Quick 'N Dirty Review: Parenthood

Before we start, here's a quick look at the rating system that we use here at The Dirtywhirl:

100-95 - Classic Show; (In best Bill O'Reilly voice) "WE'LL DO IT LIVE!!"
94-85 - Upper Echelon Show; You Should DVR This And Watch It The Same Night
84-75 - Very, Very Good; You Should Make An Effort To Watch This Within A Few Days Of Airing
74-65 - Not Bad At All; Let These Shows Pile Up On Your DVR But Watch 'Em Eventually
64-55 - Fold The Laundry While You Watch These
54-0 - Don't Waste Your Time; You're Smarter Than This (Probably) 

Now... onto the review:

Parenthood

2010 has not been kind to NBC. The Jay Leno Show was a debacle of historic proportions and the ridiculously clumsy way that the no-talent, big-jawed Leno (thanks for the characterization, David Letterman) was reinstalled as the host of The Tonight Show left the network with a metric shitton of bad press. Due to their boneheaded decision to not only hand over 20% of their primetime slate to Leno's trainwreck but then abandon it after five months, NBC was left scrambling to fill out their schedule post-Lenogate. Enter the latest iteration of Parenthood.

Originally a 1989 Ron Howard dramedy starring Steve Martin (and very young versions of Keanu Reeves and Joaquin Phoenix), Parenthood was adapted for TV in 1990 and starred the before-they-were-famous Leonardo DiCaprio, David Arquette, and Thora Birch but the series was cancelled shortly after debuting so, combining NBC's woes with an idea that already failed on television wouldn't really be a recipe for success, would it? So, how does Parenthood Version 3.0 come off? Pretty well, actually.

Boasting an impressive cast of TV veterans including Peter Krause (Sports Night, Six Feet Under), Lauren Graham (Gilmore Girls), and Craig T. Nelson (Coach) and helmed by showrunner/producer Jason Katims (Friday Night Lights), Parenthood follows the ins and outs in the lives of the Braverman clan, a Northern California family whose closeness is rivaled only by its neuroses. Imagine Brothers And Sisters were it not so soapy and histrionic. Krause and Graham play grown siblings Adam and Sarah Braverman, along with Dax Shepard (Idiocracy) as younger brother Crosby Braverman and Erika Christensen (Traffic) as youngest sister Julia Braverman-Graham, all of whom are dealing with issues with their own children. Krause's eight-year-old son has just been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, Graham and her teenage children have just moved back in with her mother (Bonnie Bedelia, Die Hard) and father (Nelson), Shepard is dealing with the five-year-old son he just found out he had, and Christensen is balancing being a working mother with spending enough time with her preschool-aged daughter.

One of the biggest things that Parenthood has in its favor thus far is its cast. Krause does solid work as a father struggling to help his son with a problem that there seem to be few answers for even if the character of Adam Braverman does seem to be drawn a little too perfectly four episodes into the series' run. It is encouraging, though, that the show is treating the Asperger's storyline as carefully as it is as Asperger's is a disease that needs more attention, but Parenthood isn't using it in a sensationalistic manner. The way that Krause and his wife (played by Monica Potter, Boston Legal) deal with their son's diagnosis cuts to the bone of any parent.

Graham was a late addition to the cast when the original portrayer of Sarah Braverman, Maura Tierney (ER) had to bow out due to her battle with breast cancer. Tierney is a more than capable actress and, while the circumstances of her exit were unfortunate, I'm a big fan of having Lauren Graham back on my TV. It would have been very easy for her to fall back into her old Lorelai Gilmore single mother beats, but it's to her credit as an actress that she embodies Sarah as a completely new kind of wounded character than Lorelai, not to mention that the mother/daughter dynamic in Parenthood could not be more different from the Gilmore Girls relationship.

On the downside, Shepard's and Christensen's storylines have been skippable and add to the grab-bag nature of the show. Half of the storylines are interesting and half of them are forgettable but, with an ensemble this talented (and a network this desperate for programming) the show is going to receive a decent amount of slack. The cast does have amazing chemistry early on which adds an intangible element to a series like this, but the producers do need to find a less contrived way to get the extended family all in one place at the same time as every episode seems to have some kind of forced family get-together. Parenthood, through its first four episodes, isn't quite what I'd hoped it would be but because of its cast, I'll keep watching at least through the end of the first season. And, really, can NBC ask for anything more at this point?

Dirty Rating: 72/100

Parenthood On Hulu