For the first of two NBC pilot reviews this week (next up: Bionic Woman) I’m going to eviscerate Chuck.
Let’s begin.
I didn’t plan on watching this show; in fact I planned on avoiding it outright when I first saw the cheesy “he’s the secret, she’s the agent” tagline in the most recent issue of EGM. Yet as I sat down on my couch at 8:00, Klosterman essay collection in hand to wait for the Heroes premier I found myself drawn to the concept of a so bad it’s funny TV show.
There’s no doubt in my mind that Chuck is the mutated love child of a PR meeting gone wrong. That fact really doesn’t surprise me; NBC hasn’t been doing too well ratings wise in the past couple of years. Heroes was their breakout hit of last year, but they also sunk a good bit of change into Aaron Sorkin’s Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip; a show that absolutely bombed in the ratings; so I can’t really blame NBC for wanting to get a few more viewers tuning into their channel for something other than Heroes on Monday nights. What I can blame them for is trying to draw in an audience with a creatively bankrupt concept that reads like the recipe for a primetime TV hash.
Hot chick? Check.
Absurdly simple espionage plot? Check
Goofy yet relatable main character? Check.
The show also fails to find success in the area of dialogue; an area that is inarguably the greatest draw for a sitcom. Chuck simply does nothing unique as far as speech is concerned, instead relying on cliché lines of conversation and a far too predictable lines that can be completed by a viewer after only a few words.
So Chuck is bad, by far the worst hour of television I’ve sat through this year. However it really is one of those “so bad it’s funny” shows: if you can appreciate that kind of thing then go ahead, you’ll get a laugh.
