrubs, Interviews, TCA Press Tour, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
Here's the full transcript from the phone interview I did with Bill Lawrence a couple of weeks ago... minus the part where we talked about
Scrubs. That's an interesting bit in and of itself, and I'll publish that in full sometime during the early part of October.
This goes on for about 5700 words, but if you hang in there, you'll find a lot of good conversation about
Cougar Town, the state of the sitcom, why Bill thinks NBC is shortsighted in its dependence on Jay Leno, and why Courteney Cox let him talk our ears off at the
Cougar Town TCA session.
You can either leave comments here or at the bottom of
the edited version.
Continue reading Bill Lawrence talks Cougar Town (full transcript)
Posted Sep 23rd 2009 11:04AM by Joel Keller
Filed under: Industry, Interviews, TCA Press Tour, Reality-Free, Cougar Town
A couple of weeks after I got
some Scrubs scoop from Bill Lawrence in Pasadena, I asked if we could talk by phone about his new show,
Cougar Town. The Courteney Cox-led show, which follows the travails of a forty-something Florida real estate agent and single mom as she tries to re-enter the dating world, starts tonight at 9 PM ET on ABC.
We talked a little more about
Scrubs (I'll print that in a few weeks), then about
Cougar Town. I opened with the fact that at the session he had for the show at the TCA press tour, he seemed to spend a lot of time defending the "noisy title" of the show.
The conversation ranged far and wide from that point, from what he thinks about the future of the multi-camera sitcom, why NBC's dependence on Jay Leno is shortsighted, why he's so outgoing to us press types, and why Courteney Cox let him talk everyone's ears off during the press tour session. You can read
the long but interesting full transcript if you're eager to find that stuff out. An edited version of the interview is after the jump.
Continue reading Bill Lawrence talks Cougar Town
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