The Great Indoors

It's a different take on an old concept - generations collide, etc. But, face it, it's current. It's something that a lot of us over age 30 have to deal with - changing technologies and we wonder how in the heck we're supposed to stay up to speed with them. Heck, I'm an IT guy - and have been for 20+ years. I LOVE technology. I've explored new stuff, though usually on the back-end. (The servers that host the stuff, the networks that keep them connected, etc.) But, I don't tweet. *gasp*

The characters are fun, the concepts don't go all that deep, but it's some lighthearted fare that is good for some laughs. I've found myself laughing out loud at some of the jokes, and Joel McHale is rocking it.

I wanted to like this, I really tried, but it's impossible. Joel McHale was hilarious and incredible witty in both "Community" and as presenter of E!'s "The Soup". Why he accepted to star in this incredible dim-witted show is beyond me. The premise of the show is that McHale plays a former outdoor reporter, who now has to work in an office with a bunch of pampered millennials. Yes, it's the old, stillborn sitcom idea: the generation gap. So a typical joke would be that Joel (who is 40something, I guess), has no idea how to use an iPhone (cue to canned laughter) and then Christopher Mintz-Plasse (30something?) helps him out. Now, isn't that funny? Hell, NO! And then there is veteran Britishcomedian Stephen Fry. He plays Joel's boss. And, like him, is completely wasted on this show. I have no idea what leverage CBS used to blackmail them into this stale sitcom, but it must be something punishable by death sentence, because anything less would be the better option.

After reading the other reviews on here I'm apparently the only person who thinks this show is hilarious. I'll just start by saying I'm an Gen X person and yes they make quite a bit of fun of our generation. That being said, they also make fun of millennial's as well. Of course they use stereotypes for both, but they make fun of each generation pretty equally. The premise of the show is about a outdoors adventurer type that is forced to work in an office setting with a bunch of people very much his junior. The humor is simple and this show isn't a thinker, it's a "turn off your brain and laugh" show. It seems most people disagree with me, but I like it.

There are certain comedic concepts that lazy joke writers love. These involve things like mothers-in-law warring with daughters-in-law or residents of Alabama trailer parks marrying their sisters. They require no cleverness or originality, just a knowledge of how such jokes are structured and the ability to recall previous jokes and change them around a little.

The Great Indoors is a show that always goes for the easy, obvious laugh. It's the sort of show that, even when you do laugh - which happens rarely - you don't enjoy the laugh that much, because you've already laughed at that joke hundreds of times before.

The premise is simple. A macho, outdoorsy writer is forced to take an office job amongst callow millennials. He teaches them something about "real life" and they teach himself about the "modern world."

The first thing I find odd about this series is that the clueless old guy is a Gen-Xer. I know a lot of Gen-Xers, and many live on their iPhones, texting and tweeting and posting selfies on Instagram. I feel the character is more like a Baby Boomer; it would make a lot more sense if the part was played by Robert DeNiro. Although I'm a Baby Boomer and look, I'm using the Internet!

The portrayal of Millenials makes me think of elderly comedians on stage going, "man, these kids today with their podcasts and their hip-hop, what's up with them?" It's as though the series is written by aliens who have simply read some joke books but have never actually met any humans.

This is not to say that there aren't young people are technologically adept but a little clueless, or that there aren't fortysomethings who lives have not intersected much with technology. The problem is not showing such characters, but in acting as though these characters aren't individuals but are rather generational archetypes.

I was ready to give up after one episode, but then I happened to see that a couple of people on the IMDb message board for this series said that episode 2 was so much better. This turned out to be untrue; perhaps it was the writers trying to save their show. If so, they put more work into IMDb than they did in writing their jokes.

Joel McHale sporting the same beard from his final season (and hopefully a movie) of Community and the great Stephen Fry are the two best reasons to watch out for this series in the coming weeks.......Being a guy born in the early 1990's I have always been thrown between the need to identify myself either as a Millennial or to be a part of the Gen X....So this series is perfect for me but for others looking solely for comic relief it still hasn't reached its stride yet....The characters are your basic stereotypes with modern influences so no one really stands out....But its refreshing to have a varied cast of people portraying these characters.....Also the female lead seems to be just a pretty face.....With just 2 episodes in no one can predict this series's fate but we can all recognize its potential...Hope the creators use the talent at hand well...P.S. This series at least has some hope when compared to other CBS duds this season....