I don’t mind Call Me Kat. It’s not great, so far, but neither do I find it intolerable. It seems to me that it needs to find its footing–is it a sitcom set in a cat cafe, or is it a sitcom set in a piano karaoke bar, or is it a sitcom focused on a late-30s woman looking for a boyfriend? It could be all three, if treated correctly. Right now, it’s a confused mess among the three choices.
I appreciate the energy Mayim Bialik puts into her role but the show was not funny at all. Call it “The Big Thud Theory.”
OTOH, one could do worse than copy “Bob’s Burgers.” I will give “The Great North” another chance. Perhaps the characters will become more distinctive.
I watched the first episode of Call Me Kat without knowing anything else about it besides it starred Mayim Bialik and it was about a cat cafe. Figured it would be a nice, fun little bit of fluff with some cute cats.
Less than five minutes in, I was thinking, “Wow, this reminds me of a bad Miranda ripoff.” The identical credit sequence cemented the idea, right before the “based on Miranda” credit flashed on the screen.
I like Miranda (it makes me cringe sometimes, but I like it). I did not like this. They even used some of the same jokes. It was embarrassing. The cast (unlike the Miranda cast) has no chemistry whatsoever, Mayim Bialik is no Miranda Hart, and the guy they got to play Tom Ellis’s role must have answered a casting call for “blandly handsome dude with no personality.”
Also, it really needed more cats. The “Zazzy” scenes from Big Bang Theory were funnier (and more cat-filled!) than this.
I don’t think I’ll be watching any more episodes.
Watched an episode of Call Me Kat, and I want you all to know that I don’t hold you responsible.
THE HORROR, THE HORROR 
Watched the first episode of Call Me Kat and absolutely hated it. I’d never watched more than a few seconds of Miranda, because I suffer from terrible second hand embarrassment, but gave it another try after learning Call Me Kat is based on it. Loved it! Even the jokes I’d just seen in Call Me Kat.
Enjoyed the first episode of The Great North, will be watching more.
Oh, and the first episode of Miranda made me dig up the first episode of Smack The Pony, which is still absolute gold.
That the same concept works in Miranda but does not in Call Me Kat fascinates me. There have been some US adaptations of British shows that worked (The Office, All In The Family, Shameless) and others that fell flat (Coupling, Skins, The Inbetweeners). Wikipedia has a list of US shows adapted from British ones.
I think the chief issue with Call Me Kat is that it takes just the superficial parts of the Miranda concept, tries to copy and polish them, and serve them in a fairly standard American Sitcom format. Miranda, where Miranda plays herself, based on her own writing, seems at once more over-the-top and more real. (And I’m basing this on one episode of each show, so I’ll shut up now.)
I saw the second episode last night, and the slack that I gave it because of a weak pilot episode is rapidly disappearing.
He had a recentish show on Netflix:
My teen son really enjoyed The Great North. We chose it as our snuggle down for bed show. He liked that it was like his most favorite show in the world: Bob’s Burgers.
He also liked another animated show on Hulu about aliens, not sure of the name.
I thought both were bland but I’m not big in to animation like he is. I love Bob’s Burgers though, mainly because it’s so clever. These two shows aren’t so much but they had moments.
I am watching Call Me Kat because I think Mayim Bialik’s performance is overcoming a weak script, and actually elevating what I would probably give a 4 to, more like a 7. I’m hanging on in case it improves. Maybe someone will start writing to her strengths, and stop making it a TV version of Cathy which is on the top 10 list of “Comic Strips I Can’t Understand Catching an Audience.” Yes, there are worse comics, such as The Lockhorns, or The Family Circus, but I can see Rush Limbaugh fans reading those. I can’t figure out who was reading Cathy. Well, me, but only about twice a month, and I always voted for it when the paper had a poll on what to drop for something new. Except when I voted for Henry, or The Family Circus. Cripes.
Haven’t seen Miranda, but now I want to. Will look for it, but I have a list of things to watch, including the “interpreter” episode of Blacklist. If it compares unfavorably, might force me to stop watching Call Me Kat.
I do find it really interesting that Jim Parsons and his husband are co-executive producers of Call Me Kat. I wonder if that’s true of Flight Attendant as well? Are they helping everyone out of a job since TBBT was cancelled? guilt? or is Mayim Bialik just a special friend? or do they really believe in the show? FWIW, they are co-exec producers of Young Sheldon as well. They are have money to spare to invest in bad projects.
ETA: know nothing about The Great North.
Oh yes.
And I am not a laugh track or one camera sitcom snob. I’m perfectly happy to watch traditional sitcoms in front of a live studio audience. Even ones with sweetened laughter. When they’re good, I’m laughing right along with both the real and taped people.
This was just really, really bad. The fourth wall asides didn’t work. (it works in some shows. it does not here.) The timing was horrible. The writing was pathetic. It was actively unfunny.
I haven’t seen Miranda. But I’ve heard good things. I wonder where this went horribly wrong.
That’s a horrifying good description!
Ack!!
I’m one of the few people who will admit to liking Cathy. Cathy was much, much, much, much better than Call Me Kat.
I did watch an episode of Miranda yesterday after posting in this thread. (Tom Ellis is unrecognizable. Never would have seen him in that and thought “oh - perfect for Lucifer!”) I’m not entirely sure why one works and the other doesn’t. It just doesn’t.
OK. Cathy was well executed for what it was supposed to be. It’s just that its worldview was so ante feminist, it gave me hives. It’s kind of like how The Lockhorns is the perfect strip for an audience who wants to read recycled jokes about disliking your inlaws and your wife’s coffee & spending habits, or your husband’s roving eye. I’m sure those people are out there, and they probably are seething over Harris in white house.
I’m a little surprised that Mayim Bialik is making a show that is about a woman who is very independent, intelligent, and accomplished, and yet falls into the stereotype of obsessing over coupling up with some man. I’m also a little surprised that a studio greenlighted it in today’s political climate. Frankly, it would be funny maybe if she were a lesbian obsessed with finding a girlfriend, and her mother was unconvinced that she couldn’t eventually find the right man for her (which still happens-- I have a friend in her 30s it’s happening to right now)-- and it would be funny because it was bending an old trop, that itself really needs to be permanently retired.
And yes, there are still women who obsess over finding a man, but it’s much more pathetic then it used to be, and also less common, and less appropriate as fodder for humor.
We should take this to another thread sometime - because it actually quite feminist in its early years and then got lazy in the latter half of its run and ended up kind of blah. But that’s getting away from the purpose of this thread which is these two shows. (The Lockhorns, OTOH, is just a misogynist mess.)
I also don’t think that Kat is about finding any man. In the episode I saw, she was obsessed with a very specific one. There’s a difference between those two things (to me). One is a bad stereotype, the other is the kind of pathetic that you can build a series on, so long as not every single episode is about pursuing that guy. (Her mother wants her married to anything - that’s a lazy stereotype but I can excuse that in a secondary character.)
It’s mostly been a different specific one each episode, with an underlying thread of the “Ashley” she really wants who is in love with someone else.
I think Bialik is being wasted on this show. OTOH, I like her enough to hope that these early episodes were scripted, or at least outlined before she was cast, and that at some point (soon!) we’ll get to episodes that were written for her.
ETA: I usually like Swoosie Kurtz, but she is just awful in this. I cringe every time she’s on. I can’t figure out if it’s just that the part is that bad, or maybe Kurtz is just regretting accepting it.
My opinion is that one has heart, and the other doesn’t. Miranda is a semi-autobiographical show written by and starring 6’1" tall Miranda. Call Me Kat is a American attempt at copying that show … which doesn’t work, because a writing team can’t copy that feel.
The first few episodes of Call Me Kat were, more or less, the same as Miranda episodes. That’s common; if you watch the first episode or two of both versions of The Office or Shameless or other shows adapted for the US, you’ll see the same thing done. Perhaps as Call Me Kat develops its own scripts tailored to its own cast, it might improve?