Listen Up

I've spent some time reading the comments on this site about "Listen Up." The show, although doing well rating wise, does not appear to be a favorite amongst IMDb users.

I think the show is a decent show. There are some great lines (i.e. "I had no idea this little hair could produce this much debris") among others. The show has good jokes. But it does lack something. One thing I can say is that if someone were to tell me what the first two episodes were about I wouldn't be able to provide the answer. The first two episodes haven't really been about anything. The daughter bans her father from her soccer games in episode 1. In episode 2 she defies him and gets more earring holes. These are not story lines with which to base an entire episode on. There's little substance there. The show doesn't have any meaning. Yes, comedies are supposed to be funny and are not to be mistaken for films that are supposed to inspire or deliver some great message. But there needs to be something.

"Seinfeld" didn't really have meaning either but the jokes centered around the little quirky things we do in our lives. This helped us relate. It made us interested. One of the better sitcoms we've had over recent years has been "Frasier" (mostly in its early years) but one thing that "Frasier" managed to do was to blend jokes with substance. Many episodes featured a serious conversation between characters that put life into perspective and revealed some truth. "Listen Up" has yet to provide something for us to grab onto. Each episode needs a conflict - one that can provide some humor but at the same time be resolved in the end such that Tony Kleinman learns something.

As for Jason Alexander and his acting thus far I have to say he's done a fine job. The little things he does is what makes his performance great - His pump of the fist when his son tells him that he's reading a book of zip codes for instance. The only thing I could perhaps fault him for is going into his yell voice too often and always with the same tone. But for the most part I have enjoyed his performance.

Everyone seems to be talking about how he's acting like George Constanza from "Seinfeld" and I'd have to say that he is. But this isn't necessarily a bad thing. Actors aren't generally supposed to act like a million different things. Actors are selling themselves. A director looks for a certain look, a certain quality in the actor's voice, and checks to see if the actor can act. Jason Alexander is Jason Alexander and he's going to be himself when he performs. He was cast to be the character he has always been. He's not a character actor. He's not going to seem like an entirely different person with each show or movie he is in.

I have watched all the "Listen Up" episodes to date. It started, as most TV sitcoms, rather slowly, but now the cast have hit their stride. The teenage son, Mickey, played by Will Rothhaar, has gradually become a main character of the ensemble cast. Rothhaar is a gifted comedian with truly inspired deadpan delivery. He's on his way to becoming a Major Talent, someday! The show's episodes are now well-crafted plots acted out by cast members who are really "clicking" together. In one recent episode, Mickey dated a girlfriend who turned out to be into Civil War Reenactment; she took him to Gettysburg in full 1860's regalia, and when he walked into the room dressed as a Confederate soldier, I nearly fell out of my recliner laughing. The look on his face was perfect! The boyfriend who can't believe he's really doing this for his girlfriend. Every show is a gem, now. Watch "Listen Up!" regularly and you'll find yourself becoming a delighted fan.

I'm a sports guy and I watch ESPN rather regularly, including Kornheiser on PTI. I also was a HUGE Seinfeld fan. So naturally, I thought this would be a show worth watching. Boy, was I wrong. "Tony" is one of the most wimpiest characters ever created next to Screech from Saved by the Bell and Mark from Step by Step. His character and his relationship with his daughter really give parenting a bad name. This show pretty much follows the new age mantra of "don't punish your kids, listen to what they have to say" BS. In one episode, Tony punishes her daughter only to feel - you guessed it - bad about it. So he tries to find ways to reward her so he wouldn't have to go through with the punishment. My God!

It seems they are really only trying to develop two characters in this show, Tony and his daughter. The "son" has a handful of lines in each episode and is portrayed as semi-retarded or highly addicted to the wacky weed. The mother hardly says a word and seems overly passive towards her kids. If someone was walking down the street and saw this group of people together, they wouldn't think they were a family. The show hardly talks about sports (Gee, wouldn't you think that a show based on a sports writer would have something to do with sports). I give this show the rest of the season and then the Axe. Side note: The opening credits sequence....LAME. Feels like something out of the 80's.

Let's say you own a hot dog stand. You hire this jerk to make hot dogs. He burns them all day long. For every customer, he turns the dog into charcoal when he tries to grill it. This goes on for a while, and nobody buys hot dogs. So you fire the jerk. Next day the jerk comes back, you re-hire him, and he starts burning hot dogs again. You lose a lot of money. The cycle repeats itself. This is how the networks run their business.

The sit com has been dead for years. The genre is just not funny anymore.It has run its course. Yet every year, the networks trot em out again, and lose more money. Jason Alexander was only funny in 'Seinfeld' because he was an unlikeable jerk. In anything else, hes just an....unlikeable jerk not in 'Seinfeld'. Hes got no warmth, no comic talent, no timing, no appeal. Yet this is what, the second or third attempt they've tried to use him to snatch some sort of audience? When are these execs gonna stop burning their dogs?

I watched this show for 30 straight extraordinarily dull minutes and didn't even grin. not once. I didn't smirk. I didn't breathe heavy. It was so dull it wasn't even embarrassing. I give it possibly 2 more weeks. The grill is on fire again.

Every single episode that I have seen has made me laugh out loud, even when I'm at home alone watching the show. The writing is witty, charming and deals with situations that most people can relate with. The dynamics in Tony's family are well thought out as well- Jason Alexander plays a perfect Tony- who is lovable, funny, charming and a bit of the underdog- we always want to root for him. Malcolm-Jamal Warner is a perfect match for Jason. Malcolm has attitude and humor that keeps me coming back for more as well. I LOVE the flashback scenes! I love getting the insight into the life of Young Tony who seems to have experienced some pretty pathetic situations as a kid. This show is fun, clean and allows our entire family to share some great laughs without us(as parents)feeling nervous about the content that our kids might be seeing.