Go On

Tonight, as NBC wraps up their coverage of the Olympics and their interview with Misty Mae-Trainer and her partner Carrie, a sneak preview of NBC's new show Go On was aired. This isn't the first time a preview of a show has been tacked on to the end of a sports broadcast, especially, if you've seen the annual drama, Who Gets the Coveted Spot after the Superbowl, and it is certainly not the last time it'll happen. If you missed the preview, you'll just have to wait to watch on September 11th, after The Voice.

So, how's the show? Well, it depends on whether or not you’re a fan of Matthew Perry. If you liked Friends or the short lived ABC comedy Mr. Sunshine, you can imagine a Chandler Bing who has just lost Monica, but without his closest friends to help cope with the loss.

Matthew Perry plays the generically named Ryan King, a sportscaster, who has just endured the loss of his wife. After returning to work, a month after his wife's death. His boss, played by John Cho, forces him into to ten sessions of group therapy. The group is a band of misfits prone to comparing their grief. In this group there are many characters.

Owen, played by Tyler James Williams, has a brother who is in a coma after a skiing accident. Laura Benati as Lauren Schnider, is the group leader. Julie White, as Anne, is a lesbian lawyer currently in the 'anger' stage of her grief after her partner dies. There is a strange man named Mr. K, who everyone is slightly frightened of, so no one knows exactly what he's grieving about. This quirky character is played by Brett Gelman. There's the blind man, who suffered a stroke, three heart attacks, a broken hip, and arthritis. His name is George and he's played by Bill Cobbs.

Perry becomes the unwilling leader of this band of misfits, after his session where he gets the members of the group to play to find out, once and for all, whose problems are worse than the others, which he claims, is what everyone is thinking anyway. It's a lithe, funny sequence. It's also surprisingly dark, but Perry has great fun with it. Perry certainly does the character justice, mixing the sadness and rage well with his unique sense of sarcasm and comedy. It's a really good and unique start to a show, but it's easy to imagine the characters falling in to caricature and the jokes never quite going anywhere. If you’re a Matthew Perry fan, there isn't a reason not to give it a shot.