9JKL

Loved Cliff Calley on The West Wing. Really loved Hank Lawson on Royal Pains. Not loving 9JKL, although Mark's charm and Linda Lavin's quintessential stereotype of the Jewish mother are occasionally fun, in a kind of cringe-moment way. Elliott Gould adds a sweet if bumbling touch as the henpecked dad.

But sad to say that this sit com is the kind of insult to intelligence that made me leave broadcast channel shows years ago. The brother and sister in law are superfluous. Not sure of the purpose for the door man, although the reality check kid is useful. It must be really hard to write good 22 minute comedy.

I'd much rather see Feuerstein bring his charm and humor to another hour long drama that has something significant to say. Sorry, Mark, this show just isn't worthy of your talents.

Okay, the sitcom is a work in progress. The show has potential especially with Elliott Gould and Linda Lavin as parents of adult sons in New York City. They all live in the same apartment building together in New York City. Josh returns home to New York City after living in Los Angeles, California. I'm watching the series for Lavin and Gould who are comic professionals. This series was based on Mark Feuerstein's own family life. Josh is a single man living alone. His brother, Andrew, is married to an Asian American pediatrician, Eve, with their baby son. The sitcom has great potential if they focus more on the parents.

The overly intrusive mother and interfering, judgmental family thing has been done to death and by actors who made it both funny and believable. Linda Lavin and Elliott Gould may be very nice people, but whoever cast them as the parents may not have actually read the script or attended the auditions.

From the effort being put in by the rest of the cast, I get the impression they've already concluded this thing is going nowhere.

I appreciate that the big three networks (NBC, CBS & ABC) are in an increasingly difficult position to produce unique and entertaining content. That said there are some shows, like 9JKL that are just bad. No sorry, its awful. Its plays on tired clichés, simply isn't remotely funny and is at times offensive. Sure there can be surprise hits but who watched the pilot of 9JKL and thought "wow, this is amazing, people will love it"?

No it won't get better with time because the basic premise of the show isn't original or funny. Its tired and hack.

I really wish Linda Lavin had a better project to be involved with. This is so beneath her, it's depressing.

The show itself comes across as if it was some high school student's creative writing project; every stupid, obvious, and tired joke possible gets deployed with painful results.

There are some series where you think, 'With a better cast/better writers, this could work." Not the case here. Skip it; probably won't be around much longer.