"Int. Chinatown" is a television show aimed at critiquing how television shows work, specifically cop dramas like "Law & Order," and more specifically how Asian-Americans are portrayed onscreen. Based on the book by Charles Yu, which was written in screenplay format for extra meta fun, "Int. Chinatown" is about a generic Asian background character, Willis Wu (Jimmy O. Yang), who decides to be something more. I never watched much of "Kevin Can F**k Himself," but this functions kinda similarly.
Willis works as a waiter with his best friend Fatty Choi (Ronny Chieng) for his Uncle Wong (Archie Kao) at a restaurant in Chinatown. He's close with his parents (Diana Lin, Tzi Ma), and has never gotten over the disappearance of his older brother Johnny (Chris Pang) twelve years ago. One day a detective named Lana Lee (Chloe Bennet) comes into the restaurant and into his life, spurring Willis to get involved in her case. However, neither of them can seem to get much attention from the lead detectives, Turner (Sullivan Jones) and Green (Lisa Gilroy), who always seem to be at the center of the action. Even the lighting gets more interesting whenever they show up. However, that won't stop Willis and Lana from digging into the mysteries of Chintatown, uncovering the conspiracy around Johnny's disappearance, and finding their way into the spotlight.
"Int. Chinatown" is not remotely subtle about what it's doing, which is to show how limited the depictions of Asian American on TV have been through a genre that everybody is familiar with. The episodes are even named after common roles for Asian actors like "Delivery Guy," and "Interpreter," as Willis figures out new ways to insert himself into the story, working his way toward leading man status. It's also constantly taking apart common police procedural tropes in the process. We get glimpses of the show that Willis is stuck in, called "Black & White: Impossible Crimes Unit," where the photogenic leads are constantly trading quips, the tech guy's job is to "enhance" everything, and of course there's a grumpy chief (Michael J. Harney) laying down the law. There are a lot of fun gags with framing and blocking to denote the different levels of reality, and pointing out things that make no sense, like everyone insisting that Lana is a "Chinatown expert." Eventually, the writers also take aim at old 70s and 80s action shows, and more modern prestige television too.
There's a lot to like here, but the execution hits some bumps. At ten episodes "Int. Chinatown" runs too long, and some of the concepts are messy. There's a subplot with Willis's mom becoming a realtor that feels like part of a different show. A whole episode is devoted to the super warped reality of advertisements, which never quite comes off right. There have also been several very good recent movies and shows about the Asian-American immigrant experience, like "Everything, Everywhere, All at Once" and "The Brothers Sun" so a lot of the Chinatown tropes that are being taken to task in "Int. Chinatown" feel very out of date. I'm also a little surprised that B.D. Wong's "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" psychiatrist character wasn't referenced at all, considering that he was one of the few Asian regulars in the genre. The material that tends to work better revolves around broader, more general cop show nonsense, like a throwaway line about having to specify that the orchestra violinist murder and the string quartet murder are two different murders.
However, Fatty inexplicably becoming a beloved celebrity because he's such a mean waiter is fantastic stuff. Ronnie Chieng frequently steals every scene that he's in. And I'm always glad to see Jimmy O. Yang in anything, because he's got such a terrific screen presence, and works well as a leading man in spite of his character actor looks. I haven't seen Chloe Bennet in anything since "Agents of SHIELD" either, and she's great here, especially when Lana starts going off the rails. As someone who watched a lot of cop dramas, and recall a lot of terrible Chinatown episodes, I came for the meta, but I stayed for the ensemble. It's always wonderful to find Asian actors like Diana Lim and Charles Pang who I wasn't familiar with before.
I doubt we'll get a second season, but I'm still rooting for one.
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