A truly awful new live-action laughtrack sitcom from producer Seth MacFarlane and writers Alec Sulkin & Wellesley Wild (the same fellows behind “Family Guy” and “Ted”), “Dads” wastes a terrific cast that includes Seth Green (“Radio Days,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”), Peter Riegert (“Animal House,” “Local Hero”), Martin Mull (“Fernwood 2 Night,” “Roseanne”) and Brenda Song (“The Suite Life,” “New Girl”).
“Dads” also stars Giovanni Ribisi (“Ted”), who in the 1980s starred in the much, much better (if similarly titled) Michael Jacobs sitcom “My Two Dads.” “My Two Dads” also starred Paul Reiser, who was to James Cameron’s “Aliens” what Ribisi was to James Cameron’s “Avatar.”
It’s about a pair of video game creators in their (very late) thirties who still live with their dads. The Mull dad is messy and still calls Asians “Orientals.” The Riegert dad isn’t gay but likes to kiss other men on lips.
There seems to be a lot of hubbub regarding the way the “Dads” pilot demeans women and Asians. I could not give a shit -- and I suspect 99.9999999% of women and Asians could not give a shit about how they’re portrayed in “Dads.”
As a comedy aficionado, however, I am wildly offended. There is not one remotely funny gag in the entire 22-minute pilot.
(For the record, this is not MacFarlane’s first fecal-fest of a live-action Fox sitcom; six years ago he was also behind “The Winner,” which was sort of the unfunny version of Fox’s “Get A Life.”)
... Dads is the new season at its worst: dated, cheaply provocative, and laboriously unfunny. …
... Material that is meant to be anarchic mostly comes across as obvious and boorish. …
... it's as if someone here thought that the problem with "S#*! My Dad Says" was that there wasn't two of everybody. …
The San Francisco Chronicle says:
... the worst new show of the season …
... The poor actors look like they’re serving mandatory sentences for the creators’ crimes of laziness. Grade: F …
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says:
... isn't at all funny. …
Fox recently decided to use all of the negative advance press for Seth MacFarlane’s “Dads” — and there is plenty of it — in its promotional campaign for the sitcom. The network includes quotes such as “Offensive,” “Reprehensible,” and “Morally Wrong” in an attempt to make the critics appear stuffy. The desired effect of the ad on viewers: “Well the show can’t be THAT bad.” Don’t fall for Fox’s gambit. The show isn’t exactly “reprehensible,” but it is definitely “tired,” “forced,” “predictable,” “lazy” — choose your own critical adjective that means “bad.” From the too-liberal use of the laugh track to the grumpy-old-men concept and the dusty jokes, “Dads” is a groaner. …
... this could be one of those once-in-a-decade debacles that all involved come to regret and struggle to excuse for the rest of their careers. …
... the exaggerated tumult the show engendered shouldn’t eclipse its general badness …
8 p.m. Tuesday. Fox.
