Going Dutch – “Pilot”
Written by Joel Church-Cooper
Directed by Trent O’Donnell
Created by Joel Church-Cooper
Airs Thursdays at 9:30pm EST on FOX
At first glance, FOX’s new military comedy Going Dutch seems fairly predictable fare, a Denis Leary-starring comedy about a disgraced servicemember who finds himself leading a quirky assemblage of personalities. And to be fair, Going Dutch‘s first episode certainly has some light “Enlisted meets Rescue Me!” vibes to it – however, there’s a bit of a more solemn, contemplative side lurking just underneath the surface of “Pilot”, which is where the comedy holds a lot of its intriguing potential – even if most of said potential still feels unrealized by the end of the first episode.
Going Dutch was created and written by Joel Church-Cooper – whose previous series, Brockmire, was one of the most underrated shows of the 2010s, and is much closer to what Going Dutch is skewing towards, rather than a typical modern nice core situational sitcom. Going Dutch stars Denis Leary as Colonel Patrick Quinn, a decorated military veteran who gets reassigned to U.S Army Garrison Stroopsdorf, a military base in the Netherlands (considered the “least important Army base in the world”) after a recording of an expletive-filled diatribe against another commander is unearthed – a service base his estranged daughter (Maggie, played by Talyor Misiak) is currently in command of, no less.
The parallels to Brockmire, which starred a disgraced baseball announcer trying to restart his career in a tiny minor league market, are abundantly obvious: and with Going Dutch, Joel Church-Cooper makes a pretty strong bid to be the definitive writer behind series about narcissistic curmudgeons embedded in American institutions (and if Going Dutch eventually embraces the dystopian undertones Brockmire did, we are in for a treat). However, “Pilot” is not completely derivative of Chuch-Cooper’s previous work; Going Dutch, with its eclectic band of secondary characters and its strong intergenerational conflict, is a bit lighter in tone and delivery than Brockmire – which, sometimes, works against the pilot’s attempts to build conflict between Leary’s Patrick and his new subordinates, who run a service base known for its fromagerie and bowling alley, rather than their combat accolades and proficiency.
However, when “Pilot” leans into some of its more serious elements, it shows a propensity to be a sitcom with some interesting interpersonal aspirations; after the first half works through its carefully-constructed exposition to put Patrick in his new, Netherlands-based home (the series was actually filmed in Ireland on a real military base), the second half mostly works on exploring the longstanding chasm between father and daughter, estranged for unknown reasons (though assumed to be Patrick’s hard-headed parenting style, which we’re not given much of a glance of in “Pilot”). Though the conflicts and parallels between Patrick and Maggie are rather obvious, “Pilot” still is a bit underwhelming when it comes to unveiling the big emotional conflict at the core of its series, even if the emotional potential is obvious (and potent).
The big problem is that the dynamic is mostly one-sided: Going Dutch still has a long way to go with Maggie, Patrick’s daughter, and understanding how she fits into the rhythms of the series. At one point, she talks about her political aspirations beyond the military, but “Pilot” never grounds that in anything tangible about her character, or how that contrasts with her father’s own lofty, unrealized military goals. For much of “Pilot”, Maggie’s character is mostly a reactionary question mark, which limits the effectiveness of their reintroduction – and more importantly, the sense of pathos at the heart of the show’s obvious redemption story.
The rest of “Pilot” is spent establishing the base’s set of misfits, which include Patrick’s XO (Community‘s Danny Pudi), Laci Mosley as another sergeant – and briefly, Catherine Tate doing a terrible accent as one of the local businesspeople (specifically, a brothel). These scenes, while amusing, are where Going Dutch feels its most perfunctory; however, none of these personalities are inherently uninteresting, it’s more a matter of Going Dutch struggling, like most sitcom pilots do, to find time to firmly establish anyone outside of its main protagonists. To its credit, it does that fairly well: while I’d like to see both Patrick, and the show’s observational comedy, get a bit sharper and more vulgar (as much as Fox will allow, of course), “Pilot” does a mostly good job introducing the emotional spaces of its top line characters.
Given how little both Enlisted and Brockmire were in their day (though the latter did get FOUR seasons on IFC, a miracle I still occasionally celebrate), it’s a big “if” whether Going Dutch will be given enough room to fully flesh out the pathos of its major arcs and find its voice as an ensemble comedy. It also could use a bit of time developing its comedic voice; though much of “Pilot” is intriguing and shows some comedic potential (especially with Pudi’s character, who prides themselves on efficiently solving any problem without taking credit for it), there isn’t a whole lot of it realized in the opening episode – there may be a few smiling nods, but “Pilot” lacks a signature comedic moment, which does make the first 22 minutes of the series feel a bit lacking in energy when it’s not letting Leary deliver monologuing rants about how bewildered and disappointed Patrick is with his new professional situation.
However, the right creative elements are in place for Going Dutch to be one of the more unsuspecting hits of the new season – and again, knowing Brockmire‘s nascent beginnings and what that series would eventually grow to become, certainly gives the series an easily projectible arc of growth. Whether it realizes that potential, of course, remains to be seen – but with a strong pilot script and a great cast, Going Dutch certainly has an opportunity to be a good show – and perhaps more importantly, help FOX start rebuilding its comedic brand.