Three comedy shows you should be watching

This has been a particularly blah year for movies, and as pointed out in the previous post, the future’s not looking that much brighter, thanks to Hollywood’s sequel fever.  But fear not, fans of visual narrative – as long as you don’t hold your nose when the word “TV” is mentioned, you won’t lack for quality entertainment any time soon.  Everyone knows this is a golden age for TV drama – Sopranos, Mad Men, The Wire, Lost, etc. – but it’s also a boom time for smart comedies, as well.  Here are three hilarious shows that are criminally overlooked and under-promoted, in my humble opinion.  Forget those Criterion arthouse flicks on your queue –  they’re just going to take up space on your coffee table for months, anyway.  Bump these up to the top and thank me later.

Party Down

I never thought the Starz network would be responsible for the best new comedy show out right now, but there you go.  The show follows the exploits of a feckless catering company led by Ron, played by the inimitable Ken Marino (The State, Wet Hot American Summer).  Ron’s as ambitious and clueless as his employees are apathetic and bitter, and that sizable gap is fertile ground for comedy.  Each episode, we’re at a different client’s shindig -from young conservatives to Russian mobsters to George Takei – and wondering, once again, how this disaster on stilts keeps getting gigs. Here’s one of my favorite bits, with Jennifer Coolidge (filling in for Jane Lynch) doing a very poor job of mixing business and pleasure.

Eastbound and Down

For a while it looked like the talented Danny McBride might be forever relegated to such roles as Buddy at Party and Caucasian Crackhead. Even for comedy, he didn’t have what Hollywood considers leading man looks, to put it bluntly.  But thankfully, he’s found the perfect vehicle in HBO’s Eastbound and Down, the story of a washed up Major League pitcher on the down slope on his career.  Reduced to substitute teaching in his home town, he’s finding it hard – if not impossible – to shed his vulgar ways in front of the kids or tone down his sense of entitlement now that he’s no longer a celebrity.  Here he is giving a very NSFW introduction to his gym class.

Pulling

Explicitly designed by its creators as the anti-Sex and the City, this unbelievably bleak BBC series takes the shine off single life by piling one disaster after the other onto its self-destructive characters.  The series starts with the protagonist Sharon quitting her job and dumping her fiance the day before the wedding, fearful of a lifetime married to a boring dolt.  However, she soon learns how overrated singledom really is, and the bland comforts of a menial job and a dullard boyfriend start to look a whole lot more appealing given the alternatives.  Here’s a scene where the aforementioned ex-fiance, Karl, finds out what happens when insult meets injury while Sharon’s eternally desperate friend Louise stalks a customer from her cafe.  As usual on Pulling, things can always get worse.