Rooster: Season 1

There is a certain comedy-drama programming on Apple TV+ that seems to permeate their lineup. Even as I was watching Rooster, I was thinking about Shrinking. And then thought some more and was more convinced it was just a college version of Ted Lasso. And was only made aware that all three shows were creations of Bill Lawrence when I saw Rooster’s poster. But, yeah, that makes total sense. Though, unlike his other two shows, this is an HBO series, the home of the searing shame spiral and deep-seated cringe. This kind of low-stakes, twee version of life where there are challenges, sure, but those challenges are just mundane ones where the threats are more goofy than anything else and the speeches are always perfect and the hearts pure. That kind of sincerity and earnestness isn’t usually in HBO’s bag. But, this is a Bill Lawrence joint, where each main character has a rudimentary character flaw or situational quandry that they need to overcome, which are usually dispensed with in the first episode or two and then life just kind of cruises through little human interactions and occasional day-to-day drama that is generally resolved with very little lasting effects.

Even less than those other two programs, Rooster refuses to go there. To really investigate what is going on with Greg “Rooster” Russo (Steve Carell). Any drama with him or anyone else is super-surface and not at all probed. It has similar beats to these other kind-hearted comedies, but doesn’t even bother to give us any sort of backstory that we get with the main characters on Lawrence’s other programs. Greg’s an author of airport paperback thrillers starring a character named Rooster. He’s divorced from a seemingly very powerful business woman, Elizabeth (Connie Britton), and has a daughter, Katie (Charly Clive), who is a college professor at Ludlow College, where his ex-wife is a big donor and board member or something. Katie is married to another professor, Archie (Phil Dunster), who she is separated from and is struggling as Archie carries on with a young grad student, Sunny (Lauren Tsai). Greg is buddies with the college’s president, Walter (John C. McGinley), who basically manipulates / guilts him into taking a role as a visiting professor in creative writing, despite Greg never having attended college himself. He figures it would be a good way to keep an eye on his daughter, who he assumes is in a fragile state following her separation. That’s the gist of the whole thing.

Greg is characterized as an awkward introvert. Which I suppose Carrell plays well. He’s not 40-Year-Old Virgin level awkward, but his character does occasionally spout the wrong thing and get hauled before the college’s board to let him know he can’t say this or that to students. It’s a whole everything-is-so-politically-correct gag that presumably the writers think will appeal to us olds, but it’s a pretty tired joke at this point. We get it, the kids are super-sensitive snowflakes who take everything as a micro-agression, even though it’s clear Greg has no intention to be offensive or agro. Har har. This is the level of humor here. It doesn’t say anything. It doesn’t challenge anything. Hell, it’s mostly not even very funny. The whole series just kind of floats on this cloud of blah. Which, again, is surprising for an HBO series, which generally lean into trauma and shock. That’s prestige in the 2020s. Honestly, there is very little of that here. None of the characters are ever in true danger or challenged either ethically or morally. Nobody really grows or changes, nobody is in jeopardy. Maybe this is how these college-based shows go. Lucky Hank is like this. To some extent, so is The Chair. So are films like The Holdovers. But even compared to those like-for-like narratives, this one seemed soft and inconsequential. And not particularly cerebral. Honestly, I think this is supposed to be an elite college, but all the people there are kind of idiots. Especially our one “special case” student who nicknames Greg “Rooster” because he’s a fan of Greg’s low-brow Rooster novels — though he’s a kid who doesn’t really seem to read — and into whom Rooster pours his care and attention. Yes, he’s the son of an administor at the college and therefore gets to go at a significantly reduced cost, but the kid is a moron. As are his pack of friends. As is the son of the dufus town cop — who presumably also gets to go for a reduced fee because his dad is a local? Point being, there isn’t much consistency in terms of the perceived prestige or standing of this college, which is kind of at issue given it’s the workplace of everyone involved.

In general the cast is decent and does the best they can with the uneven and sometimes boring content. I would have liked a lot more Danielle Deadwyler, however. They set her up in the beginning as a key character and a possible love interest for Rooster, but her storyline kind of cul de sacs and she gets sidelined as a third stringer that pops in with some plot blips here and there. She’s great, and I really hope there’s a lot more of her and a lot less of Dunster’s upscaled Jamie Tart character from Ted Lasso. Honestly, he plays yet another egotistical, not-self-aware jackass Brit who the ladies find irresistible to the point they become mush-mouthed dummies themselves around him. Seriously, all these seemingly intelligent women and female students just fawn over this clearly awful person because he’s good looking and has a fancy accent, which feels just a wee bit misogynistic and anachronistic. And a tad insulting to us viewers to boot. But, hey, this is essentially a sitcom, so I shouldn’t be looking to it for modern societal morays. It’s really Carell’s show, of course, and he does his thing. It’s nice to see him back to playing the dufus-y nice guy again after having to watch him play the heel in The Four Seasons, Mountainhead and The Morning Show. That beard is doing a lot of work. But he is good at sappy. He is good at kind-hearted, sometimes mildly delightful content where can aw-shucks and bring his face to the edge of tears. That’s his sweet spot. There’s not a ton of that here, but when it comes up, Carell is a total pro. All this is to say that Rooster breaks absolutely no new ground, is functionally a piece of media that relies entirely on your feelings about the cast and generally does nothing above low-to-medium inspiration. It’s a middling entertainment with a few high points, but mostly it flatlines. I have a sneaking suspicion that season two will be this, but not even.