Okay, they always say be very careful what you write on the internet and I certainly don’t want to offend anyone out in TV Land, but after watching several episodes of Rules of Engagement I can tell you that I don’t think it is funny and here are some reasons why:
A) David Spade is so ugly now that this character does NOT work. It is beyond believable that any women would sleep with him. The reason this works in Two and a half Men is that Charlie Sheen is gorgeous and even if he isn’t every woman’s type, he has classic good looks-so it is believable that he would get all these woman. In How I Met Your Mother Barney is also a ladies man-it works. Neil Patrick Harris is adorable and while not classic movie star good looks, he is attractive. David was fine is earlier stuff, but this Joe Dirt facial hair and mess on top of his head makes it hard to buy that he is even an executive. Ways to fix it would be to, have David clean up a little bit: a new hair cut and a shave would work, OR go the opposite and make him the ugly, dirty, unsuccessful exec that thinks he can get women but doesn’t. The show is breaking it’s own “world rules” here.
B) All the characters are constantly telling jokes. A way to fix this is to write better, smarter dialogue and we the audience will laugh, but joke after joke, especially when they don’t work-isn’t funny. In Friends Chandler told a lot of jokes, but that was his character so it worked, in Two and a Half Men, Jake jokes a lot and usually he makes a comment about it after, because they character would joke. In Rules, it feels like stand up. Here they have Patrick Warburton who is hilarious, and then have him telling jokes and then waiting for laughter. The reason Putty worked so well on Seinfeld is that Patrick wasn’t trying to be funny, he was funny.
C) They always laugh at their jokes, which breaks character taking us out of the world.
I think the concept of the show is great and I wanted to love it so much, but it just needs some adjustments.
Unfortunately most of America seems to like joke joke joke and have no idea why shows like: Friends, Seinfeld, Cheers, Frasier, Will & Grace, Big Bang Theory, Two and a half Men, How I Met Your Mother-stand out and get bigger laughs. It is our jobs as writers to deliver great content so they don’t have to think about it and they can just laugh while we collect royalties from syndication and 10 seasons.
Steph Olivieri Bourbon ~ Writing Coach 