Casual

The season as a whole is terrific, and comes very satisfyingly full circle with all of its stories, but you might want to give the first two episodes a try tomorrow and then loop back later to watch the rest in a smaller window.

Casual is more wry than funny, but it has some sharp observations and moments. It's also got a secret weapon in Watkins.... Casual definitely gets better as it goes along.

Valerie and Alex are both oblivious and self-involved, but they also love each other, and Watkins and Dewey save them from stereotype with strong sibling chemistry and a surprisingly natural inclination for truth. This emerges slowly, in bits and pieces, often camouflaged by one-liners and set pieces (adjacent blind dates! the first one-night stand! Mom comes to town!), but it is truth nonetheless, hilarious, heartbreaking and miraculously resilient.

Iif the path is well-worn, Casual mostly transcends predictability thanks to a finely calibrated tenor that mixes gentle laughs with a wistful, resigned air.

Casual is occasionally surprising, sexually provocative and cruelly wry; despite some of the show’s faults--including a cynical through-line that occasionally reaches toxic levels of intra-family hurt and resentment--it is addictive and weirdly welcoming.

Beautifully crafted and excellently acted, Casual is well worth checking out, to see if its mood and rhythms fall in sync with yours.

Casual, which features salty language, is a smart, grown-up show for grown-ups who know the sexiest organ humans possess is the brain.

It’s the idiosyncratic story of an idiosyncratic Los Angeles family that shows how idiosyncrasy has become a formula itself. But this is a well-executed version, which becomes more than the sum of its quirks.

The half-hour series is a wise, amusing, and poignant take on personal growth and the fears and freedoms brought on by change.

The comic situations and commentary on how difficult it is to find love in the era of Twitter and texting feels organic to the three people at the center of this remarkably well-crafted and well-acted piece.

It's funny, strongly realized, self-assured and a joy to watch. You want another when the last episode is over.

Every once in a while, the writing of Casual falls into an utterly predictable trap. Too many times, it's easy to guess who's walking in on or waking up next to who. Fortunately, many of those moments are then maneuvered into a plot development that proves pretty intriguing.

The pilot's take on these lovable downers is a bit of a downer itself, but the second half hour sharpens its wit. [9 Oct 2015]

Casual really hits its groove around the midpoint, as more characters attach themselves long term to the main trio.

Over its first season, Casual breaks no new ground. Many of its scenes could swap in to any number of indie movies about bougie ennui, and many of its conversations have been had better elsewhere. That said.... Casual is often smart, and it's well paced, and it addresses its to-do list head-on.

Casual is a weird show, and at first, it’s not entirely easy to go with its erratic flow.... The show is perplexing, but as evidenced by the care it shows for Laura’s fragile relationship with her father, or the siblings’ devotion to each other in the face of their egotistical, manipulative mother (Frances Conroy)--it has a poetry to it, too.

The grins and angst menu serves Casual well at times, but perhaps not well enough to keep a majority of first-time samplers coming back for more.

Reitman is a get for a project like Casual, but his presence only serves to bolster the nagging feeling that Casual might have worked better as a movie-length project. The show evokes both the tone and the format dysmorphia of Togetherness.