Each week, I take a look back at a pilot from the 2011-12 season, first reviewed on my blog during that season. This week, I am looking at CBS's multi-cam utility comedy 2 Broke Girls!
The Details:
Premiered: September 19, 2011 on CBS
Starring: Kat Dennings, Beth Behrs, Garrett Morris, Jonathan Kite, Matthew Moy
Created by: Michael Patrick King and Whitney Cummings
What I Thought Then:
"These types of shows are all about chemistry and luckily the leads in this show have it."
"The two leads play off each other well and seem to already have natural timing with each other, which is sometimes difficult to do early on in sitcoms."
"They need to figure out something to do with Jonathan Kite as Oleg ASAP because his character didn't work at all."
"This has real potential to be the partner for How I Met Your Mother that CBS has been searching for for awhile."
What Others Said:
"The best new sitcom of the fall, CBS' 2 Broke Girls is rich in laughs and snappy performances." - Mark A. Perigard, Boston Herald
"Like many sitcoms, 2 Broke Girls stretches a little to set up the premise, but once it gets there we're sold, mainly because the two lead actresses are funny and endearing with great chemistry." - David Hinckley, New York Daily News
"The odd-couple pairing is one of the oldest ones in the TV playbook, and the two mismatched waitresses in 2 Broke are good company, at least in the show's initial outing." - Maureen Ryan, The Huffington Post
"Despite a diversionary opening salvo of post-feminist raunch and unfortunate racial stereotyping, 2 Broke Girls is a solid, old-fashioned sitcom about two mismatched girls taking on the big city and makin' their dreams come true." - Mary McNamara, Los Angeles Times
"It was half appealing, with strong chemistry between Kat Dennings and Beth Behrs, and half awful, with some egregiously clunky one-liners and borderline (or over the border) offensive ethnic caricatures." - James Poniewozik, Time Magazine
What I Think Now:
2 Broke Girls developed a reputation as one of those typical CBS sitcoms that was completely ignored by critics but had a decent following and a decent run even if no one would ever put it among the all time great sitcoms. I was curious to revisit this as I hadn't watched an episode of this show since I bailed on it sometime during the first season. I must admit the pilot wasn't as bad as I thought it might be on a re-watch. That's primarily due to Kat Dennings and Beth Behrs, who have instant chemistry with each other and seem to have a really good handle on their characters. Whenever those two were interacting in the pilot, it was enjoyable. Everything else was pretty rough. It was a bit crass but mostly it was just stock sitcom characters and situations. The actors weren't given very good material but also didn't do anything with the material they were given. Pilot episodes are comedies are hard but most of the time there can be glimmers of what is to come and this was clear that it wasn't going to rise above anything to be a great TV sitcom.
What Happened to the Show:
2 Broke Girls was one of the buzzier new comedies heading into the 2011-12 season because it was added to CBS's strong Monday lineup. It was given a preview premiere airing after Two and a Half Men's first post-Charlie Sheen episode. CBS knew that would be big which is why Girls got the preview slot. But no one could predict just how big it would be. Men delivered 28.7 million viewers and a 10.7 demo, numbers that were unheard of by 2010 (and of course now). It led into 2 Broke Girls, which debuted to 19.4 million viewers and a 7.1 demo, which were the best ratings for a sitcom premiere since 2001 at the time, and obviously nothing since has come close. Also despite the reputation it later developed, Girls didn't have bad reviews (66 on Metacritic) so hopes were soaring after the premiere. It settled into the 8:30pm slot between How I Met Your Mother and Two and a Half Men and continued to deliver solid numbers through the 2011-12 season. On the strength of that performance, CBS made the decision to give it the anchor slot sooner rather than later and it took over the Monday 9pm slot for Fall 2012. But this was a case where it just wasn't ready. The numbers were not strong enough to be an anchor show and CBS saw a slow decline on Mondays. While a decline on the night may have been inevitable, the beginning of the end of CBS's decades of comedy dominance on Mondays was accelerated by Girls just not being anchor worthy. It bounced around the schedule for four more years and always worked better as a utility player than an anchor but CBS never really found another permanent slot for it. The show also developed a reputation for being crass and stupid despite the more positive initial reviews. It finally left the airwaves with little fanfare in 2017 after six seasons and 138 episodes. It has since aired on TBS and in syndication but has never been a major player. Beth Behrs jumped over to another long-running multi-cam CBS sitcom with The Neighborhood, which ran from 2018-2026 while Kat Dennings also returned to multi-cam land with the still-running Shifting Gears on ABC (which will featured Behrs in a guest starring role this coming season).
Final Episode: April 17, 2017
Episode Count: 138
Where to Watch: The Roku Channel, available for purchase on DVD
I'm excited to be contributing to The TV Ratings Guide! You can read my regular work at Benjamonster's TV!
