The Other Two

I'm three episodes in and loving this show. Went in skeptical of (potentially too gimmicky) premise, but the writing is solid and the actors are fantastic. If you're a fan of Schitt's Creek like me, you'll probably like this, too. If strong pilot doesn't hook you, move on.

Chase Dubek aka Chase Dreams (Case Walker) is a 13-year-old social media phenom in the early stages of stardom. Mother Pat (Molly Shannon) is complicit in his attempt to achieve success. Chase's older siblings are the other two---Brooke (Helene Yorke), a former child dance student who dabbles poorly in real estate, and Cary (Drew Tarver), a waiter who wants to act. Their love lives are a mess and they long to achieve any goals they once envisioned.

The show is about dreams. Chase seemingly has the world at his feet---the tween world, at least. Brooke and Cary keep reaching for their dreams, but the world keeps dragging them back down. But their "dreams" are ill-defined (and mostly defined by others), having to do with social media "likes" and facial recognition.

And Chase is just a programmed cute-bot, the product of polls and momentary memes. He lives in a virtual world, with his mother and his manager, Streeter (Ken Marino), acting as interfaces with reality. He has no opinions of his own and shills for whatever is presented to him.

When I first started watching this series, I thought it was unfunny, focusing on shallow characters. But by the second episode, I knew it was an acerbic satire. By episode four, it was apparent that the writers (Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider) are talented and gifted with an eye for insights. In their vision, the key to success is a cryptic code in an absurd Kafkaesque nightmare. And self=esteem is something granted by other vacuous wannabes. The show is a send-up of pop culture, virtue signaling, the cult of celebrity, narcissism, and what might be called Hollywood culture.

I read a review of the series "A. P. Bio" in which the critic wondered how it could be executive produced by Lorne Michaels. Lorne Michaels is also EP of this series and has made a bold choice to back SNL writers Kelly and Schneider. Fortunately, the humor of this series exceeds the standards of SNL in recent years.

A brief wrap-up after each episode features the show runners and the actors in informal conversation, providing back stories and personal observations.

The main characters are hapless and mostly clueless, but I enjoy watching them. Though they are totally without haps or clues, they are not so much tragic figures as they are comic foils, and the actors are up to the task. Watch for some fun cameos and bit parts.

Chase Dreams (Case Walker) is a 13 year old boy who is becoming enormously popular in internet. Now his brother Cary (Drew Tarver) and his sister Brooke (Heléne Yorke) have to deal with being the other two in the family.

This is an excellent show. Better than I expected to be. I decided to watch it one day that I was pretty bored and I like the two first episodes, they are really fun and have a really good satire about the show business and how hard is to be a child star.

The acting is decent, good for a comedy, and the plot feels like it's always moving, a little bit slow but it's moving. The jokes are reasonably hilarious, I found myself laughing on most of the episodes, especially the third and fourth episodes.

The best part of the show is the satire of the show business; a lot of things may seem to be really familiar like the fact that Chase Dreams is a decent looking pre-teenager who sings cheesy romantic songs that only appeal to girls, or maybe you find quite familiar how a guy publishes means tweets and make his whole Instagram account to share those tweets, probably if you're like me, you will find very familiar how hot dudes are popular in Instagram just because they are really hot. This kind of things and more is what you're going to discover in this show.

Give it a try; it has 10 episodes and if you watch them together, they doesn't last more than 5 hours, probably less than that. The first season of this show gets 8 out of 10.

Some of the jokes are hit or miss, but when it hit, it really witty and hilarious. The pop culture commentary is somewhat smart without being too pretentious. And it's also weirdly good family drama series.

The writing is consistently strong, but The Other Two's strongest card comes in its casting, enlisting the aid of the ever-great Ken Marino as a sleazy agent, and Drew Taylor (a gay man himself) gives a non-stereotypical portrayal of homosexuality.