"Don't Pull - Push"

Chuck Lorre is a smart hombre.  Teaming with different collaborators on each  projects, he has amassed a sitcomical empire (Two and a Half Men, Big Bang Theory, Mom and et cetera.)

Except for a more personal effort (the somewhat bolder Kominsky Method on Netflix) Lorre’s shows air exclusively on CBS, the most “traditional” broadcast network, of which David Letterman proclaimed, in a “Top Ten ‘CBS Promotional Slogans’” segment:

“Your grandparents like us.  Why don’t you?”

Imaginably, most “creatives” bristle at the limitations CBS imposes on how shows ought to be done.  Which, for that network, makes sense.  You lose your conservative viewership and except for Sunday Night Football, you’re done.

Reiterating, Chuck Lorre’s a smart hombre.

So, new sitcom on CBS?  See above title:   

“Don’t pull.  Push.”

Meaning,

Instead of fighting CBS’s strangling standards, give them a show that accedes to those shackling restrictions.  And while you’re at it, don’t just “accede” to them.  Luxuriate in them, like an enveloping bubble bath. 

Call it “A Hyper-Traditional Sitcom.”

Call it Bob (Hearts) Abishola. 

Which first intrigues with its challenging idea:  An encounter between Bob, a convalescing white, middle-aged man and Abishola, a Nigerian (black), mid-thirties hospital nurse kindles latent sparks of possible “connection.”  

Okay.

We’ve got “White-versus-Black.”  We’ve got “Immigrant” versus “Mainstream American.”  We’ve got…

Hold on there, partner.  This is CBS we’re talking about.  

“Nix” on the “cultural fireworks.” 

Accede!  Accede!

Okay, forget what I said.  We’ve got “Opposites attract.”  A bedrock sitcom “reliable.”  (I used it myself on Major Dad.  “Lifer Marine” – “Liberal journalist.”)

The rest of Bob (Hearts) Abishola – straight from the traditional “toolbox.”  (“Unchanged since 1957.”)  Call it a “slippers” sitcom.  It’s like you’re watching in slippers. 

Which does not mean it’s not professionally executed.  “Soft food” can be skillfully prepared.  And does not mean it’s unpopular, because my contemporary ratings standards, it is doing quite well.

Still…

Stereotyped characters and relationships, recycled jokes, venerable storylines, all at a pace I would describe as “a “snail’s pace”, but I fear insult to snails.  If a snail watched this, they’d go,

“Come on!  Pick it up!”

The standard joke would be “If it went any slower, it would go backwards.”  Except the show does go backwards.

The handful of episodes I watched began with a medley of scenes, recapping earlier episodes, updating new viewers tuning in, and reminding old viewers who forgot.  (Probably shouldn’t have said “old.”)

– They met in the hospital.

– He brought “Thank you” socks’; she shut the door in his face.

– They met casually for coffee.

– She abruptly broke things off.

– They had bad dating experiences apart.

– They then tentatively re-met.

Hello, First Grade!

“We have learned the first six letters of the alphabet.  Today, children, it’s “G.”

Bob (Hearts) Abishola not shy about being a sitcom.  In a “fresh” but head-scratching procedure, it shows its genre credentials in (incongruous) giant-sized letters.

For no discernible artistic reason, each time they begin a new scene – in a way appearing previously only in the scripts – we see, displayed conspicuously on our televisions:

“THREE DAYS LATER.”

Sitting outside the location.

Why did they do that?

“Because we’re a sitcom!”

And they don’t care who knows it.

There is an appealing sweetness to Bob (Hearts) Abishola, which is, after all, a love story.  But remember, that too’s part of the traditional template. 

A smart guy, Chuck Lorre.

He figures, “Why fight?”

You know what they want, and you give it to them.

And while you’re at it –

And then some.