I had a feeling I wouldn't like it, but I wanted to give McMillan & Wife a try. The title sounds cute, and really, that's all it is. Cute, with a lot of fluff. Nothing of substance. I might be a female, but I love gritty, intense, and even somewhat frightening crime thrillers. With all of the kissing, hugging, and goo goo eyeing Rock Hudson and Susan Saint James do, it gives off the vibe of a chick flick. Any story that focuses heavily on the characters' romantic relationship gets boring for me. Perhaps it's because of the generation I'm from. People nowadays aren't placing a ton of importance on getting married. There has to be other aspects to the story besides love to hold my attention. Although Rock Hudson (Stuart "Mac" McMillan) played a police commissioner in San Francisco, there was little to no suspense. And that might've been due to his dorky wife, Sally, an amateur detective, helping him with solving the cases. I was expecting her character to be, well, I don't know, more attractive and mature. She reminded me of a nerd. While they were somewhat passable as a couple, the longer you looked at them, it didn't look realistic for them to be together. Rock Hudson was 46, and she was 25, so no wonder she looked more like his daughter than his wife. He was 21 when she was born, so he technically could've been her father. That only shows how dated this is - a man who's in a relationship with a woman who's basically a kid compared to him. Him being gay in real life had nothing to do with why they didn't look right as a couple. It's just that the substantial age difference was obvious, even before I searched for their DOBs (at first I was like hmm, maybe Rock Hudson wasn't that old but just looked old. With the type of lifestyle celebrities live - spending long hours shooting films and/or TV shows, doing interviews, going to parties, and sometimes not getting enough sleep - that's possible). They don't quite look like the sexy couple that they were trying to portray.
I didn't even make it to end of the pilot episode. The acting was unimpressive. The conversations weren't believable (when they're in a traffic jam, Stuart tells his chauffer 'I know I had to go to work, and I know you had to take me, but why did we bring the car.' No one talks like that). The dialogue was also risque for its time. But watching it from a 21st century perspective, it just sounded dumb. Sally telling Stuart on the phone that she wanted to tear off his clothes, knowing other people were around. Stuart talking to Sally while she was taking a shower and telling her he didn't have any underwear, because he tore his last pair when they got stuck in his zipper (I think it was implied he was zipping up his pants after having finished going to the bathroom. That's what it sounded like to me). Before they leave for an auction, he tells her he's going upstairs to put on swim trunks, then he says he can't walk around with no underwear and laughs. When a script is bawdy, that's enough for me to know I'm not in for anything special. The innuendos weren't clever. Just seemed more or less like they were trying to make something where there wasn't anything. And some people think Mannix is lame. This went back and forth between either being a yawnfest, or just totally awkward.
I didn't even make it to end of the pilot episode. The acting was unimpressive. The conversations weren't believable (when they're in a traffic jam, Stuart tells his chauffer 'I know I had to go to work, and I know you had to take me, but why did we bring the car.' No one talks like that). The dialogue was also risque for its time. But watching it from a 21st century perspective, it just sounded dumb. Sally telling Stuart on the phone that she wanted to tear off his clothes, knowing other people were around. Stuart talking to Sally while she was taking a shower and telling her he didn't have any underwear, because he tore his last pair when they got stuck in his zipper (I think it was implied he was zipping up his pants after having finished going to the bathroom. That's what it sounded like to me). Before they leave for an auction, he tells her he's going upstairs to put on swim trunks, then he says he can't walk around with no underwear and laughs. When a script is bawdy, that's enough for me to know I'm not in for anything special. The innuendos weren't clever. Just seemed more or less like they were trying to make something where there wasn't anything. And some people think Mannix is lame. This went back and forth between either being a yawnfest, or just totally awkward.