This season's standout new half-hour comedy, The Knights of Prosperity, finally arrives tonight at 9 on ABC. It's a smart, single camera show about a group of blue collar guys (and one attractive woman) who decide to improve their status by robbing a celebrity. In the pilot they set their sites on Mick Jagger (who plays himself in very funny segments throughout tonight's episode).
If the series had premiered last year as originally planned it would've been one of my top picks for Fall TV, but the network decided to hold off until midseason. At the time I thought that might be a good move, but it's possible Knights could've benefited from the Dancing with the Stars lead in that Ted Danson's Help Me Help You squandered. Now Knights goes out with According to Jim as a lead-in...the differences couldn't be more striking.
Knights stars vaguely familiar TV faces like Donal Logue, Sofia Vergara and Lenny Venito but their credits are not as important as the chemistry they develop as an ensemble. Each of the six characters is well defined, unique and smartly cast. One of the show's most immediately appealing traits is the lack of cookie-cutter casting.
The writing and direction for the pilot are equally sharp. It's impossible to say if the show will sustain its heist-driven concept, but the writing and cast chemistry should make Knights a welcome addition to the quality TV comedy landscape.
If you miss tonight's premiere you can still catch it on ABC.com tomorrow.
Knights is paired with another new comedy, In Case of Emergency. I haven't seen it, but I hear it's not so good.
Showing posts with label The Knights of Prosperity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Knights of Prosperity. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Looking forward to fall
I don't like writing about pilots for the broadcast networks' new fall shows so early for two reasons: first because the early pilots networks send out aren't always reflective of what will actually air (things can still be recut, reshot, recast or otherwise reworked) and secondly because not that many people have access to them and they won't actually air until September. So I'll save the detailed posts for later, but I've been looking for something good to mention here lately and a couple of the pilots I've seen so far definitely fit the bill.
They're not, however, either of NBC's heavily-hyped-by-entertainment-media Saturday Night Live-inspired "backstage" shows. I like the one by the woman who actually wrote for SNL a little better than the one by the guy who (for some completely unfathomable reason) wishes he had. But they both have strengths and weaknesses. Together they might make for a great show, but separately they're both too TV-focused to actually be interesting and simply not creative enough to stand out beyond their concepts and pedigrees. In other words neither one really leaves me wanting more.
At least that's one problem that another new NBC show, Heroes, doesn't have. The average-Joes-discover-they're-superheroes hour is derivative of Lost in a lot of ways, but unlike last season's glut of convoluted supernatural mystery offerings this one only borrows concepts from Lost that are well suited to a TV drama. If it maintains a strong emphasis on its characters (and improves its writing a bit) Heroes may even turn out to be better (less frustrating) than the hit island saga.
But we have to switch networks to cover the best of what I've seen so far. Three new shows from ABC suggest the network is looking to corner the market on TV's most involving, and best looking, series. According to Jim is going to look even worse on a network where everything else looks like a mini-movie, if the pilots for Betty the Ugly, Let's Rob... and Notes from the Underbelly are any indication. Yes two of them have terrible titles (and a case could be made that Let's Rob... is pretty bad too) but they're all interesting, well done shows that make the whole pilot thing look easy. Even though anyone who's ever watched TV knows it's anything but.
Notes is the least special of the three and suffers from an unfortunate lack of chemistry between its leads, and I don't expect it to be around very long, but it still looks and feels so much better than we have any right to expect from network TV. For most networks it would probably be a standout effort, but not here.
Especially because both Betty and Rob are so extremely good. They could be the best pilots of the season, but it's too soon for me to say (there's nine more shows to watch from ABC alone). Like the best pilots these two immediately place you in their world, establish a strong, distinctive tone and introduce you to characters you want to keep watching. Both have casts that immediately click (with very strong leads in America Ferrera and Donal Logue, respectively) and, very important since both are comedies, both have genuine laugh-out-loud moments (especially Rob).
It's still a long way till September, but in the network TV world it's never too early for hype. And these two deserve it.
So again:
Betty the Ugly
and
Let's Rob...
They're not, however, either of NBC's heavily-hyped-by-entertainment-media Saturday Night Live-inspired "backstage" shows. I like the one by the woman who actually wrote for SNL a little better than the one by the guy who (for some completely unfathomable reason) wishes he had. But they both have strengths and weaknesses. Together they might make for a great show, but separately they're both too TV-focused to actually be interesting and simply not creative enough to stand out beyond their concepts and pedigrees. In other words neither one really leaves me wanting more.
At least that's one problem that another new NBC show, Heroes, doesn't have. The average-Joes-discover-they're-superheroes hour is derivative of Lost in a lot of ways, but unlike last season's glut of convoluted supernatural mystery offerings this one only borrows concepts from Lost that are well suited to a TV drama. If it maintains a strong emphasis on its characters (and improves its writing a bit) Heroes may even turn out to be better (less frustrating) than the hit island saga.
But we have to switch networks to cover the best of what I've seen so far. Three new shows from ABC suggest the network is looking to corner the market on TV's most involving, and best looking, series. According to Jim is going to look even worse on a network where everything else looks like a mini-movie, if the pilots for Betty the Ugly, Let's Rob... and Notes from the Underbelly are any indication. Yes two of them have terrible titles (and a case could be made that Let's Rob... is pretty bad too) but they're all interesting, well done shows that make the whole pilot thing look easy. Even though anyone who's ever watched TV knows it's anything but.
Notes is the least special of the three and suffers from an unfortunate lack of chemistry between its leads, and I don't expect it to be around very long, but it still looks and feels so much better than we have any right to expect from network TV. For most networks it would probably be a standout effort, but not here.
Especially because both Betty and Rob are so extremely good. They could be the best pilots of the season, but it's too soon for me to say (there's nine more shows to watch from ABC alone). Like the best pilots these two immediately place you in their world, establish a strong, distinctive tone and introduce you to characters you want to keep watching. Both have casts that immediately click (with very strong leads in America Ferrera and Donal Logue, respectively) and, very important since both are comedies, both have genuine laugh-out-loud moments (especially Rob).
It's still a long way till September, but in the network TV world it's never too early for hype. And these two deserve it.
So again:
Betty the Ugly
and
Let's Rob...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)