Work It: "Pilot" Review

Advance Review: Welcome to the absolute end of civilization.

Apparently if you've ever written for the hit NBC series Friends, like Work It creators Andrew Reich and Ted Cohen, you're now an untouchable monster who can throw whatever pigs*** you want up on the screen. I joked with some folks early on, after initially watching the pilot for ABC's abysmal sitcom Work It last summer, that this show was on the air because someone high up on the TV food chain either won a bet against someone who loves television or lost a bet against someone who hates it. Now, after re-watching the pilot again (I have my own masochistic issues, btw) I can firmly say, without fear of contradiction, that this series has damning apocalyptic undertones.

As the first property (that I could find) to get a perfect "0" score from IGN since 1998's controversial Olympic Hockey Nagano '98 review, Work It is hyperbole-proof. I cannot over-emphasize enough how much this show is a freakish, insulting abomination. It thuggishly offends on so many levels that it's hard to even remain clear-headed enough to piece together a simple review of an episode that deals with two men who dress like women to get jobs.

Being a bit of a launch pad for Tom Hanks and (to a lesser launching extent) Peter Scolari, Bosom Buddies is a fondly (?) remembered goof of an 80's sitcom that featured Hanks and Scolari dressing up like gals to live cheaply in a "females-only" hotel. It's not classic TV by any stretch of the term, but many will say that Hanks gave a flashy enough performance for him to stand out and "elevate" the material; base "gender slapstick" material which is now semi-forgiven because it was 30 years ago. ABC will argue that Work It merely honors that show and that crude tradition, but what they're leaving out of the hype is that Work It will also make you want to go travel in time and execute the person, or people, who invented broadcast entertainment.

Here's the rundown: Lee (Benjamin Koldyke) is an idiot who's been out of work for an entire year, having been laid off from his job as a Pontiac salesman. His wife is hot and, in the grand tradition of lazy comedy, tolerates Lee to the point of sainthood. Lee's friends Angel (Amaury Nolasco) and Brian (John Caparulo) are also out of work. Brian is a complete idiot and for some reason (possibly due to the same supernatural enchantment that allows Lee's wife to remain in the same room with Lee without stabbing him in the neck) Lee and Angel are friends with him and consider the things he says to be true. Like when Brian comes in and says that the real problem with the world is that jobs are only hiring women now. Not men. Because it's a "mancession." Because the village doofus says so.

Now I'll touch a bit up on what's personally offensive. Yes, having been raised by an overly-sensitive, feminist mother (and hey, my great, great grandmother was Lucretia Mott too) who reacts poorly to anything she deems to be "anti-women," I have to tell you that her displeasure with "drag" has rubbed off on me. Not drag as in "Drag Queens" who are a different phenomenon entirely, but men dressing up as women for comedy as part of a TV show or movie where the worldly identity of a woman is so minuscule that all it takes to become a woman is to dress up in women's clothes, wear make-up and speak in a higher octave. As if to say that's all a woman is. And that's all you need to do to be readily accepted as one.

And yes, as a fan of Monty Python, Kids in the Hall and other troupes that often had their male performers play the roles of women, there is a bit of a fine dotted-line here. Mostly having to do with the quality of the material itself and the act of playing the role of the woman in a sketch and not have that be the joke.

I have indeed now become a maniac over a dumb, basement-level sitcom, but I told you at the top of this thing that this show wasn't just terrible, it was hazardous. I know that some of you out there will want to check this show out in a sort of "it sounds so bad it might be good" way, but let me be clear: This show is so bad it will suck the love out of your heart.

• Lee and Angel have an "If I'm working, you're working" pact. Meaning that whoever gets a job first will then, somehow, get the other one a job by, I dunno, pulling it straight out of their ass. Oh, and let's not forget that Lee and Angel both had completely different jobs before they got laid off. Offensive to: People who think
  
  
• After being out of work for a year, Lee still has too much pride to take a menial customer service job. Represented here by "AstroTaco." Because serving food is more demeaning than being able to support your family. Offensive to: Anyone with a family or anyone who has ever worked in a customer service job
  
  
• Lee and Angel, as obvious it is that they are both large masculine looking males, are instantly recognized as women when they put on wigs and makeup. Yes, this is the part of the show you just have to "go with" if you want to buy the entire premise, but I still stand by the fact that it's asinine and s***ty. Offensive to: Anyone who enjoys "good things"
  
  
• Lee and Angel walk down the hallways, in their new jobs as Pharmaceutical Sales Reps, to Destiny's Child's "Bootylicious." Offensive to: People of Earth, Jesus, Children of Destiny
  
  
• Even though this Pharmaceutical Company is, for some reason, only looking for female sales reps, which is illegally discriminatory, Lee, while posing as a woman, impresses the female boss by being the smartest woman that had thus far interviewed for the position. "Most of the girls who interview here think that clinical trials are those things Lindsey Lohan has to go to." So women are idiots. And the smartest woman is... a man. Offensive to: Women, anyone who has ever known or loved a woman, your mom

I would probably have to say that the only good thing to come out of this show is that it, momentarily, employed people; writers, actors, production crew, etc. Giving them money to spend on food and shelter for their families. Still though, if the people who worked on this series had half the pride that Lee and Angel had, they would have taken a job at AstroTaco instead, cleaning the hilariously "dirtied-with-Mexican fast food diarrhea" bathrooms with honor, knowing that they were providing a much better service for the world.

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Work It premieres Tuesday, January 3rd on ABC. Please don't watch it.


Matt Fowler is an Editor of IGN TV. You can follow him on Twitter at @MattIGN.

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