Last night saw the debut of TNT’s Trust Me, a light, harmless, but strangely already dated-seeming ad-business dramedy that I reviewed earlier this month:
It has the misfortune of sharing this subject with the masterpiece Mad Men, though its period (the present) and tone (comedy-drama) are far different. Mason (Eric McCormack) and Conner (Tom Cavanagh) are partners at a Chicago agency, getting by on caffeine and zingers. It’s innocuous fun–Cavanagh (Ed) exhales charm as effortlessly as most mammals do carbon dioxide–but predictable, down to the pilot’s last-minute-inspiration-in-the-pitch-meeting climax.
And strangely, the show–conceived before autumn’s economic free fall–seems further from today than Don Draper’s 1962: the office is flush, everyone has iPhones and drinks Starbucks, and no one is getting downsized. Trust Me may have to adjust its depiction of business–if the viewers don’t lay it off first.
Anyone watch? So what did the focus group think?