God's Favorite Idiot: Season One
June 27, 2022 12:00 PM - Season 1 (Full Season) - Subscribe
Clark (Ben Falcone) is an IT guy. He's also starting to glow. He might be a key player in the Apocalypse.
Do you like Melissa McCarthy's whole thing, generally? Because this is a Melissa McCarthy thing. Eight episodes, streaming on Netflix.
Falcone and McCarthy’s creative partnership makes a crystalline case for allowing someone from outside the family into the making of art; together, their work is slackly paced and meagerly plotted. -- Variety
Melissa McCarthy, Ben Falcone, and Leslie Bibb are all great, but shouldn't a show about God's big message to Her people have more to say? -- AV Club
The authentic chemistry between the actor and her co-star husband elevates these apocalyptic hijinks to a higher plane … if not all the way to heaven -- The Guardian
Do you like Melissa McCarthy's whole thing, generally? Because this is a Melissa McCarthy thing. Eight episodes, streaming on Netflix.
Falcone and McCarthy’s creative partnership makes a crystalline case for allowing someone from outside the family into the making of art; together, their work is slackly paced and meagerly plotted. -- Variety
Melissa McCarthy, Ben Falcone, and Leslie Bibb are all great, but shouldn't a show about God's big message to Her people have more to say? -- AV Club
The authentic chemistry between the actor and her co-star husband elevates these apocalyptic hijinks to a higher plane … if not all the way to heaven -- The Guardian
It's cute and quirky. Falcone is really good in it; I like McCarthy generally, but here she whipsaws between personas a bit too much for me. Leslie Bibb has a lot of fun, and may be the most enjoyable performance. The rest of the cast is fine, but they aren't given much to do besides be the quirky characters from a workplace comedy that are suddenly faced with existential questions.
It has nothing too insightful, profound, or even challenging to say, really, and that's the weakness here...Falcone plays the mild-mannered, kind, gentle Clark really really well but there's no potency behind his message - I get the sense he was picked because this show's version of God seems equally milquetoast. The "miracles" happen when its convenient for the plot, but there's never any follow up to them - the pastor who whipped everyone up against Clark seems to have a change of heart when Clark displays insight into his trauma and speaks in tongues, but there's no real sense of awe or transformation or even repentance; the reporter similarly just suddenly believes in Clark despite getting knocked cold and missing out on everything that Clark does.
Maybe there's an eventual point the show will make about how good can fight back - but it is doing a lot of meandering to get there. Feels like there was a chance to take some risks here and go after some ideas the way the Good Place did, but somebody got cold feet. In all honesty, I think just having a workplace comedy but with one of the coworkers being a verifiable prophet, forget the whole war in heaven, could have been mined for more than what this is doing.
Read somewhere that Netflix is holding off picking up the remaining episodes until they see how this first half does. I enjoyed the first couple of episodes enough to stick this batch out, but at this point I don't feel like there's anything really happening that would be worth coming back for.
posted by nubs at 11:09 AM on June 28, 2022
It has nothing too insightful, profound, or even challenging to say, really, and that's the weakness here...Falcone plays the mild-mannered, kind, gentle Clark really really well but there's no potency behind his message - I get the sense he was picked because this show's version of God seems equally milquetoast. The "miracles" happen when its convenient for the plot, but there's never any follow up to them - the pastor who whipped everyone up against Clark seems to have a change of heart when Clark displays insight into his trauma and speaks in tongues, but there's no real sense of awe or transformation or even repentance; the reporter similarly just suddenly believes in Clark despite getting knocked cold and missing out on everything that Clark does.
Maybe there's an eventual point the show will make about how good can fight back - but it is doing a lot of meandering to get there. Feels like there was a chance to take some risks here and go after some ideas the way the Good Place did, but somebody got cold feet. In all honesty, I think just having a workplace comedy but with one of the coworkers being a verifiable prophet, forget the whole war in heaven, could have been mined for more than what this is doing.
Read somewhere that Netflix is holding off picking up the remaining episodes until they see how this first half does. I enjoyed the first couple of episodes enough to stick this batch out, but at this point I don't feel like there's anything really happening that would be worth coming back for.
posted by nubs at 11:09 AM on June 28, 2022
I’m a few episodes in and it’s kinda fun..? I don’t actually care that much about the God stuff but I like the office people. Mostly I’m in it for her outfits. The vintage ties alone are worth it!!
posted by exceptinsects at 9:32 PM on August 9, 2022
posted by exceptinsects at 9:32 PM on August 9, 2022
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It's cute, it's quirky, it's not horrible, I will finish it. If you are a McCarthy and Falcone fan, you will like it.
posted by rozcakj at 8:03 AM on June 28, 2022