ABC
If you don’t already know, ABC is airing the remaining new episodes of Better Off Ted on Tuesdays this summer. And what better time to remind you of that than the morning after it aired?
When Ted premiered earlier this season, I liked it but was left a little cold. I was a huge fan of creator Victor Fresco’s Andy Richter Controls the Universe, for the way that show combined workplace comedy with a rounded picture of the people who worked together. Ted, I thought, was very funny but fell short mainly because of the title character: Jay Harrington played Ted as too much of a satirical stuffed shirt and slickster, as opposed to a more human Michael Bluth type.
I don’t know if either Ted or Harrington’s performance have improved or if I’ve just grown accustomed to him. But he seems now to inhabit the character rather than satirize him. In last night’s episode, in which Ted needily befriended the lab guys and became obsessed with their Medieval Fight Club—all, it turned out, as a way of sublimating his anger toward his ex-wife—he showed us some chinks in his highly-polished armor. (Ironically, by putting on armor.)
And everything else in the show that works, works so well that I’d be enjoying it even without more affection for Ted. Portia de Rossi, in particular, shows that her Arrested Development wasn’t just a one-off; in fact, her Veronica—all smarm and quizzical bird-like stares—may be an even better performance. And the fake Veridian Dynamics commercials get better by the week. If you have a spare half-hour in your viewing schedule—and come on, you do, it’s summer—take a weekly meeting with Ted.