Mr. Sunshine

He's back! After the failing of Studio 60 a while back, it's good to have another show of Matthew Perry on TV. The show, though, is clearly not the same as Studio 60. Mr. Sunshine is a lot less serious, but has true potential to be something good. It was almost disappointing to find out the episode lasted only 20-something minutes, because up until now each episode left me wanting more. It was already a done deal when the intro (short, dry, funny) already made me laugh. Fingers crossed they will keep shooting and airing Mr. Sunshine, because it'll definitely brighten your day. Let's hope for more crazy events, dry humor and extravagant characters alternated with a hint of romance and yes, some heartwarming, touching scenes. So far, so good!

I watched this show only because of Matthew perry. He is really talented. and spontaneous. we can see a bit of chandler in his new character Ben. May be its because Matthew is a bit like chandler, so he cant get it out.

The pilot is good, but its like I have seen an entire season in just one episode. The characters, the story goes so fast, its like they are making an half-hour movie. So many things had happened in just one episode. Ben gets dumped, Roman meets his mother after a long time, Ben realizes that he is insecure and needs a commitment,... oh my god, its like going in a train, the trees disappear very fast and the journey is coming to an end. Mathew has to slow the story, so that people will get time to know the characters, connect with them and gradually enjoy the show.

Overall, its really nice to see Perry back and the show has a lot of potential. May be as the time grows, perry will grow in confidence and rock the show, like he did in Friends. ATB

If the rest of the episodes live up to pilot, Mr Sunshine will be a big hit. It is a smart comedy with dialogue reminiscent of some of the episodes of "West Wing". Allison Janney & Matthew Perry play off each other well and though Matthew Perry's character seems a little like, "Chandler - the Later Years", it's still very funny.

As with most ensemble comedies, it will take a little time to learn the characters and their individual personalities. I think this show has the potential to be a big hit and it is in an appropriate spot in the line-up at the present time, following 3 other hit comedies. Let's hope the network doesn't move it around to other time spots, as sometimes happens, before it has time to create its audience.

Ben Donovan (Matthew Perry) is the harried manager of a San Diego sports arena. Crystal (Allison Janney) is the crazed interfering owner. Alice (Andrea Anders) is the cute marketing director love interest.

The group could never get the laughs going. Matthew Perry tried his best. Most of the laughs come from Perry. He is basically a one-man band. The Friends curse continues with the cancellation of this show. It did not last more than 13 episodes. They probably only filmed that many because of Perry.

This was my favourite show from this past T.V. season and I really hope it gets picked up for next year. It's a sharp, well-written sitcom with great comedic performances by virtually the entire main cast. The premise revolves around Ben (Matthew Perry), who is the manager of a major sports arena in San Diego, and his off-beat staff members and wacky boss (Allison Janney).

Janney really sinks her teeth into this quasi-insane character, who, despite being the owner of the arena, delegates most of the work and responsibility to Ben. I really enjoyed the season-long arc involving her awkward and contrived attempts to be a better mom to her 20-something son and new employee, Roman (Nate Torrence), who seems to have been neglected by her and is just looking for a healthy mother-son relationship. Actually, I liked any scene or plot line which involved Roman. Torrence is hilarious and charming pretty much every time he appears on screen and gets a laughs from me simply through his delivery. I've read some people saying they find him obnoxious and don't like him, but I just can't understand why that is, because to me, he's my favourite character.

Even though the performances are great, I think the real star of this series is the writing. I just watched the 'Celebrity Tennis' episode on NETFLIX and I was laughing consistently throughout. You can't find a lot of new shows with scripts this smart and so densely packed with humour. However, I have a sense that it may not have mainstream appeal, since there didn't seem to be a lot of buzz and fanfare for it.

I really hope people discover it on NETFLIX (The first 8 episodes are currently available) and a fan-base starts to develop that is large enough to keep it going indefinitely on ABC. I also think ABC should have been airing more reruns of the first season this summer to give it a chance to catch on, and I really hope this does not indicate that they are giving up on it.

I encourage you to watch it if you can (start with the first episode just to get a sense of all the main plot lines and relationships) and decide for yourself if you think it's as good as I do. Note, however, that this is one of those sitcoms without a laugh-track, which is an important feature of this show since I just can't imagine it working as well with one.

Season Rating: 3.5 stars out of 4