Derek’s first season provided an interesting challenge for Ricky Gervais: to create a character that had zero unlikeable qualities, but was still able to generate laughs through misunderstandings and the foibles of the human condition. Whether you were a fan or not, it was going to be worthwhile to see how he handled it.
While I still have plenty of questions remaining from the first season of the show, for the most part, I appreciate Gervais’s lofty aims. He is urging us to take a long, hard look at the type of people we might otherwise ignore, particularly the elderly shuffling through their final days in these often cheerless care facilities. And he encourages everyone to try a little harder in our lives to approach our daily interactions with a lot more kindness, a laudable message even if it carries with it a lot of treacly sentiment.
The beginning of Season Two doesn’t let up on these ideals, but the first episode feels unmoored from the seven that preceded it. New characters are brought into the mix, with Derek’s father taking a room in the home and a brash gent named Greg onboard to supposedly help out. Some fresh wrinkles are introduced as it is revealed that Hannah, the chief caretaker, and Tom are trying to have a baby (which leads to the funniest exchange in the show as Tom’s grandmother explains to Derek the difference between a vagina, cervix, and uterus) and Dougie quitting after getting frustrated with the conditions of his job and the home. All of that is skimmed right over, though, and there is no real plot to carry us through to the end of the 22-minute program.