A Man. And His Blog.

The first season of Showtime's dark comedy aired in summer/fall 2007

David Duchovny returns to the TV screen in the hilariously dark comedy series Californication. Bachelor Hank Moody has almost got it made: He’s a sexy, best-selling author, but his insatiable appetite for beautiful women often lands him in hot water. Every day, Hank finds himself in bed with another woman and two steps back from his ultimate goal: restoring his family. He wouldn’t mind reviving his writing career either, but as a part-time dad juggling his wild L.A. lifestyle with grown-up responsibilities, this “devil-may-care” writer is at a loss for words. From the very first episode, Hank sets the tone for the whole series. We meet him first in a church asking Jesus to help him get his life back on track, but he gets distracted by a hot nun, which turns out to be a dream that is representative of his lifestyle – he then goes on to have sex with a woman who is cheating on her enraged husband and a 16 year-old girl who he thinks is in college. This clever comedy also stars Natascha McElhone as Hank’s ex-girlfriend Karen, Madeleine Martin as Becca, his wise-beyond-her-years 12 year-old daughter and Evan Handler as Charlie, Hank’s best friend and agent.

Episode 01: Pilot
Probably one of the better comedy pilots I have seen in my life. It could have really been one of the best, when the writers actually included a bit more character development into the episode. All in all, there is a bit too much sex in it, and it looks like the producers wanted to sell the series with much sex and vulgar language in it, instead of showing more the midlife crisis of Hank Moody. Because that storyline didn’t shine really through here and had its best moment at the end, when Hank flashback’d for a bit.
Other than that the pilot really had its interesting moments and was funny as hell. I laughed every three, four minutes about something, and David Duchovny is a treat in his role. The rest of the cast is good as well, though there wasn’t much for Evan Handler to show, after he had just one scene in this episode.
The characterization is working at least for a bit; we know that Hank is in his midlife crisis, though he never really mentions it, but his sex walks, little alcohol problem and definitely the need of some drugs speak for it. This could make the series a bit more darker and a bit more of a dramedy, but maybe the producers didn’t want that and put lots of tits and pussy in it. Hey, I liked it, but I missed some real story in here.
All in all a good pilot episode with too much porn and too less character development in it, but I had my fun. 8/10

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