Gary Unmarried

Gary Unmarried is pretty much business as usual, introducing us to a dude of simple pleasures.

I like Gary Unmarried. It’s like other sitcoms I’ve seen of late involving newly broken-up households (remember when the sitcom single dad was widowed instead of divorced?).

The show is funny enough, and the performers and setup are solid enough to hope CBS will give this working-class comedy a little time to work.

Mohr is too frantic, and Marshall is too harsh, but Ed Begley Jr. delights as a goofy therapist.

While they're entertaining together, the show needs other characters to avoid becoming just an endless exchange of the snarky things TV writers love to have exes say about each other.

Gary's uneven because it doesn't feel like a sitcom working for Mohr, but Mohr working for a sitcom.

There are funny moments here, mostly coming from Mohr's agitated rantings. But the laugh track is mighty intrusive, which detracts from the average jokes by throwing them in your face (or down your ear, as it were).

The performances, in and of themselves, range from solid (King's) to inspired (Marshall's)....But taken together, there is both too much and too little going on.

On the up side, some of the one-liners are quite funny. On the downside, a lot of the show just doesn't work no matter how hard Mohr works it.

Mohr knows how to deliver a sarcastic one-liner, the pilot has a few laughs and the characters are all likable. But despite modern references to things like "Second Life," the whole show comes across as a bit antiquated.

Mostly, though, Gary trades insults with his ex-wife (Paula Marshall, who really needs to stop jumping into the sack with uninspired series) and stammers toward the beautiful young woman (Jaime King) with whom he's in bed when the premiere begins. The prospects for transforming that slim premise into a satisfying show would seem less grim if those elements could survive a half-hour.

Their recently divorced characters have all the stereotypical sitcom tsuris, plus she's engaged to their marriage counselor--ho, ho--who turns out to be Ed Begley Jr., who actually is a little funny. As is Ryan Malgarini, who plays Gary's son, who at 14 is more confused about females than his dad. He's the best part of the show.

This sitcom may elicit a few laughs, but the premiere episode is pretty lackluster overall, with obvious punchlines and predictable characterizations.

There are errant laughs floating around, but for the most part Gary Unmarried is Gary Unfunny.

It's hard to enjoy characters in such dire need of a hard slapping.

The writing's not there, and neither is anyone who can play at the level of "Christine's" Julia Louis-Dreyfus.

Not at all intelligent, the show is pretty much immune to any form of legitimate criticism, and further, it will likely be gone within the first few weeks of this television season.

This is the kind of dull-witted, over-laugh-tracked, artificial sitcom that makes you wonder if the Hollywood honchos ever got the memo about the 21st century and all.

Ed Begley Jr shows a light touch as the ex-couple’s counselor, and not every joke on Gary Unmarried falls flat. But this show hinges on one’s ability to ignore its misogyny and on the limited appeal of Mohr.