Denis Leary Military sitcom takes time to mature
More than a decade after the quick cancellation of the underrated show “Enlisted,” Fox has taken another bite at the apple of a sitcom set in the U.S. military. As with its predecessor, the midseason premiere ‘Going Dutch’ contrasts the global reach of the central employer with the intimate one of the immediate family. What it adds to this shared premise is a long litany of jokes about bicycles, tulips, prostitution, bluntness as a cultural value and cheese.
In ‘Going Dutch’, created by Joel Church-Cooper (‘Brockmire’), Denis Leary – also executive producer, along with his son Jack – plays Colonel Patrick Quinn, a career officer exiled to Stroopsdorf, ‘the least important army’. basis in the world.” The Dutch outpost’s bowling alley, laundry facilities and top-notch fromagerie are under the interim command of Patrick’s estranged daughter Maggie (Taylor Misiak), who defends her coworkers’ lavender-picking and silent-disco habits from the harsh judgment of her father.
As a gruff macho rageaholic, Leary just plays slightly less to type than his recent turn on “No Good Deed” as Ray Romano’s blackmailing brother. “Going Dutch” makes the most of Patrick’s fish-out-of-water laugh, forced out of the fray to man parades by some trash talk captured on bodycam during an exercise. Patrick’s boss, General Davidson (Joe Morton), is palpably happy when he sends the colonel from a more strategically important post in Germany to a surprise family reunion with Maggie, whom he hasn’t spoken to in two years. That’s by Maggie’s reckoning, since Patrick hasn’t even noticed his own child no longer making contact.
In the three episodes offered to critics, “Going Dutch” easily entertains, especially in Patrick’s interactions with underlings like Sergeant Dana Conway (Laci Mosley, of the “Scam Goddess” podcast) and Corporal Elias Papadakis (Hal Cumpston). Whether you denigrate Papadakis as “a fat hippie on a bicycle” or become apoplectic that Conway spends a small portion of the Pentagon’s budget on purchasing fine wines for the commissary, there is a fruitful culture clash in a jingoistic American ensnared is catching up with Europe’s lax pace.
Like a wheel of ripening gouda, other elements of “Going Dutch” may need more time to mature. On the conceptual front, the show shares an underlying tension with “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” and other light comedies set in flawed, scrutinized and often violent settings. There are no signs that “Going Dutch” plans to follow the “Abbott Elementary” playbook and make political discourse the driving force behind its plan, nor is it obligated to do so. But without such context, certain jokes stick out like a sore thumb. “I was so committed to completing the mission that I didn’t think about the consequences,” Maggie admits. “That’s just like every other US military mission since 2001!” Patrick answers. I’m not sure what “Going Dutch” wants audiences to make of that allusion to a quarter-century of foreign policy — but I’m certainly curious about the perspective of his deputy Abraham Shah (Danny Pudi), who largely enforces policy. Patrick’s command, while keeping his opinions to himself.
The relationship between Patrick and Maggie is more central to the series’ objectives, although Maggie is often defined more in relation to her father than as a protagonist in her own right. She is a defender of Stroopsdorf’s relaxed atmosphere, but also a West Point graduate who dates CIA agents and dreams of higher office. Synthesizing that empathy and ambition into a coherent character may take a few more episodes, even if “Going Dutch” rushes some Patrick-related subplots like a crush on a local madam (Catherine Tate). But there’s no reason to think the show won’t happen eventually, and the early episodes generate enough goodwill to buy the time it takes to sort itself out. “Going Dutch” takes the scenic route through the tulip fields on its way to a more focused, emotionally grounded show.
“Going Dutch” premieres on Fox on January 2 at 9:30 PM ET, with remaining episodes airing weekly on Thursdays.
