The Crazy Ones: “Models Love Magic” (Episode 1.10)

When The Crazy Ones was announced, I’ll admit to being mildly intrigued by the possibilities of this cast together in a new comedy. However, when the first promos aired, my interest waned substantially. From the outside, it looked like nothing more than Robin Williams acting like an idiot, with Sarah Michelle Gellar being underutilized as the daughter who’s dealt with this insanity her entire life, and an entire cast of actors I like who will probably each be one-note.

Though I was right, it’s never right to judge a book by its cover. Or at least, that’s the lesson The Crazy Ones is going for in “Models Love Magic.” Unfortunately, it goes about it in a very stupid and condescending way, managing to completely negate the very lesson it’s trying to convey.

For no discernible reason, Victoria’s Secret models are coming to the office to do their Fantasy Bra commercial photo shoot. I’d really love to see that office memo: “Hey guys, on Wednesday can everyone move your desks so that we can shoot maybe the most popular bra ad in our offices? They can afford a $10 million dollar bra, but apparently have no location budget.”

Being that all we know about Lauren is that she is probably mentally unstable, of course she sneaks away with the bra that has its own bodyguard (played by Breaking Bad’s Huell!), puts it on and then can’t get it off. While Zach, Andrew and Lauren are trying to deal with the bra, Sydney is trying to show the models that she’s mentally superior to them. It all ends with Sydney being schooled by Adriana Lima’s model book club discussion of the works of Kafka, proving that models can be smart too, I guess?

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Yet just minutes earlier, Zach and Andrew discovered that the models can easily be won over with magic, which it’s also hinted at that they believe in. I’m not saying that smart people can’t have silly fascinations, but it was hard to figure out just what the show was saying on the subject of models and brains.

Speaking of easily distracted people, Simon and business partner Gordon go on a lunch meeting with a pie-selling client. These two brothers hint at liking something a bit more simple and to be safe, Gordon implies that he’s not gay, but is married to a woman to seem more normal to these “narrow-minded clients.” Gordon is terrified that Simon is going to ruin things by being too open-minded. He even gets worried when Simon says hello to a friend of his that is French. Can’t let those pie makers think they know any gay people or French people. That would ruin everything!

But at the end of the meeting, the pie makers couldn’t care less if Gordon is gay or not, since it’s a private matter, though they do let it slip that Gordon’s definitely going to hell because of it.

Help me as I try to follow the writerly logic here: First, Gordon thinks they hate gays for basically no reason. Then, they realize they shouldn’t have judged these people. But almost immediately after, it turns out his suspicions were right and they are judgmental, just not enough to lose their business. So … what exactly was the point of the story here?

These mixed messages and boring, old sitcom ideas are just made worse by the fact that The Crazy Ones isn’t funny at all. When discussing the agency’s clientele, Simon says that the reason people come to them is because of the colorfulness he brings, while Gordon maintains that plenty of people like things boring and bland. At this point in The Crazy Ones, that means plenty of people are getting exactly what they want.