BUY IT AT AMAZON: CLICK HERE!
STUDIO: Buena Vista
MSRP: $59.99
RATED: TV-14
RUNNING TIME: 1024 min.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
• Exclusive Unaired Episode With Introduction By Show Creator Dana Stevens
• Calling All Friends: The Story of What About Brian
• What About 3: The Season That Never Was
• Audio Commentaries by Writer/Director Dana Stevens
The Pitch
“So, what’s your new series about?"
"It’s about us… if none of us ever smoked pot."
The Humans
Meet Brian (Barry Watson), his best friend Adam (Matthew Davis) Adam’s fiancée Marjorie (Sarah Lancaster), his other best friend and business partner Dave (Rick Gomez), Dave’s wife Deena (Amanda Detmer), his big sister Nicole (Rosanna Arquette) and her husband Angelo (Raoul Bova). New Season Two regulars include Adam’s co-worker Jimmy (Jason George), Jimmy’s wife Ivy (Amanda Foreman) and, in spoilerish capacities, Natasha (Tiffani Theissen) and Laura (Jessica Szohr).
The Nutshell
A close-knit group of longtime friends with unlimited access to hairstyling products is down to one remaining bachelor. Is his single status to be pitied, envied, or exploited?
Option Two dominates, as the three couples are revealed to be less secure than they appear. Nicole is struggling to conceive a child and she’s getting tired of hearing the phrase ‘at your age’. Deena is worried that by getting hitched young and cranking out three kids she’s missed out on a world of opportunities, sexual and otherwise. And Marjorie? She’s got a case of the Felicitys, if you know what I mean.
The Lowdown
Speaking as the last singleton standing among my own peers, I can verify that there are many authentic aspects to this show. I’m the guy who’s available to help you move, watch your kids, listen to your relationship crap. Granted, I don’t bear a distracting resemblance to Sawyer from Lost. I don’t have a cool job designing video games or a house smack-dab on Santa Monica Beach. And the endless procession of astoundingly sexy-smart girlfriends? Only in my dreams.
Season One is only five episodes* but a lot of intrigue gets set in motion. While the show is at its best when the ‘grown-ups’ are taking Brian for granted, the overall narrative isn’t structured enough to make it the true focus. Ultimately, the strongest storyline is that of Dave and Deena. Ms. Detmer succeeds at the tricky job of making her character simultaneously immature and sympathetic, and when she proposes an ‘open marriage’, Mr. Gomez keeps us aware that the bewildered Dave only agrees to see other women out of unconditional love for her. In some ways, their awkward exercise in liberation recalls 1968’s Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice; Detmer’s resemblance to Dyan Cannon is striking in some scenes.
Season Two (episodes 6-24) gets off to a rough start due to some substantial retooling. There’s a new, utterly ordinary opening title sequence; there are some abrupt casting changes; a conventional ‘hangout’ setting is introduced; and melodrama is elevated at the expense of tone. Producer J.J. Abrams’ influence is obvious in the season premiere, with a signature out-of-nowhere car crash. There’s also some terribly lazy writing: What do you mean, we never told you Brian has a valid realtor’s license? What do you mean, Deena never mentioned her tarot-card-reading grandma before?
The style settles down and things pick up with the arrival of lovely recurring characters Heather (Rachelle LeFevre) and Bridget (Krista Allen), but the most satisfying subplot remains that of Dave and Deena.
Many veterans of other Bad Robot productions pop up, (along with several establishing shots of L.A., lifted from Alias). Oddly, no Greg Gunberg this time round.
The Package
Dana Stevens, the show’s creator, supplies audio commentary on the first and last episodes. She’s very articulate about what the show was trying to achieve and shares some valuable details about how the episodes were written and shot. The most important of the supplemental items is the unaired episode What Happens In Vegas, which would have been the Season One finale but was ditched in favor of Episode 5’s cliffhanger ending. I recommend watching it in that sequence, since it clarifies several plot points that are only briefly touched upon in Season Two. It also features some of the best-acted scenes in the series, including a great showcase for girlfriend du jour Bre Blair.
What with so many of the characters’ relationships in flux, this is the sort of show where it’s a bad idea to keep track of who is (or isn’t) billed in the opening credits or featured in the ‘previouslies’ from week to week. This extends to the box art: Think Brian’s blonde actress girlfriend (Stacy Keibler) could be The One? See her picture anywhere? Then guess again. Meanwhile, Ms. Theissen doesn’t appear until Episode 20 and yet there’s her face front and center on the cover. So you know she’s up to something.
*Six, actually. See above.