Delocated

You have to understand how extreme this show actually is. Their aesthetic is a wonderful reflection of reality television and the real world. Think of it like this. The deadpan humor is gonna be a lot funnier when you realize that sometimes, peoples grip on reality can be fractured. Jon is borderline insane, but comes off as a quirky character, due to the nature of the programming. But in reality, there are too many people who can't appreciate that attitude we see on reality TV in average real life situations, in which Jon is constantly finding himself in. Visiting his girlfriends house and meeting her family while still being "on" for the cameras, the embarrassment the people around him feel, and how it goes over time. In this situation, Jon's reality show really has no hope. It follows the wreckage something like witness relocation can wreak on a family, while be reminded of the surreal quality of television truly invading and exploiting the private lives of people. It's absolutely insane just how understated the insanity is. Because it's completely serious, that's the point. You just gotta be aware of the elements of the show, and how they carry each other to become an enriched fan of the show. But, at the same time, you can just lay back and let it carry you along without a thought and with it's dead pan delivery, contrasting characters, you'll find plenty of reasons to be entertained.

I went into this unaware of anything except for the title and the basic premise. After watching all 3 seasons (and the epilogue episode) I feel I can give a fair opinion of the show; for the most part, it sucked. Its problem seems to be that it wants to be random but only half tries most of the time. This is perhaps why Season 2 is the best, since it succeeds in gaining a great balance between dialogue, story, and being random but ultimately being cohesive (the best example of this, and the best episode overall, is Season 2 Episode 5 "Jon He Does It" AKA the prank episode). The end of the series is completely underwhelming and makes you question why you even watched this at all; the "reveal" of Jon's face and all of the events that come before it seem like an attempt to clear up as much of the story as possible, when story was never all that important (there are inconsistencies between episodes, whatever allows that week's story). I'm sure most people would have been happy to have left certain threads dangling, since that seemed to be the nature of the show established in the very first season (e.g. the unexplained changing of the characters who hang around Jon). It still gets a 6 out of me (which keeps flickering to a 5) because it does have genuinely funny parts and I feel that if I was more of a fan of reality television I would be laughing even more. It seems to rely on subverting the tropes of that genre as humour in and of itself far too often but the fans of reality shows are too busy watching the new Kardashian's Toddler Shore shows to bother with anything else so who are these jokes actually for?

I've watched all of season one 3 times, so I feel like I can safely review this series now. And you know what? I'm still laughing at something new with every episode.

This is truly a work of genius and is probably the funniest show currently on television. Just consistently mindblowing in every way! So loaded with jokes... the humor is very dry and probably isn't for most people, but there I moments where I almost cry from laughing so hard in EVERY SINGLE EPISODE. Can't say that for any other show currently on television.

Fake reality shows are not a new concept, and the look and concept and feel of the show might be a reason for most people to write it off without thinking twice. But trust me, give this one a look. It'll be a show people talk about in 10 years from now. A future classic...

High concept shows tend to appeal to a very narrow audience, but this one is so bizarre, it goes way beyond its very specialized formula.

What if a guy testified on behalf of the Federal Government against the Russian Mob? His family and he would get new identities, leave their friends, schools and jobs behind and go into the Witness Protection Program. That's the background story of this group.

But then, some documentary filmmakers decided to take these people out of the nameless and bland suburb they lived in and place them in a New York City loft, to have their lives taped and to watch what happens! Welcome to "Delocated," also referred to as "Delocated New York" (as if they might do other versions of this series in other cities).

"Jon" (played by Jon Glaser) is the man in question. His family: wife "Susan" (Nadia Dajani) and son "David" (Jacob Kogan) are extremely reluctant to leave the safety of their quiet life for the possibility of getting killed on the streets of New York by the Russians (these aren't their "real" names, hence the quotation marks).

In order for the filmmakers to shoot this documentary, for their safety, the family must wear ski masks any time they're on camera, which is basically all the time. And they had microchips implanted on their vocal cords to permanently alter the sound of their voices. But the trouble begins as soon as they arrive in NYC, when they find out that their "loft" was just a studio apartment! "Jon" is angered because he put his family in mortal danger so he could live in a cool loft and got this instead. And "Susan" immediately walks out with "David." Let the mayhem begin!

As noted, this is a high concept comedy, as the idea that someone in the witness protection program would suddenly be a TV star in, of all places, New York, is absolutely absurd. Of course, when his wife left, "Jon" gets suggested by his Fed Agent caretaker to start dating, just to add another layer of insanity to the proceedings!

Every episode has some unexpected twist, just like that, which takes the episode in a new and more cockeyed direction, and typically includes "Jon" having battles with the filmmakers or the network producing the show about some element that didn't go according to plan.

Glaser's constant deadpan reactions to how everything happens and the disasters that occur as a part of that day's filming only adds more laughs to the hilarity. I should also note that episodes run between 11 minutes and 22 minutes, so you can easily binge this in a day.

New York plays a part because where else would people find it perfectly normal for a guy in a ski mask to just be wandering around town, working at a copy shop or going on a date at a public park when it's warm enough to wear shirt sleeves. Oh, and being followed by a camera crew! It's great because there's a lot of location shooting all over town, so the show really feels like you're hanging out all over the city with "Jon" and the situations that he finds himself in are as freaky and as ridiculous as the show's original premise.

This series is a brilliant satire of the entire Reality genre and skewers a lot of the tropes that are commonly associated with shows of that type. It also features some surprising cameos and gets in some smacks on other shows.

But I'll be the first to tell you, this is definitely not for everyone.

This show is coming from the people to blame for Wondershowzen and Xavier: Renegade Angel. If you haven't seen those, maybe you want to check them out before trying to watch this.

The show is about somebody in witness protection on TV, which is obviously ridiculous. Being the only person walking around NYC in a ski mask with a voice-modulator at all times is pretty obvious. The show is goofy and absurd, obviously. I think he's voice sounds funny as hell the way it is, same thing with Xavier's voice, and sometimes that alone is enough to make me laugh.

If you aren't into this kind of stuff, then you're not, and you should stick to some laugh-tracked sitcom on ABC or something. Not as good as Wondershowzen or Xavier, but still a show worth watching.