Matthew Gengler: The canon is now defined by what you can stream, what is available, especially what is in front of you right now. And while this is probably most troubling in the realm of scholarship, I am a reference librarian by day, as someone who spent the better part of a decade shedding DVDs and CDs. I find this problematic because I am bored. At any given time, we are all plumbing the depths of Netflix and Hulu for something interesting to say at a party, whether it’s that you watched the Levon Helms documentary and you found it both touching and also kind of hard to finish, or that you finally made it through Ran, even though it’s a lie and you fell asleep, or that you read the reviews of Rob Schneider’s Rob and found them more interesting than the actual show. Here at least, it appears most of us agree. Rob Schneider, the truly not ready for primetime player of the ‘90s SNL cast, has produced a really boring television show.
Perhaps it is not surprising that Rob is disliked. The actor has recently been vilified as a shill for the anti-vaccination crowd. It’s understandable that in an industry that relies on likeability, that when an actor becomes unlikeable, their characters become unlikeable. But then, what if the character is the actor. If the plot synopsis of one particularly bad review is to be believed, Rob is kind of like Larry David, but, “without the humor, wit or self-awareness.”
So here it is, something to say at a party. Rob Schneider’s new show is bad. How bad, as one reviewer puts it, “So you still watch a guy be unlikeable while still having an unrealistically attractive wife.” Here is the rub. The actress who plays Rob’s wife is Rob’s wife. This then turns into a kind of review of the actor himself. Do we no longer like Rob Schneider, or is it that he isn’t likeable enough to justify his unrealistically attractive wife? Maybe she becomes less likeable in later episodes. I don’t know, I only read the reviews. Rob’s wife, on the show at least, is mentioned multiple times in the reviews. When Rob receives a higher marks, it is often in comparison to his wife, who is apparently, “just awful.” But again, this is his actual wife, and in my emotional arc of reading the reviews, it is easy to feel bad for Rob and his horrible wife.
There is one positive review of the show, “It got better as it went. My wife and I both loved it.” It is unclear if this was written by Rob, but it sounds like it.
Video after the ump.
