The Game highlights strong, intelligent women who refuse to fall victim to the pitfalls of living with football players and who strive to build and maintain their own unique identities outside of the supporting roles they play in the NFL franchise.
Mowry herself is charming and capable, and Wendy Raquel Robinson has some fine moments as the mother-manager, but it's clear that The Game is to be played on the surface of these potentially interesting lives.
As a been-there football wife, Kelly boasts she can get through a "Vogue, a People, and two Ebonys by halftime." I wondered about those two Ebonys, since Kelly is the designated hot blond co-lead, but mostly I just heard the strained writing.
It just isn't funny. At all. Ever. Whatever else we may ask of sitcoms, they should at least be required to make us laugh somewhere along the half-hour line.
The Game commits all the sins you can imagine in a poorly conceived sitcom. It goes for laughs and sap, the world's most dangerous and noxious combination. It's also not funny, believable, interesting or, as previously mentioned, inspired.
This new CW series cranks out brash jokes that evaporate upon hitting the air, winds them into situations where women submit to their men, and leaves no aftertaste when it's gone. It's on TV, but it's never truly on.
