Review: The McCarthys

The McCarthys was a 30 minute comedy series on CBS about a close-knit working class Boston clan whose sports legacy runs deep in the family. But when somewhat athletically challenged and openly gay son, Ronny, is chosen by his father to be his assistant high school basketball coach, much to the surprise of his more qualified siblings. The series debuted on CBS during the 2014–15 television season, later CBS pulled The McCarthys from the schedule after 11 episodes, with 4 unaired episodes left and officially cancelled the series after only one season.

Here's the cast.

Tyler Ritter as Ronny McCarthy, 

a 29-year-old openly gay man and guidance counselor who must choose between a great opportunity to move to Rhode Island and an offer to work with his dad as an assist. high school basketball coach.

Laurie Metcalf as Marjorie McCarthy, 

a mother of four children. Her favorite is Ronny, with whom she watches The Good Wife.

Jack McGee as Arthur McCarthy, 

Marjorie's husband and father of four. He is the head basketball coach at a Catholic high school and wants to hire Ronny as his assistant.

Jimmy Dunn as Sean McCarthy, 

Arthur and Marjorie's son and the fraternal twin brother of Gerard.

Joey McIntyre as Gerard McCarthy, 

Arthur and Marjorie's son and the fraternal twin brother of Sean.

Kelen Coleman as Jackie McCarthy, 

Arthur and Marjorie's only daughter, who is single and pregnant.

All told, the best part of The McCarthys is its cast. Ritter is likable in the lead role, and Laurie Metcalf made the show as Ronny's confused-but-caring mother. Character actors Jack McGee (the dad) and Jimmy Dunn (the brother) are put to good use based on their looks alone. Kelen Coleman was nice to look at and obligated to mention former New Kid On the Block Joey McIntyre.

CBS really missed the mark! The McCarthys was a good show with possibilities. The production quality was good but series started a little mediocre and predictable, though it get better with each episode. They could've try some new writers with some of the old but networks need to stop pulling shows after only one season. ALL shows should be 2 year season minimum because it sometimes takes a while for a good show to get noticed. With all the TV watching opportunities these days, you can no longer expect even a great show to get noticed right away. So you really need to give shows a better chance to succeed, instead of pushing a group of new crappy shows at us each season.

Consensus: I actually thought the show was pretty funny with above-par performances. But the obvious reason I love the show is the eye candy. Namely one Jack McGee.

Jack was down right adorable as Arthur.

The living room set where most of the show takes place. 

You'd think they'd be more scenes with Arthur and Ronny coaching being said coaches in all.

In many of The McCarthys scenes, Arthur is sitting in his chair, watching TV, eating or reading looking handsome in what ever he wore.

Laurie Metcalf and Jack McGee are the two reasons why I love this show. Metcalf pretty much steals every scene she's in and McGee is simply eye candy. The show overall is average at best, 

but the eye candy.... ohhhh yeah, that's paramount!

Crash and Burn

Having seen a lot of movies about the future, whether it be evil corporations taking over, the development of killer robots, or an environment ruined by man's hubris. Unfortunately for the people inhabiting this movie, all three have happened; it has been a bad century.

From the start, the movie feeding us morsels of details about how this world works and introduces us to our hero Tyson Keen (Paul Ganus). Tyson is making a delivery to a local TV station run by Lathan Hooks (the late great Ralph Waites of The Waltons and Carnivale), a vocal dissident of Unicom and their fascist ways. Tyson buddies up with Lathan’s 16-year-old grand-daughter Arren (Megan Ward), a tech wizard who instantly develops a crush on him. The rest of the cast of characters include Parice (Eva LaRue), a teacher who does an educational program; Winston Wickett (Rescue Me’s Jack McGee), a sleazy talk show host who only has a show because his father owns the station; Quinn (Bill Moseley), the company’s workman; and Sandra (Elizabeth Mclellan) and Christie (Katherine Armstrong), two prostitutes that are guests on Winston’s show. They all end up staying the night in the station (actually an old power station converted into a TV station) as a thermal storm comes in making it unbearably hot and dangerous to be outside.

During the night, a mysterious stranger kills Lathan and the group realizes one of their number might be a ruthless synthetic human. To find out who's who, they rip off of John Carpenter's "The Thing." That is right, cut everyone's finger to see who bleeds oil, but it does not work since the synthoid are full of fake blood. They could find an easier way, like noticing the two characters who never sweat in a hot ass station, even when everyone else is dripping wet! I noticed it, probably half the viewers noticed it. So, why didn't Tyson or Arren not notice it?

They finally catch on to the fake people and soon a game of cat and mouse is played out through the station's dark corridors. None of it should surprise you, especially not one of the hookers deciding to take a shower and being killed. Only when things look hopeless does our heros play their trump card, the DV-8. You know, that big robot featured prominently on the DVD cover. You spend the entire movie waiting for the DV-8 to do something cool, but soon become very disappointed. It walks about a hundred yards, lifts up a fallen girder, steps on the synthoid, then falls to pieces.

All signs indicate "Crash and Burn" should be a forgettable, disposable movie, but in spite of its flaws, it works quite well. It's a solid mix of cheese and moderate suspense, steals some concept elements from Class of 1999, The Terminator, Robocop, Blade Runner and The Thing to name a few. Oddly dubiously marketed as Robot Jox 2 (don't expect the fights of Jox) as it contains less than a minute of giant Robot action. "Crash and Burn" is a solid purchase for a b-movie freak, and a solid rental for everyone else.

Now with all that being said, I might be a bit bias because of real reason I watched this. Namely one Jack McGee who makes this movie for me. Jack's a lot heavier in this flic with nice shots of his sweaty chest and belly.

The scene where he's awakened by emergency alarms after sleeping with some hookers all sweaty and plump was nice.

The director could have treated us with a little sex scene with Jack like they did with the male lead. Sex scenes in a B movie is never a bad thing. Later, in another shirtless scene, he's tending a cut he received from the synthoid earlier in the film.

And another plus for the film is it has an appearance by ole pa Walton. 

My only problem with the film was that it was made in in the early 90s. So the video quality isn't all that great. But if you look around, you can find some copies that have OK to good video quality. Strangely enough, the blooper reel on my copy has a better video quality than the actual film. Speaking of which, highly recommend watching if your a McGee fan (you probably are if your reading this) especially a heavier McGee fan. Well the entire film is for a heavier McGee fan.