Andy Barker, P.I.

As you likely read in my Today's News blog, Andy Barker has been hastily ushered off NBC's lineup, and last night's double bill was likely the last we shall see of our intrepid sleuth. Unfortunately my schedule did not afford me the chance to view the episodes, but please feel free to use this blog to discuss it amongst yourselves.

As I said in the news blog, it's a shame this show didn't catch on, as it had a wholesome, sweet, suburban feel to it. Not every sitcom needs to be littered with pop culture shout-outs and knowing winks.

RIP, P.I.

PS. Now how about that prequel spin-off "Guy Halverson, Two Tons of Don Juan"?

Here I was, fresh from penning the 30 Rock recap, prepared to shrug at the relative humor of Andy Barker, P.I. — I mean, 30 Rock is 30 Rock — but our stalwart accountant/private investigator combination served up a pretty good time. I've decided that the cartoony, ready-to-be-solved-in-22-minutes mysteries are akin to Police Squad!, with broadly drawn broads and gummy-bear goons. I loved Drebin & Co., so that's a favorable comparison.

It's interesting that this week's guest star, Traci Lords, hailing from an early (porn) career known for bad acting, is... wow, she's a bad actress. But perfect for this week's purposes, as Geneva Marseilles (CC had "Marsay," but I have to think they were going for the history-rich one-two) wasn't Oscar-caliber either.

The bullets:
• This week's dollop of man-wife tenderness: Jenny tilting her heel as she pecks Andy.
• Andy's bean-counter humor: "They don't call it Quicken because it slows your pulse."
• "You bit me! What are you, four?!"
• Simon to the late-night stakeout crew: "I don't want any cracks about my retainer."
• Lew eyeballing the whipped cream-topped coffees Simon brought for the stakeout: "I'm growing a set of jugs just looking at this thing." (And Wally scolding Simon, "We sell coffee here, you know.")
• As Lew beats on Andy's father-in-law, Simon "helping" by flailing around "like Ann-Margret."
• Andy re: Jacobsmeyers' blackmail photos: "It could be worse. They could have put two candles in your bottom."
• Andy to Simon: "Why is '48 minutes' written on the back of the [video] box?" Mmmmm-hmmmm....
• Wally set to give Andy's FIL a second beat-down: "Today I am an American!"
• Goon 1 to Goon 2, to test the stolen credit-card numbers: "Go to gap.com and get me some wrinkle-free pants. 44 waist."

And how many chase scenes are initiated by the search for a Wi-Fi signal? To file a tax return??

So, to date on NBC's Andy Barker, P.I., we've had a Russian mob-lette hoodwinking our valiant CPA into finding a "dead" man; a murderous, gay golf caddy; and now a ruthless low-grade chicken cartel abetted by a poultry inspector with a thing for collectible pistols. This week's adventure, in which kebab-shop owner Wally sics Andy (and thus Simon) on his shady supplier, was a bit on the super-silly side for my "high-brow comedy likings," but the "mysteries" obviously are just clotheslines on which to hang humorous reactions and jokes. I mean, yeah, 30 Rock has "plots," too, but that show's zany delivery is really the star.

I like how we got some more "tender" from Andy and his wife — his office has a great view, he boasts, indicating a framed pic of Jill — awww! But I missed Nicole, though maybe she is better in measured doses. And you had to relish the new reveals about gruff 'n' tuff Lew, who apparently had some unfinished business with a bird.

The bullets:

• Jenny trying to pronounce Wally's name: "Wal-lee." Then later suggesting he Americanize it now that he's in the U.S.
• A mustache almost magically appearing on Simon, making him the spitting image of Borat.
• Andy's lip-smacking explanation of the "boil-BQ" process.
• The jerk-chicken hawker deriding Transcorp's poultry as "all beaks and knuckles." Ewwww.
• Lew working the bag at the gym: "Take that, Castro!"
• Lew describing Big Chicken as "like the pork business, but without a conscience."
• Simon critiquing Andy's inability to shake a tail: "Because you keep signaling!"
• The Barkers' mailduck.
• Andy imagining a desperate Wally luring park pigeons into a net.
• Lew mourning ol' Dolores Freeman: "Somewhere in hell, somebody is putting wood to a quality broad." I'll have to remember that the next time I don't know what to say at a memorial service.
• Lew (again), taunting coffee-drinking Simon: "Guess you didn't need to bring sugar. You've got enough in your shoes."
• Andy trying to avoid being killed for knowing too much: "Or I could sign a nondisclosure agreement. Those are binding in court."
• Andy incensed at being labeled a "bookkeeper."
• And lastly, Lew's long-in-the-coming face-off with his foul friend: "Hey, remember me? I'm Lew Stasiak and I'm all grown up now."

Reminder: As Andy Barker continues, 30 Rock returns early next week and in a new 9 pm/ET time slot.

Here we are, nine hours later, and Guy Halverson sprinting down the fairway, a hoagie bursting with "three kinds of ham" in his grasp, still haunts my noggin. What made the recurring image so damn funny, though, isn't its subject matter — large man plus flailing sandwich plus slow motion — but Andy Richter's expression of disbelief each time he went into and out of the flashback. "Ah, yes [his mistress was] jealous.... Ya think?" The theme song for Guy's last gallop didn't hurt either.

And that, folks, brings us to a discussion of Week 2 (of 6) of NBC's Andy Barker, P.I.. As I said before, what makes this show sing is the casting. Clea Lewis is the supportive wife every guy wants (and, in this case, wants Guy). And Tony Hale opposite Nicole Randall Johnson shows seriously funny promise. I love how Nicole (as Nicole the self-hired assistant) "switches on" that perky, entirely false demeanor en route to making the person she's talking to feel like a fool.

Perhaps my only recurring quibble is that the cases Andy takes on have outcomes ("twists" is too generous a word) you see coming down Broadway. Even if you don't work near Broadway, as I do. But if I had to choose, I'd always take Andy Barker's warmed-over Columbo with fresh, crackling humor over brilliant mystery-telling saddled with lame jokes.

The bullets:

• Guy's ice-cream carton half-full outlook on life: "I like to think that I'm 66 percent not body fat."
• A variation on the Platoon score as Guy collapsed to the ground.
• Nicole to Andy: "The fact that you hired me as your assistant more than makes up for [her getting fired at the archives]." But he didn't hire you.
• Andy cocking his eyebrow at wife Jenny's confession that she, too, was hot for Guy: "But he was so huge. And he was kinda dirty. And pretty smelly, too." Jenny's retort? "Those are called pheromones , Andy, and he was lousy with 'em!"
• Simon's come-ons to Nicole: "We could watch Jungle Fever... or Taxi with Jimmy Fallon and Queen Latifah" — and then later suggestively biting at a (yes) black-and-white cookie.
• Question for my fellow 30 Rock ers: Do you think golf pro June Park is related to NBC page Grace Park and/or the Battlestar Galactica chick?
• Jenny IMing Andy in bed, "Why the long face?" Don't you just love her?!
• Andy on stakeout: "'I wonder who,' said the owl.... "
• Nicole — whom Andy didn't hire — badgering him about the health plan, because, "I'm trying to schedule some elective surgery." Then later griping, "I busted my ass to get here by 11 o'clock!"
• Lew evoking a mental image that, unlike Guy on the greens, we'd like to forget: "You look lower than the nipples on a wet nurse at an orphanage." OK, ewwwww.
• Andy "clubbing" the murderer at the climax of this week's clumsy chase scene: "Now that's how you hit a pitching wedge!" — and the groundskeeper correcting him.

I'm gonna miss Guy, though. Coulda been a fun recurring character.

If you're a 30 Rock fan and know me from that show blog, it's good to see you joining me here. To everyone else, greetings, I will be your host for these six episodes of NBC's Andy Barker, P.I.

Previously in the 30 Rock blog, I talked up Andy some, if only to assure fans of Tina Fey, Alec Baldwin, et al, that their time slot would be in capable hands. Since then, it's been good to see the legit TV critics throw some praise Andy Richter's way, as this show certainly has sharp writing, but perhaps more importantly some very nice casting. I will admit, my exposure to Andy has been minimal (having never been a Conan fan). But I do like him in this role of a hapless "cheese and crackers"-cussing accountant resigned to a vanilla office in a vanilla strip mall, then seduced by the invitation — from the Wrigley's Orbit gum gal — to walk on the wild side as a private dick.

Andy Barker ups the ante further by surrounding Richter with a winning ensemble. Clea Lewis (Ellen) is perfect as Jenny, the dutiful, geeky-flirty and never-nagging wife. Tony Hale of Arrested Development fame pairs sympathetic despair with gung-ho zeal as bored-out-of-his-gourd video-store clerk Simon. Harve Presnell as mentor PI Lew Staziak? I could listen to him bark out the phone book. But the icing on the cake is Madtv's Nicole Randall Johnson as Andy's never-hired secretary. If line delivery were currency, she'd be filthy rich.

This week's "case" was so-so, I'll admit — Wally's 24-caliber security cameras? How'd Andy know there'd be a PA system at hand in the abandoned warehouse? — but next week's is a howler.

That said, my bullets (aka fave lines or moments):

• Jenny to her hubby: "That Judging Amy we TiVo'd isn't going to watch itself."
• "I didn't think they could top Miss Congeniality 1, but boy, did they come close."
• The "overboard" signage at Wally's kebabs: "Go USA People!" and "No MSG, Yes USA."
• Andy re: Chinatown: "Is that with Jackie Chan?"
• Simon re: Wally: "This man came to America in the wheel well of a jumbo jet."
• "Ohh, a tax return. Things just got interesting."
• One of Nicole Randall Johnson's best lines: <fake smile> "Sure! I'd do anything for you!" </fake smile>
• Simon telling a caller to the store, "We don't have Meet the Fockers" — all the while a whole Fockers display is in the background behind him. Simon then hanging up on Andy to tend to "a beefy goth chic in horror."
• Lew advising Andy: "You got your boy into hot water. Let's see if you got the Mike and Ikes to get him out."
• Andy telling Nadia her Russian gang is "throwing money away" by renting the abandoned warehouse.
• Andy revving it up to a responsible 45 mph during the chase.
• The end, when Andy deciding to keep at the PI biz even though, "I've got hot links I was going to grill."

All six Andy Barker episodes are streaming, I believe, at NBC.com already, but please, let's all be considerate and not "read ahead" and spoil specifics, since some here will be watching in real time. Thank you!