Split up Perfect Couples



Olivia Munn is funny as the oblivious 'perfect wife' in a fake perfect marriage to apparent alcoholic husband

 Yet another sitcom about a group of married couples, the new NBC series is headed toward the same fate as all those before them. I’ll admit I laughed during the course of the debut episode, but it has some serious issues that keep it from being something you’ve gotta watch.

The new comedy series is filled with funny writing and the ladies who play the wives are fantastic in the show, particularly Olivia Munn, who is absolutely adorable as the one trying to be the perfect wife (Leigh) in a perfect marriage in a relationship which appears to have some real issues beneath its faux surface. Problem is, the ladies, which should also include the workplace assistant Isabella for two of the lifelong buddy guys, are only half the show.

The other half falls completely flat. The characters Dave (Kyle Bornheimer) and Rex (Hayes MacArthur) have no personality or presence while David Walton (Vance) only adds slight value in his quirky, handsome appearance but is really only reprising the same kind of dull portrayal of what should be a good character that he did in the short-lived 100 Questions. You would think the NBC executives would have learned considering that show was also on their network less than a year ago.

I give Perfect Couples credit for trying to be edgy and going further into questionable content areas. But because it is on network television it falls a bit short, especially in comparison to a show like The League on FX or the British sitcom Coupling that ran from 2000-04 and is the funniest show I have seen revolving around the lives and relationships of 20-30 year old friends and couples without kids. I’ve seen shows try to replicate this over and over and they always fail because they never have a good core premise and/or cast the wrong talent. The League is a brilliant show because the premise is not about couples, but about the fantasy football league. The quirks of the couples are the offshoot of the league.

Maybe it is just me because I am not married, but I don’t see this show lasting very long.

Side Comment on 100 Questions: I actually kind of liked the show despite Walton’s performance in the lead male role. It was a show about a woman who was in the midst of a dating company interview for a matchmaking profile and was recounting stories from her life to the interviewer. Unfortunately the interviewer was an over-stereotyped gay African American man, but the comedy between the lead and her friends was quite funny. I liked the lead actress Sophie Winkleman, but the huge mistake NBC made though was the character was British. While I had no issue with that, especially since she was funny, you just can’t make the central character foreign in a sitcom about friends in New York. Just does not work.