Good news, Lucky Louie fans! The show just got canceled, so now you can start finding much better ways to use your time! Yes, HBO declined to offer a second season to its first three-camera sitcom, a show I called "flaccidly unfunny" in the pages of this very magazine and then got some hate mail. Not sure if HBO’s decision means I was right, or they were wrong, or the entire thing was just an embarrassment, but either of those three possibilities is fine by me. I would like to send a personal note of consolation out to EW senior editor Ari Karpel, however, because I know this show was all he had to live for. Ari, sweetie, can I interest you in some Married… With Children reruns to help ease the pain?
In true good news, though, Entourage got picked up for a fourth season. Granted, that’s not a surprise, but who knows — HBO could have decided to go with an all-Dane-Cook, all-the-time lineup or something. I wouldn’t put it past them.
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Aww yeah! I sent the snippet on this to popwatch last night! You guys actually read fan email! Popwatch rules! What if I told you there is a website for a national publication where the editors publish your tips, would that be something you might be interested in?
One really sucky sitcom is off the air. Now, what voodoo curse can we all chant to get “the War at home” cancelled? What if I told you there was a way to have the shows you hate taken off the air forever that would also help keep your favorite shows on for at least another season, would that be something you might be interested in?
I couldn’t resist as a new season of Entourage is making me giddy. Long live Mark Wahlberg and his band of merry men!
I’m not afraid to say it…I liked the show. I’ll miss it.
There I said it!!!!!
that headline should read “hbo makes some really good decisions… except when the cancelled the comeback.”
im actually sad that lucky louie got cancelled… i really liked it especially after the first 3 episodes… im actually suprised it didnt catch on… ill get over it though– unlike The Comeback which i am still in mourning for (even more so since Lisa Kudrow was robbed of her emmy)!
Did you juct compare “Lucky Louie” to “Married With Children?” Did you even watch the damn show? “Married” was an over-the-top farce, with over-the-top hoots and hollers from a horrible audience. “Louie” was performed live in front of an unsweetened audience and portrayed the most realistic husband-wife w/child dynamic I’ve ever seen on television. If you didn’t get it, you:
a)Have never been married while living somewhat below middle-class
b)Have never had an awful, annoying kid
People keep on saying that the show thought it could get away with using shocking language in lieu of actual jokes. THOSE WEREN”T ALWAYS MEANT TO BE FUNNY! Not every scene was meant to be packed with laughter. Many episodes were amazingly subtle, purposefully cringe-inducing, or even dramatic.
Lucki Louie was awful. I mean, there is crap television and then there was Lucky Louie. and now there’s Lucky US… for not having to have to run into it on HBO.
I know it often lowbrow, and the supporting characters were uninspired, but where else on TV would you see married couples having realistic conversations about sex, masturbation, and how much they hated each other sometimes. For that, I will miss it a little bit.
This show was truly terrible, I thought I was watching ABC when it came on and had to double check my Comcast DVR info button to make sure it was HBO. This show is no big loss at all.
Please don’t give HBO the idea of an all Dane Cook hour, that guy has turned into possibly the worst and most irritating comic that has graced the TV screen in some time, he’s like Carrot Top, but without the extra chromosome.
I also have to agree with Steve on his Lucky Louie views, it was one of the more realistic portrayals of modern marriage that I’ve seen on TV. Was it always funny? No. But ask this: How often are the Simpsons funny anymore? Or: Will & Grace, that show was on for like 8 years or so and it wasn’t funny for 7 of them.
That was the gayest show on cable since OZ. Hey HBO… male nudity is not funny or groundbreaking it’s GAY.
What if According to Jim were even less funny, only once an episode you had to see Jim naked? Worst. Sitcom. Ever.
I’m not a prude but not only was Lucky Louie spectacularly unfunny it was also vulgar, filthy piece of trash.
I think you’re entirely off base. Lucky Louie was never “must-see” TV for me but I always thought it scored points for bringing some freshness to a tired format… kind of like Roseanne but upping the “white trash” quotient. I would much rather be stuck watching it than “According to Jim”, “Married with Children”, or “How I met Your Mother”… how sad it is to see Alyson Hannigan and Jason Segal working with such weak material.
The Comeback was worse than this show.
HBO is still reeling from its poor showing “The Sopranos” season and the ending of both “Six Feet Under” and, yes even, “Sex and the City.” Instead of focusing on putting anything on the air that seems innovative (which “Lucky Louie” was except it wasn’t very good), why not nurture your good shows instead of reacting like network TV. I thought the whole point of HBO was that they weren’t cable, they weren’t in the habit of yanking shows like everyone else. Is this a long paragraph to simply restate that “The Comeback” should in fact come back. Yes, but I wanted to sound like I had a point.
Both Lisa Kudrow and Michael Patrick King have said they want to do “The Comeback” again and it can’t cost that much, bring it back!
Sorie, that should read “I thought the whole point of HBO was that they were cable…”
This crappy show is what replaced THE COMEBACK! Who in the world is making the decisions over at HBO!
I consider myself working class but I could never relate to the topics of the show. The show’s style and language were very much like the working class back in the 80’s. It’s Welcome Back Carter and The Jefferesons type of working class. Things have changed since then.
The show Weeds and it’s portrayle of working middle class is more 21st century.
But enough about that, I still can’t believe that HBO settled on this instead of renewing The Comeback for another season.
And Chris, bite your tongue – HARD!
P.S
Those of you who are fans of Michael Patrick King’s writing should know that he is currently in the works with HBO in creating a Sex in the City-ish comedy. He said it’s in the spirit of Sex but two things differ; it’s a male lead and it will be shot in L.A.
I, for one am excited to hear this. There’s also another couple of comedy shows in the works that HBO has planned for the future. Let’s hope they get it right this time.
Good! Now bring back “The Comeback” HBO. As for Lucky Louie, all I can say is “I dont need to SEE that!”
Lucky Louie wasn’t very good, but Louis CK is effin’ hysterical. if you get a chance DVR his HBO One Night Stand special and you’ll see what he was going for. Get him in an Entourage-type show with a less-lousy supporting cast and it could be gold, a male The Comeback or something. if HBO uses this, I’m suing.
Lucky Louie wasn’t very good, but Louis CK is effin’ hysterical. if you get a chance DVR his HBO One Night Stand special and you’ll see what he was going for. Get him in an Entourage-type show with a less-lousy supporting cast and it could be gold, a male The Comeback or something. if HBO uses this, I’m suing.
I’m a bit sad to see it go. I watched every episode and can say that it really was improving. I appreciated the occasional startling, raw, real moments, and the fact that their ability to cuss and be “uncensored” wasn’t always wasted on lowbrow idiocy.
Was it brilliant, or even very good? Nope. But there was potential, and a there were a few moments where I laughed harder watching than I did anywhere else this summer (Louie in the confessional, anyone?).
Hey ihateukfans, does that mean that female nudity is hilarious and genious and LESBIAN? Let’s leave the comments to those PopWatchers with insight and something to actually contribute, mmm-kay?
The first four episodes or so of Lucky Louie were terrible, because C.K. kept trying to shoehorn his standup routine into a sitcom and he has neither the writing nor acting ability to pull it off.
However the final half of the season was some of the most hilarious stuff ever shown on TV. Segues flowed much better than the usual hamfisted “Well why do you hate [taboo topic]?” and mugging for the camera. Watch the episodes where they realize that their daughter is a jerk and the one where Louie starts going to a confessional to complain about his wife, and then try to come back and say this show deserved to be cancelled.
There was a great show waiting to come out of Lucky Louie. It just needed another season or two to come out.
LOUIS CK? Patently unwatchable. What’s next? Surfers from outer space?
I must say, I scanned this article for The Comeback in Italics, hoping they had dropped Louie to reinstate our beloved Ms. Cherish. But alas, it’s still MIA.
I want more Valerie!!!! Slezak – this pop blog has been lacking lately – we want more Comeback references!
Yes, HBO has been making some bad decisions (*sniff* Deadwood *sniff*), but Lucky Louie WAS funny and had a lot of potential. It was a contemporary and fresh attempt at the live-audience, three-camera sitcom, HBO-style. Shows like The Comeback and Arrested Development were funny, but there’s something irritating about their continuously whining defenders. The corpse is cold; bury the body already. Just don’t knock my show just to make your point
I don’t even know what this show is. and I swear to god I thought I knew everything about current pop culture.
Joe we’ll be hearing from you a year from now “whining” about how Lucky Louie was cancelled.
One thing that I think we can all agree on now is that HBO no longer gives its show time to grow like it use to. THE COMEBACK, Lucky Louie and the rest were all good shows that didn’t have enough time to develope. I thought Lucky Louie would be funnier if the cast wasn’t so stiff. But alas, that would have changed had HBO given it a couple of years.
And again for you Joe: THE COMEBACK
Wow…all the misdirected hate at this show. This is where the world is these days. Did LUCKY LOUIE get THE COMEBACK or DEADWOOD cancelled? No. Was it responsible for THE SOPRANOS being mediocre this season? NO. How about just judge it on its merits. Did every TV show turn out GREAT in its first few episodes? No. This show really hit its stride in the last few episodes, as said by many here. It still wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea…but do you need to cheer its death just because something you liked died before it? It dared to deal with real life marriage much better than any over-the-air sitcom ever could under current FCC guidelines. Sure, some full frontal male nudity hit for shock laughs, but it isn’t like it was the basis of the show.