14 Best TV Shows Similar to Fawlty Towers
Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears
So it’s fairly obvious that the first two seasons of The Bear had a whole birth/death thing going on. The show opens in the aftermath of the shocking and abrupt suicide of Mikey Berzotto (John Bernthal), and the first season charts the slow, inevitable death of his restaurant, The Beef, under the stewardship of his little brother Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and best friend Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach). The second follows the birth of The Bear, the new restaurant that rises from the ashes of The Beef, as well as the blossoming of many of its employees from a sloppy blue-collar crew to a careful, refined, highly efficient team. And Carmy flirted with birthing a life outside the kitchen through his relationship with old-flame-from-back-in-the-day Claire (Molly Gordon). But while the first season ended in pretty unambiguous triumph when Carmy, Richie, and the rest of the Beef staff were suddenly flush with cash and a plan for the future, season two ends on a significantly darker note. The Bear manages to open its doors on time and have a successful opening night, but Carmy’s relationships with Richie and Claire are in tatters—casualties of Carmy’s rage and anxiety. There was a kind of dry run for the catastrophe that closed the end of season two near the end of the first. Carmy loses his shit, breaks a bunch of stuff, yells, and alienates pretty much everyone. But the final episode brought them all back together, stronger than ever. Carmy is what George Costanza would describe as a “delicate genius,” ferociously gifted but intense and unpredictable. To work with him is to warm yourself by the raging fire of his mind while trying to avoid getting burned by the constant sparks and flares that burst from it. “THE BEAR” — “Tomorrow” — Season 3, Episode 1 (Airs Thursday, June 27th) — Pictured: Jeremy Allen White as Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto. CR: FX. The show did an elegant job pacing Carmy’s assholeishness with revelations about his past home and professional life. He grew up in a single-parent home with an alcoholic, mentally unwell mother, prone to fits of rage and depression. He worked under a monstrously critical chef while he was coming up, who criticized and undermined everything he did. These revelations are for the audience, not necessarily the other characters in the show. So when Carmy melts down in a fit of panic and self-loathing on opening night, we know it’s informed by his hyper-tense childhood and abusive mentor. But the people who work under him don’t. Some know parts, but no one knows everything. And it’s harder for them to understand.Now we come to season three, and the completely reasonable expectation is that it will open much like season one closed. Having learned a valuable lesson, Carmy will gather the crew back together, apologize, and things will return to normal in the kitchen. Oh, it might take a little longer for some of them to come around than others, but everything will work itself out. Except it doesn’t. Because while the first two seasons were concerned with birth and death, the third is a lot more about life. And the thing about life is that it’s its own thing, separate from birth and death. They’re related, obviously, but life is also a distinct thing in ways that birth and death are not. Continue Reading →
Tires
After six about 20-minute episodes of the Shane Gillis-Steve Gerben-created sitcom Tires, one can begin to understand why Netflix would want to work with him. He has a certain charisma and some acting chops. In one scene during the first episode, Gillis’ character, also named Shane, tries to snow a very unhappy reporter. In the sequence, Gillis has to convey to the audience that he doesn’t mean a word he’s saying and is using the moment to humiliate his boss and cousin Will (Gerben) while playing authentic convincingly enough that one can see why the reporter might fall for it. It’s not an easy lift, but Gillis makes it work. The story is fine enough for a hangout comedy. Will is a failure whose father owns several tire stores. Either as punishment or because it’s where he can do the least harm, Dad has exiled Will to manage one of the two lowest-performing branches of the chain. Physically slight and coded as a kind of nerd, Will doesn’t fit in with the mechanics, including their seeming ringleader, Shane. To save the shop and his job and earn his dad’s affection, he spends every episode of a “marketing” idea that derails spectacularly. Catch a glimpse of Steve Gerben. (Netflix) The bad news is that, despite a sound enough premise, everything the show says or tries has the shape of jokes without actually including a laugh line. It’s the essence of humor without any of the pesky chuckles. Continue Reading →
One Day at a Time
Netflix’s new romance limited series offers a thoughtful, warm adaptation of the 2009 novel. The hook of author David Nicholls’ 2009 novel is irresistible. Readers catch up with two former classmates who are something more than friends but not quite lovers on the same day, July 19, every year from 1988 to 2008. It’s no wonder it has managed two adaptations in the 15 years since its release—first as a 2011 movie directed by Lone Scherfig from a script by Nicholls himself and now as a limited series created by Nicole Taylor, with only one Nicholls’ script among the fourteen episodes. Dexter Mayhew (Leo Woodall) is handsome, charismatic, and just rich enough not to worry about making a plan for his future. Emma Morley (Ambika Mod) is also quite attractive—although she can’t (or won’t) see it—and from a working-class background that makes her feel as though she can’t pursue her clear goal for the future: to become a writer. They travel in different circles, but on the night of graduation, they end up falling into her bed. While they kiss plenty, it never goes further, Emma preferring to chat despite her massive and evident crush on Dexter. Continue Reading →
Hazbin Hotel
Messy writing keeps this solid cast from shepherding Hotel to strong Yelp scores. Hazbin Hotel is not for me. That is not a bad thing. If every piece of media appealed to everyone, the homogeneity would be stifling. I can see the appeal of a big, bombastic, gleefully violent, heart-on-its-sleeve musical cartoon for grown-ups (heck, I've enjoyed my fair share of them)—I just don't click with the show's ice-pop made-of-blood aesthetic, and I'm not a huge show-tune guy. Acknowledging the disconnect between the show's vibe and my personal tastes, as a critic, I have two primary takeaways from Hazbin Hotel's first four episodes: In terms of animation and voicework, Hazbin Hotel is solid—and Keith David's turn as the burnt-out bartending demon Husk is a standout among a game cast. In terms of writing, Hazbin Hotel is a mess, awkwardly careening between silly and dramatic without precision—most noticeably when it delves into the horrific life of one of its lead players. Hazbin Hotel's aesthetic is built on contrasts—primarily between series heroine Charlie Morningstar (Erika Henningsen)'s deliberate good cheer, bright smiles, and crayon drawings and the continual viciousness of Hell and most of its denizens. Visually, the cast (both the show's core ensemble and the wider community of Hell) is expressive and distinct. Hell's assorted players and agents are united across factions by the frequent use of red and black either alone or in concert in costume design. Each faction, in turn, has its own visual signifiers—the staff and residents of the Hotel tend towards a hybrid of casual and professional wear, while a powerful gangster clique goes all in on decadence. Heaven's murderous, brotastic angels, meanwhile, opt for a more uniform style. Continue Reading →
Frasier
When Frasier premiered in the fall of 1993 it had massive shoes to fill. That's probably an understatement. Its parent show, Cheers, was a critical and commercial monster in a way that can only happen when there are only three shows for two hundred million people to choose from. It was nominated for almost two hundred Emmys over the course of its eleven-year run, and its series finale aired to 90 million people (40% of the country’s then population) three months before Frasier’s start. So yeah, expectations were pretty high, and Frasier ended up pretty much meeting them all. While never as popular as Cheers (nothing has been as popular as Cheers since Cheers), it was nevertheless a solid commercial hit that carved out its own identity and won more Emmys than its parent show over the course of its own eleven-year run. A lot of that success was rooted in Frasier’s ability as its own, independent show with its own characters and rhythms instead of being Cheers 2.0. Continue Reading →
The Golden Girls
In 1983, a group of crooks broke into a vault at the Heathrow International Trading Estate in London, patrolled by Brink’s Mat security conglomeration. The Brinks company was already famous for a famous robbery, one that was carried out in the '50s in the North End in Boston, an incident that turned into a charmingly strange movie by William Friedkin in 1978. Continue Reading →
Minx
At the end of Minx’s first season, setbacks and rivalries split the Bottom Dollar team apart. Doug (Jake Johnson) and Tina (Idara Victor) still have the company but no Minx or resources to print the magazines they retain. Joyce (Ophelia Lovibond) has the Minx name and rights plus centerfold towards Jack of All Trades Bambi (Jessica Lowe) and photographer Richie (Oscar Montoya). Continue Reading →
American Auto
The network sitcom, much like the American auto industry, is a dying breed in fields looking to modernize and capitalize on newer, flashier models. NBC’s new American Auto sadly won’t revitalize either one. It's a two-dimensional sitcom that follows an inept CEO (Ana Gasteyer) as she attempts to shake up a Detriot auto manufacturer Payne motors. Continue Reading →
Head of the Class
Remember when the Saved by the Bell reboot hit small screens? How it stunned critics and viewers alike by being a delightful, intelligent show? One that managed to both send up its previous incarnation and deliver the goods in its own right? Head of the Class is the show we were all anticipating. Continue Reading →
Jellystone!
The small, fictional town of Jellystone is like other close-knit communities across America. It’s quaint, charming, and filled with jittery citizens on the edge of a nervous breakdown. HBO Max brings back the beloved characters of Hanna-Barbera (the first since their deaths in the 2000s) for a newer, more anxious generation with, an animated show that’s as hilarious as it is self-aware. Continue Reading →
Ted Lasso
Eleven months ago, nearly exactly to the day, I first fell in love with Ted Lasso—the show and, I suppose, the man too. As several people, including myself, have proclaimed, it seemed the perfect show for a population battered by the isolation and fear of what felt like a possibly endless pandemic at the time and, for Americans especially, the ugliness of a looming election. Lasso proved the wonderful good-hearted surprise so many of us were so in need of. Continue Reading →
Mythic Quest
In a perfect world, every sitcom would have a first season that never sees the light of day. That’s because it usually takes a season for the actors to grow comfortable in their characters’ skins, and for the show’s writers to fine-tune the dynamics of the ensemble into something compelling. The new season of Apple TV+’s Mythic Quest is a perfect example of a show finding itself after taking ten episodes to figure things out. Continue Reading →
Nickname Pine Leaf
Ralph’s stubbornness becomes a liability, and Jack finds a sympathetic ear in a disappointingly below par episode. Warning: don’t read until you’ve seen the episode! At what point does folding one’s arms and refusing to give in start to become actively harmful? Ralph’s noble pursuit of truth and logic despite the increasing weirdness of the Peterson case is now hindering the investigation, while Glory’s refusal to pull up stakes and leave town is causing her needless pain. Both of them are unwittingly setting up a veritable banquet for the The Grief Eater in “In the Pines, In the Pines,” a shorter than normal episode written by mystery author Dennis Lehane (Mystic River, Shutter Island) that feels a bit like filler. It’s the morning after Holly’s disastrous presentation, and no one really knows what to do next. Though Ralph (Ben Mendelsohn) told Yunis (Yul Vazquez) that he was going to return to “real police shit” in the ongoing investigation, he mostly just wanders around his house in a troubled fog. Jeannie (Mare Winningham) is so shaken by the discovery that her nighttime visitor was real that she’s gotten rid of the chair it was sitting in, to which Ralph reacts to his with his usual, slightly condescending harrumphing. It’s unclear at this point if Ralph is troubled because he thinks there might be some truth to what Holly’s saying, or because the only person left on his side is Howard (Bill Camp), who, being the Maitland Family’s attorney, is technically his adversary. Continue Reading →