I am – Hercules!!

A six-episode HBO comedy from the “Foot Fist Way” team of writer-director Jody Hill, screenwriter Ben Best and writer-actor Danny McBride, “Eastbound & Down” follows a vulgar, racist, homophobic, narcissistic, dope-addled, deluded and tax-evading former major-league pitcher named Kenny Powers who finds himself reduced to serving as a P.E. coach.

Besides McBride (“Pineapple Express,” “Tropic Thunder”), the series stars John Hawkes (“Deadwood”), Jennifer Irwin (“Still Standing”), Katy Mixon (“Four Christmases”) and Andrew Daly (“Mad TV”).

It holds a handful of solid-gold gags, and a lot of waiting between solid-gold gags. McBride’s no Will Ferrell (who produces the show with “Anchorman”/“Talledega Nights”/”Step Brothers” co-writer-director Adam McKay) in the kind of role Ferrell practically trademarked, but I suppose there’s enough funny here in episode one to lure me (and, I suspect, other fans of “Flight of the Conchords”) back, especially since Ferrell himself is slated to guest-star in at least one upcoming episode.

USA Today says:

… a smug, ugly, wit-free comedy from Will Ferrell and friends that operates under the assumption that the audience is as stupid and vulgar as the show's characters. Prove that assumption wrong.…

Entertainment Weekly says:

… What lifts Eastbound & Down away from mere crudball humor is McBride's ongoing love affair with the lower middle class: He revels in getting all the details right, from his brother's cramped suburban house to the frowsy bar where Kenny drinks boilermakers in the front and hoovers coke in the back-room.…

The New York Times says:

… feels like a margarine, not butter, version of “Talladega Nights,” the Nascar reversal-of-fortune story in which the children were ingeniously named Walker and Texas Ranger, and the exchanges between Mr. Ferrell and John C. Reilly had an addicting improvisational madness. Comparatively, “Eastbound & Down” feels static. Unlike Ricky Bobby, Kenny shows no signs (at least not yet) of a turnaround, and it is unclear whether Mr. McBride could believably pull one off. Lacking Mr. Ferrell’s vulnerability, one that comes to a great extent from resembling an overgrown 10-year-old, Mr. McBride looks like someone you’d run away from in the parking lot of a Waffle House.

The Los Angeles Times says:

… I can't say the pilot struck me as especially funny, but there are good things and talented people in it, and it looks good. (Hill directed, and Best appears as Kenny's once-and-present drug buddy.) Perhaps I am just being old-fashioned, but I was disappointed by its tenuous relation to reality and the uneven respect it pays its characters. …

The Chicago Tribune says:

… Played by the wrong actor, Kenny could be someone you’d instantly hate, but Danny McBride (“Pineapple Express”), one of the creators of “Eastbound,” somehow makes this guy dementedly winning without glossing over his flaws. … Kenny’s outsize ego may get tiresome after a while; though I've only seen the first half-hour of "Eastbound & Down," I can't escape the feeling that it might have worked best as the first third of a comedic washed-up-athlete film. …

The Washington Post says:

… He's never lovable, he's barely tolerable, but many of the things he does and says are frighteningly recognizable. He's a kind of Everyjerk, and when a long day of blustering and cursing is done, he can be heard weeping pitifully in his bed. "Eastbound & Down" finds true triumph in utter failure.

The San Francisco Chronicle says:

… What HBO might find equally difficult with "Eastbound & Down" is overcoming the fact that the series is mostly stupid, frequently unfunny and covers for its lack of original comic material by dropping f-bombs all over the place. The notion that being daringly inappropriate at all times or shouting obscenities as loud and often as possible somehow makes "Eastbound & Down" cutting edge is misplaced. Anybody can do that. Is it funny? Sometimes - definitely. But the repetitive yahoo-centric situations hint that there are no other comedic layers here. Swearing, yelling and snark, with an unlikable main character - that's just "Deadwood" without the brilliance, nuance and originality. At this point, "Eastbound & Down" is a consciously lowbrow, one-note tirade. Maybe the five other episodes grow up? (HBO usually sends three or four episodes, so something seems amiss.)…

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says:

… The humor in "Eastbound" is a far cry from the cerebral comedy currently en vogue on shows like "The Office" and "30 Rock," but that doesn't mean "Eastbound" can't do sly humor that falls left of center. …

The Newark Star Ledger says:

… Kenny is so abrasive, so unapologetic in his cruelty, that it becomes almost as frustrating to watch him as it would be to live with him. … Maybe McBride has more pitches in his arsenal than he's shown so far, but the repertoire on display in "Eastbound & Down" feels too limited for a long stint on HBO's mound.

The Boston Globe says:

… falls into the grating category of totally obnoxious dude comedies, at least based on tomorrow night's premiere. Maybe the series, whose producers include Will Ferrell, will improve in coming episodes, but it's hard to see how.…

The Hollywood Reporter says:

… What's initially so sublimely hilarious about the series is its protagonist's utterly clueless refusal to conform to polite society, yet he's somehow likable -- lewd-crude hubris and all. Credit the performance of Danny McBride, a budding star who makes it clear in the premiere that he will spare no foul-mouthed rant or offensive diatribe in depicting an arrogant anti-hero of monumental self-delusion and hostility. …

Variety says:

… Perhaps sports fans are similarly pining for something to fill the emotional void left by "Arliss," but anyone holding HBO to a higher standard will signal for a reliever long before "Eastbound" reaches the bottom of the ninth. … Even with the promise of a Ferrell cameo in future episodes, it's a tired premise -- a more profane version of the kind of low-swinging sitcom that could easily have wound up on TBS. …

10:30 p.m. Sunday. HBO.