The new season of Two and a Half Men started in Fall 2011 with a new lead actor; Ashton Kutcher, who takes the place of Charlie Sheen. I have been a long time fan of the show and I wasn’t sure about the change but I had seen Ashton Kutcher’s work before and thought there was at least a possibility that he could fit into Two and a Half Men. Anyway, I decided to give the show a chance and I watched Ashton Kutcher debut as Walden Schmidt, a young billionaire whose marriage was on the rocks.
The first episode was a little slow and only had a few chuckles for me but I kept watching Two and a Half Men because I assumed it would get better as the story of Walden Schmidt unfolded. Fortunately the show did get funnier as the craziness of Walden Schmdit became apparent. Evidently, Kutcher’s character, Walden Schmidt, had been married to one woman, Bridget, for many years until she decided she wanted a divorce. She said she still loved Walden but she wanted more from the relationship. In a later episode, when Walden visits Alan’s therapist (Jane Lynch) we find that Bridget took care of Walden in the same way that Walden’s mother had taken care of him.
Ashton’s character on the show lets Charlie’s brother, Alan and his son Jake, stay and live with him, in Charlie’s old house (which Walden bought) and the two become good friends. Walden frequently runs around the house naked, which is usually funny in one way or another. Berta is still around and she is now Walden’s housekeeper. As the show progresses, Walden appears to finally get over his feelings for his ex-wife as he does a bit of bed hopping until finally he meets a new lady, Zoey, whom he professes to love.
I find that the new Two and a Half Men, isn’t quite as funny as I had hoped it would be. I have watched each new episode and found some of them to be quite funny but then others fall flat. For instance, in one week’s episode, we find that Walden had been raised with a young gorilla in the role of his brother because Walden’s mother wanted to experiment. But she never told Walden that his “brother” had been a gorilla who had been removed from the home so Walden had always believed that he’d had a brother who either died or just disappeared or who had been sent away because he was bad. That plot device was not as funny as it might sound instead it was just rather lame.
I will probably continue to watch Two and a Half Men, at least for now, but I definitely think the show’s writers need to make a few changes. So far, the humor has not been consistent in each episode. I believe the possibility for huge laughs is there but I believe the writers will need to make a few changes to up the humor quotient so that I can continue to watch the show and hopefully catch a few laughs.
You can watch the show ‘Two and a Half Men’ on CBS Monday nights at 9PM.