Tom and Ann could have worked if they just did everything completely differently

Like write them as completely different characters at the beginning of the series?

If they were determined to go down this path, they could have used it to humanize Tom a little bit and bring out something resembling a personality from Ann. Instead, they made Tom even wackier than normal and Ann even blander, which made a bad idea even worse.

Terrible news.

No, this season has been better than last season.

Ugh. That Schur quote is basically everything I was worried for the show. They simply don't realize how what they've turned Tom into. Even played for laughs, it just doesn't work. Office all over again, ugh.

Also- if you're going to post a quote like that- please cite the source.

We need a beginners TV forum for posters like you.

Spurious gonna Spurious

Not sure what you were watching but last season was about as close to a perfect season as I've ever seen.

tbf up to the campaign ad one, I think this season wasn't too far away from being on par with season 3. The rest of the season seems to be well mapped out now too so I'm confident they'll get it back again.

Right on. Wacky Tom only really works when we can see how that side of him is actually useful (schmoozing with Joan Calamezzo, for example, or charming all the old guys at the sauna into helping out with the Harvest Festival). It seems like they're determined to play up the most grating parts of Tom's personality, and Ann is gonna stick with him even though she spends every moment with him looking like she just wants him to shut the **** up and go away.

Tom acting the way he does in the examples above makes sense, he is trying to sell someone on something, it's an endearing skill. It's not endearing if someone is always like that and has no ability to adjust for more intimate contexts, which makes Ann settling for him even more ridiculous. Seriously bring back Justin Theroux and have him say "this is the girl"

+1 to you both.

I guess, based on what Schur wrote above, that in attempting to keep the Tom-Ann relationship "fun/humorous/light", they will look to avoid any "real" relationship moment - basically getting Tom a win by being actually helpful/charming to Ann, and us seeing Ann actually fall for Tom.

This of course destroys any sense of why these 2 would be together in the first place. Terrible balance they've struck, and really bringing the show down.

Still overall enjoyable to watch tho imo!

What's really grating is that they know all this. When April set them up in the first place, she talked Ann into it by pointing out that wacky and crazy Tom was all an act. Yet, they seem to have completely forgot the entire premise on which it was set up. It really annoys me how bad this is.

The scene where Tom is waiting out in the rain for Ann is WOAT P&R imo. Not funny, not heartfelt, just really horrible. I wonder if the producers are holding back on Tom-Ann being more "real" because they think the audience wouldn't buy Ann falling for Tom. I mean, I probably wouldn't.

If I was younger, and thus stupider, I'd totally be organizing some effort to twitter bomb Schur and tell him how stupid this all is.

I just read his twitter, he described the last episode as his favorite Aziz episode of the season. Not looking good.

Yes! I can't wait for a whole episode of Tom acting like a selfish, tone-deaf, annoying *******, and getting everything he wants anyway!

The thing that made Seasons 2 and 3 so great for me is that they really seemed more like real people than TV characters. This season, I see the characters merely being used as vehicles for punch lines.

The only characters I think they've done a good job with this season have been Ben and Chris.

Probably not a coincidence that those are the two most recent additions to the show. I guess this writing team only knows how to mine ~3 seasons of good material out of a character.

Also I totally agree with your first observation.

Like take the Ron Swanson eggs joke from last episode.

Ron eats "All the bacon and eggs you have" because he basically wants to binge drink his depression away, but he uses meat and eggs instead of alcohol.

Ron sitting down to eat 2 dozen eggs because it got a laugh 10 episodes ago isn't nearly as funny or in character.

If you want the awesomeness of Justin Theroux, go see Wanderlust. It's ****ing hilarious.

I think it started with Tammy 1. Tammy 2 was first introduced when Leslie went to talk to her, and she didn't seem so bad. Then Tammy 2 and Ron do their fight/sex thing, which she then uses to get the lot for a new library before Leslie talks some sense to Ron. They sort of do the same thing in Ron and Tammy 2, she slaps herself with some jerky but Ron is able to resist it, then he and Wendy break up, he slips up again and they get married, and then when she beats up Tom at their party, he comes to his senses again. It all flowed nicely, and it all made sense, you understood how Ron could get mixed up with her, and she wasn't a one note character, she had coworkers who seemed to like her, she was able to fool Leslie at first, but she also had the crazy side. Tammy 1 though just dropped in out of nowhere, they sort of told us her back story without it ever manifesting itself on screen, and then it was abruptly resolved by introducing Tammy 0, a complete one note character, and having the drink off, where Leslie does virtually the exact same thing she did to Tammy 2 the first time. The Tammy 2 and Tammy 1/0 story lines were just on completely different levels, and it's pretty much continued throughout the rest of this season. Sometimes the jokes land better one episode than another, but the overall plotting is way down.

Yeah, it also wasn't funny because the punchline was thunderingly obvious given what we already know about Ron.

Well that doesnt mean that it can't be funny. A lot of comedy characters have a running joke. Just to take Friends as an example, we (or i, at least) laughed for several seasons at the lameness of Chandler with chick, or the geekiness of Ross with dinosaures, or the spoiled attitude of Rachel, and so on.

You can't come up with different type of jokes, asides from the specifics like eggs and bacon here, when playing the same character. I think the joke was well into character and eventho we know that Ron eats a lot, the delivery of the joke was good. And, yes, we all saw it coming, but I dont think it matters that much.

meh i thought the eggs joke was funny.

the tom/ann plot is painfully bad especially with how they've developed the characters. the amazing thing to me is, theyve written tom well with girls before, he wasnt anything like this with them, why does he have to be this way with ann? why is she his dream girl again? because shes hot? he knows nothing about her and everything he has learned hes criticized, if anything this would lead him to be more like his single self than the sad/whiny version weve seen with ann.

they have a girl that has terrific chemistry with him AND is believable in the bartender chick that broke up w him bc he was hung up on his "ex-wife". she made an appearance earlier this season iirc. ann has ALWAYS hated tom and could pretty much get any guy she wants, settling for tom bc he "wore her down" and staying with him despite his absurd antics is both unbelievable and stupid.

i believe the problem is ann, she really is useless on this show unless shes with a guy. its time for her to go despite how hot she is. she adds nothing. tom is better off with bartender girl or by himself kickin it with jean ralphio