"Go On" and "The New Normal"

I watched two episodes each of NBC's new Tuesday night comedies, "Go On" and "The New Normal," which premiered a few weeks ago. Both are single camera shows, have some promising characters in them, and display a lot of potential to do more interesting things.

First up, "Go On," the latest attempt to put Matthew Perry back on television. It's clear why NBC keeps trying, because Perry's slightly caustic everyman schtick still works, and he does a great job of distracting from the weaker parts of the show. Perry plays a radio sportscaster named Ryan King, whose wife has just died in an accident. His boss Steven (John Cho) orders him to go to counseling, and Ryan ends up in a support group for people going through major life changes headed by Lauren (Laura Bernanti), whose touchy-feely methods Ryan can't help but clash with.

I've heard some comparisons of "Go On" to "Community," with Perry in the Jeff Winger role, but right now the assorted, multicultural members of the support group are far broader and more caricatured than the Greendale study group. There's a tough lesbian lawyer (Julie White), a blind, elderly African-American man (Bill Cobbs), a plump girl getting over the loss of her cat (Sarah Baker), an Asian brown-noser (Suzy Nakamura), a middle aged woman who only speaks Spanish (Tonita Castro), and Mr. K (Brett Gellman), a the too-obvious weirdo. More subtle characters like Danny (Seth Morris), who is dealing with his wife's infidelity, and Owen (Tyler James Williams), a reticent younger guy, whose brother is in a coma, haven't made much of an impression yet.

I expect that most of these characters will settle down eventually as we learn more about them, but it's going to be a real balancing act to keep the show from being too sarcastic or too cloying. The first two episodes were pleasant and watchable with some clever ideas, but it was hard to get a grasp of how the ensemble is shaping up since we're still getting to know the players and how they relate to each other. I think that once the show stops leaning so heavily on Matthew Perry and explores how some of the other characters interact with each other, it'll be in a better place. However, a lot of the second episode was devoted to Ryan's assistant Carrie (Allison Miller), who I'm guessing is his second major potential love interest after Lauren, so this may take longer than expected. It's really wait and see for now with "Go On."

"The New Normal" is much stronger from the outset. A gay couple, level-headed doctor David (Justin Bartha), and raging fashionista Bryan (Andrew Rannells) have decided to have a baby together. They hire a young mother named Goldie (Georgia King), recently broken up with a cheating louse of a husband, Clay (Jayson Blair), to be their baby's surrogate. Goldie and her adorable little daughter Shania (Bebe Wood) find themselves becoming part of a new family unit with David and Bryan. However, Goldie's grandmother Jane (Ellen Barkin) is horrified by Goldie's unconventional new choices and is determined to get her back together with Clay, or at least away from the influence of her new employers.

You can tell Ryan Murphy of "Glee" is behind "The New Normal," because David is clearly a grown up Kurt Hummel, and Jane is an older and more obviously bigoted Sue Sylvester. However, the dynamics are very different, particularly without the school setting or the musical numbers, and it is fascinating to get such a different perspective on pregnancy and parenting when there are two fathers in the mix and a woman who is carrying the baby purely for monetary reasons. The show establishes its major relationships very quickly and very efficiently, giving us plenty of reasons to root for David and Bryan to become new parents, and for Goldie and Shania to get their fresh start.

I expected Ellen Barkin to be the highlight of the cast, and she's great, but Andrew Rannells and Georgia King are growing on me very quickly. I was worried that Rannells was playing up Bryan as too much of a gay stereotype, but he's consistently funny and he's being used well so far. Various conservative and religious groups are not happy with "The New Normal" for its supposed immorality, but the irony is that the show is more family oriented than anything else I've seen this year. There's constant talk of getting ready for new responsibilities with the baby, forging new family ties, and even David and Bryan's attempt to go clubbing ends in a renewed commitment to happy domesticity.

The best part is that the show is very open-ended and could go in a lot of different directions once the baby is born. A few additions to the cast, and this could easily morph into something bigger and more complex like "Modern Family." But I'm getting ahead of things. So far so good, and of the new sitcoms I've seen so far, this is the best of the lot.
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