DEREK

 

**1/2 (out of ****)

 

 

 

 

If Matthew Weiner and Vince Gilligan are living the dramatic television dream, having full control of their shows, a control that they will probably continue to have long after their respective shows have gone off the air, then Ricky Gervais might be living the comedic version. He has an idea for a show, he makes the show. He has control. He dictates how long the show will go for. His track record is pretty good. He only works with networks, like the BBC, HBO, and his new home, Netflix, that nurture his creativity, and essentially leave him alone. Through this system, he has given us the world altering The Office, and the incredibly underrated Extras, which is more and more looking like some sort of apex, combining the awkward laughter of everything that came before it with the need to deliver messages to the common man in an attempt to make the world a better place. The less said about Life’s Too Short, the better. In between, we’ve got podcasts and awards hosting gigs, and cartoons, and a little stand-up. And now we’re back to what Gervais does best: creating a character that allows him to use everyone on the planet as a foil, which means, based on that description, Derek was doomed from the start. Once again, we get another lesson from the school of Too Much Power Isn’t Always a Good Thing.

 

Ricky Gervais stars as Derek, using his most capitalized ACTING to date. Derek “works” (it seemed like he might just be a volunteer, or works for nothing but room and board) at an old folks home. He doesn’t really have a specific job or jobs, other than being very, very nice to the old people. See, Derek is…special. What kind of special is never really spelled out, although the money grubbing white man that funds the old folks home really, really believes Derek is autistic, and is very interested in getting him tested. He is white and money grubbing, and probably knows about tax breaks you can get if you employ an autistic person. Or he knows that their souls taste the best, and wants to suck him dry, the thrill of normal food having been extinguished long ago. As Derek and his cronies explain to the old man, it doesn’t matter what he is. He’s just Derek, mother fuckers.

 

Comedies featuring handicapable people were essentially murdered by the Farrelly brothers ten years or so. With each movie that they made, the Farrelly brothers would include more and more handicapped people. It got to the point where it seemed the entire point of making the movie was to let us all know that they LOVED handicapped people, as opposed to the rest of us, who were hoping that one day someone would ship them all to some sort of island. Gervais tries to deftly walk this tightrope as well, giving us very few set-pieces where Derek is the butt of the jokes, and instead focuses the spotlight on the non-handcapped people, making them the dirty assholes. Sometimes Derek even outsmarts the non-handicapped! This is all well and good, but if you take it too far, you don’t make us realize that people like Derek are actually just like us, but instead, people like Derek are fucking saints, only down here on Earth to help a couple of us get to Heaven, where Derek will sit next to us for all eternity, rubbing our heads and telling us stories about kittens and puppies hugging each other.

 

In the end, Derek teaches you as much about handicapped people and old people and kindness as Crash teaches you about racism: you’ll learn a lot if you’ve never watched a movie or met a person. If you have done either of those things, some of Derek can get pretty unbearable. By the end of the series, the show has bashed you over the head so many times with its messages that you start to worry if any of it wasn’t a waste of time. If it was all a waste of time, why was I always so eager to get to the next episode?

 

Maybe Ricky Gervais has earned so much faith over the last 15 years that I kept thinking that some of this stuff would straighten out. Maybe I wanted to watch the next episode so I could get the series watched as fast as possible. Or maybe there’s many different kinds of schmaltzy garbage, and the presence of Gervais, along with superstar Karl Pilkington, will always make it rise a little above average. This is destined to be a polarizing show, not because some people will get it and some people won’t, but because some people will smile enough to overlook the constant delivery of maudlin bullshit, and some people won’t be able to tolerate it. I get both arguments. There’s so much stuff in here that, when I see it in other movies and TV shows, I want to shit into a box and mail it to the people in charge. Some of it is mind-blowingly stupid. When the old people sleep, that dream footage of themselves as young people. When Kev, a character who both jerks off in a library and shits himself during a party planning committee meeting, reflects on Derek, he begins to cry because of the level of Derek’s kindness. Yet I still think that there’s a chance that all of this doesn’t completely ruin the show for you. It might not bother you at all. Nah, it will. Watch at your own risk.

 

-Ryan Haley