This show seems to suffer from not knowing what it's supposed to be. The first season started strong with a fresh and funny plot involving an alien masquerading as the town doctor while a murder mystery unfolds. The puns were clever, the characters were witty and charming. I think it hit its peak too early.
The show was at its strongest when we watched an Harry the alien adapt to a medical environment. I wish the writers had leaned into that more and kept it as part of the core story because that's where it really delivered laughs.
Instead, they quickly phased out the medical angle after the first few episodes and by episode 6 he wasn't even the town doctor anymore. That left writers struggling to justify the medical setting, diluting the story with a bunch of filler plot lines like vilifying adoption and making Asta look like a villain. I guess the adoption plot is intended to add emotional depth, but her biological child hasn't really had a bad life or suffered in any way, causing the story to fall flat. Incidentally it would behoove the writers to know adoption is not a bad thing and plenty of adopted children lead normal and happy lives.
So we finished out season 1 with an uneven mix of highs and lows. There were some incredible moments and some real stinkers.
That brings us to season 2, which feels like everything good about the series is gone. There was hardly anything fresh, funny, or memorable about the first few episodes. That brings us to this episode, which was the last for me.
Its core purpose is, I guess, is making some huge statement about feminism. Every other scene ends with a pun or a jab aimed at illustrating how it's terrible being a woman, everything is better/easier/more awesomer for men, and how the women of Patience, CO are apparently going to right all the wrongs of inequality with one night of drinking and celebrating sisterhood. Cool, cool, let me know how that turns out.
The alien plot line is barely existent, just a slight buzzing in the background as we watch Harry fumble through a couple of cringey and super forced interactions. Again, this show doesn't know what it's supposed to be. The characters aren't moving forward so much as they're just moving along.
If the point of this series was to make some landmark change to society, I'd say yay for that. But the plot is forced, the jokes aren't funny, and the series is barely recognizable from where it began. Even the characters don't really align with who they were in season 1. For example, we're treated to an ongoing gag about BDSM that was mildly humorous at first but has been dragged out and forced into almost every scene just to make the point that BDSM is, um, funny, I guess? It has nothing to do with the original story and feels very weird to see so much sex in a show that wasn't very sexual at all in the beginning.
I wish this show has reached its full potential, but I think the writers tried to do too many things all at once without much planning for the overall story and direction. This was the last episode for me. I have no interest in watching this show continue to go downhill.
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