'Married' Pilot Review: An Uncomfortably Genuine Comedy

The previews for Married implied a broad comedy, in the vein of an NBC-styled sitcom. The jokes shown were predictable and bland, but it seems that was just to draw in the common viewer. Within the first five minutes of the pilot, we’re given a very modern and bleak view on monogamy from a couple eleven years and three kids deep in their relationship. The series adapts elements common to comedies involving marriage and relationships, but explores them from a new — and particularly dark angle — that keeps the show from feeling stale.

The Bowman family, Russ (Nat Faxon) and Lina (Judy Greer), are at the center of Married. Their sex life is essentially dead and played for laughs, but the application of these jokes aren’t the hacky ones that you’ll see largely elsewhere – this isn’t the tedium of NBC’s Whitney. The Bowmans will lay in bed together; Lina nose deep in a vampire or werewolf book while Russ openly masturbates. When Russ complains about their sex life and how disinterested she is in it, Lina responds with a suggestion: go get a mistress. The thing is, she’s serious.

Russ discusses this with his friends, who are likely to be featured subplots of their own. Together, they run the gamut of relationship statuses: Jess (Jenny Slate) married a much older man and their sex life, as he’s gotten older, has declined; A.J. (Brett Gelman) is recently divorced and pretending he’s totally over it; John Hodgman appears briefly, playing Russ’s only friend who has a functioning and apparently happy marriage. They’re all given brief monologues defining their relationships, and are defined by that one thing, but the jokes are funny enough to let it slide. Likely, this was creator Andrew Gurland’s way of establishing his intentions as the season progresses: he wants to touch on all of these concepts, and not only the difficulties of the Bowman clan.

The writing, while understandably expository considering it’s a pilot, is also reasonable and witty. The actors are all comedy veterans and play their roles with ease, though Judy Greer is severely underutilized. It takes two people to be in a marriage and hopefully, as the season progresses, Greer’s Lina will have as much of the spotlight as Russ has here.

The episode takes a particularly dark turn when Russ, deciding to indeed have an affair, begins speaking to an incredibly attractive beautician. This leads to her revelations involving the destruction of her own marriage following a late-term miscarriage. She keeps a photo of the sonogram by her bed; she couldn’t look at her husband anymore, being reminded of Charlie, the son they never had. Over the course of a day or two, Russ develops a sense of responsibility for her. She’s desperate for something good in her life and so he buys her a puppy that she names Charlie.

The course of the episodes changes again when Russ has a meeting with the woman’s rather terrifying ex, who is strangely philosophical. Russ decides to not have an affair. His daughters find the puppy and, unable to break their hearts, Russ fakes the dog’s death and tells his would-be girlfriend that it was hit by a truck. She weeps uncontrollably about this — she keeps losing Charlie, she says — and Russ returns to his wife and family. When his wife still won’t sleep with him, he again resorts to masturbating. Roll credits.

The miscarriage subplot here is an odd one to say the least. This is, after all a comedy, but it’s not without its dramatic undertones. Admittedly, while you cringe, you can’t help but laugh awkwardly. I’ve never quite seen a plot like this in a comedy, but I admire both Gurland and FX for trying something so drastically different, especially when the pilot ends and nothing is resolved. In a number of ways, Married feels uncomfortably genuine and worth checking out.

Married airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. on FX.

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