As a retro multi-cam series, The Carmichael Show, debuting Wednesday night, is a rarity in that its humor is almost entirely issues-based. Created by comedian Jerrod Carmichael and filmmaker Nicholas Stoller (Neighbors, Forgetting Sarah Marshall), NBC’s latest sitcom follows a fictional version of the Carmichael family, and it seems fairly traditional on the surface.
On the show, Jerrod and his girlfriend Maxine (22 Jump Street’s Amber Stevens West) have just moved in together in the former’s hometown of Charlotte. However, the young couple has yet to tell Jerrod’s abrasive parents Joe and Cynthia (played by David Alan Grier and Loretta Devine, respectively) about their new living situation, for the same reason Jerrod’s eccentric brother (LilRel Howery) hasn’t told them about his recent divorce. There’s a definite Everybody Loves Raymond vibe to the family dynamic, which is almost identical to that show. (Joe and Cynthia’s living room even looks like a redress of the Barone household, and the commercial breaks fade in and out with tinkling piano.)
That said, the comedy is almost all topical — a veritable minefield of political hot buttons. In that way, it sort of feels like a throwback to old shows like All in the Family and Maude, only it deals with more current issues like Barack Obama as president, Black Lives Matter and religion in the 21st century.
The thing is, because it is so tethered to the family sitcom format, The Carmichael Show often feels like it’s going out of its way to make points rather than doing so organically. It doesn’t so much comment on the issues as it does bring them up randomly to make a few jokes and then move on to the next one.
That’s not to say all the jokes aren’t funny — some humorous moments do arise — but not enough to shake the feeling that the audience is being preached to (sometimes literally, by the Bible-thumping Cynthia). And while Carmichael and West have solid chemistry on screen, their characters’ relationship takes a backseat to Joe and Cynthia’s frequent tirades. As a result, the younger couple become a sounding board for the rest of the family and their outdated zingers. In the end, The Carmichael Show’s brand of topical humor isn’t sustainable enough to fuel entire episodes, nor is the family original enough to work on its own. The show’s heart is in the right place, but the balance between comedy and relevancy is not — at least for the time being.
