The Grubbs

Dear Americans: Please stop remaking British comedies. You cannot do it. Your crass obvious method of delivering "jokes" cannot begin to hold a candle to the clever and witty understated humour that British television is renowned for. Every single American remake of a British show is trash, and this one is just another example of that. The Grimleys was a charming and witty show. The Grubbs is a crude ripoff. All-star casting cannot begin to make up for a complete lack of understanding of intelligent humour. And now that I have finally padded this review out to the ridiculous minimum character requirement, I end by saying this: Please just stop trying to remake British TV. You don't understand it, you can't compare to it, you do it an injustice and insult it by even trying.

The Grubbs are a poor family of under-achievers. Mike (Randy Quaid) is the father who is scamming insurance. Sophie (Carol Kane) is the mother. Jimmy (Brian Sites) is the older son. Mitch (Michael Cera) is the younger son who wants to do better. He has a crush on hot new English teacher Ms. Heather Krenetsky (Lori Rom). He gets bullied by PE teacher Coach Garra (Ricardo Chavira). Fellow student Cricket (Alexandra Krosney) has a crush on Mitch.

Fox was probably trying to do another Married with Children. This is most interesting to see a pre-Arrested Development Michael Cera. He is so young that his voice is higher. He is showing some star quality. In fact, he is the lead of the show. The rest of the cast is fine. More time would tell whether they are good together. I expect perfection from Carol Kane. Randy Quaid could annoy me. The hot teacher needs to do better with the slo-mo hot posing or just don't do it that way. This show got a lot of hate and canceled before it aired. For me, I see the potential especially with Michael Cera.