Sunday, August 23, 2015

Ballers Is So Bad That It's Good***





NyPost.com - "Ballers," a creation of the folks that brought you "Entourage," revolves (mostly) around a group of friends who have retired from the NFL (or are still in it). Johnson plays Spencer Strassmore, a retired NFL player who's trying to make a career for himself in money management now that he's out of football.
His boss is a sort of whacked out dude named Joe, played by Rob Corddry (of 'The Daily Show" fame). He only hired him, he says, because of his football connections, and he's still starstruck by current and former players. Corddry is an odd choice for this mostly serious show. His 'comic relief' just feels annoying.
The season premiere mostly revolves around a current player and friend of Strassmore, played by John David Washington, who is trying to find a new place to play football after another in a series of off-the-field screw-ups. Strassmore spends his time trying to help him out, and working to get his post-football money management career off the ground.
But let's get to the heart of the matter. "Ballers" was not that fun to watch and gave me very little reason to come back for episode two. I get that it's a pilot, and the show can evolve, but I don't have a lot of hope.


I wanted this show to be good so bad but it's simply horrible. The shows idea is perfect for idiots like me that will consume anything sports related. But, the story lines and acting are so bad that it might actually be good. In a completely backwards way.

The show is a badly copied blueprint of the HBO show Entourage(Same Executive producers). Entourage scored ratings with flashy stuff and hot girls. Somehow they took that idea and mixed it with sports and it came out bad. Pretty impressive taking that combo and making it bad for their target demo of 18-35. I guess writing matters even for shows targeting idiots like me.

I like The Rock but he's simply not a good fit for this show. He is good at mauling people or shows that have lots of explosions. This show needs to take a page out of the Jerry McGuire book and have assholes like Jay Mohr's character dominate the show.

Solid rumors are are projecting the second season of the show to be picked up by HBO. I would scrap the whole cast because the idea is money but the execution is straight poop. Also the fact that this show isn't actually acknowledged by the NFL makes it cool in my book. Anyone that stands up the NFL and spits in their eye is good by me.

P.S. The fact that the show has an "Inside the Episode" following each show to explain what happened is so fucking scary for our society. Can't let people in China find out that we need cliff notes for a show that has no plot or direction.

P.P.S. Naturally, I watched the entire season because I am a mouth breather and anything football related I feel obligated to consume.

P.P.P.S.  When my wife tells me the show has bad acting and then legitimately thinks shows like Empire are well acted that should be an explosion of red flags in my brain.

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