Uncoupled: Is Netflix’s latest Star production this year’s Emily in Paris? – صحيفة الصوت

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REVIEW: The man who gave the world such splashy delights as Beverly Hills 90210, Melrose Place, Sex and the City, Younger and, um, Emily in Paris is back with a new eight-part Netflix series.

Co-written with Modern Family regular Jeffrey Richman and offering a terrific showcase for the sensibilities of How I Met Your Mother’s Neil Patrick Harris, Darren Star’s Uncoupled’s conceit certainly showed plenty of promise.

However, like the much-maligned Emily, this is let down by broad stereotypes, predictable plotting and an over-reliance on miscommunication and misunderstandings to pad out the four-hour running time that really could – and should – have been halved.

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At its heart, Uncoupled is the story of New York real estate agent Michael Lawson (Harris). His seemingly perfect life is thrown into chaos when he discovers that while he has been planning his partner of 17 years’ – handsome, hedge-fund manager Colin McKenna (Tuc Watkins) – surprise 50th birthday party, Colin has been plotting his escape.

“I just need some time to figure things out,” Colin says when confronted, “It’s not all about you.”

“You’re making an US decision,” Michael wails in reply.

While even more humiliated that another realtor has assisted in finding Colin a new place to live, Michael consoles himself with the fact that Colin has suggested couples’ counselling. However, it is hope that doesn’t last long.

And while his friends and colleagues are sympathetic – and supportive – they aren’t exactly helpful. Dire warnings that, at his age, he does not want to be “gay and single” in this town abound, while business partner Suzanne (Tisha Campbell) queries: “Why are you so calm? I’d be in bed – calling lawyers, or ordering hitmen.”

It is she who urges Michael to put his anger into his work, especially when they have the opportunity to try and win the contract to sell recently divorced socialite Claire Lewis’ (Marcia Gay Harden) opulent apartment.

However, between her eccentricities and familial links to Michael’s most-loathed rival, wooing her will not be easy. He though, believes he has an ace up his sleeve, he can identify with the personal pain she is going through.

Yes, while the banter between Harris and Harden (The Morning Show) is certainly one of the show’s highlights, it feels something of a let-down that Star and Richman felt the need to make her character such a central figure as a compare/contrast to Michael’s situation. It just feels like such a clunky narrative device and a rehash of tropes and ideas Star just explored on And Just Like That.

Likewise, Campbell feels wasted in what is the traditional rom-com sassy best friend role, offering little more than one-liners, or blundering, that deliberately breaks any building tension.

Filled with laments about Hermes towels that are too good to use, smug millennials, Grindr gags and double-entendres about “scooping out bagels”, like Emily in Paris, this is frothy, forgettable stuff that takes a place in a world far removed from most of us (as Michael points out when visiting Claire’s apartment for the first time, “I feel like I’m in one of those 1930 movies where the depression is happening outside”).

Escapist television is one thing, and I’m all for it, particularly in these literally gloomy times, but unless you’re a huge Harris or Harden fan, this is just depressingly disappointing.

Uncoupled begins streaming on Netflix on the evening of July 29.