Hank
ABC | Release Date: September 30, 2009
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
36
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 22 Critic Reviews
Positive:
0
Mixed:
9
Negative:
13

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
60
Los Angeles TimesRobert Lloyd
Season 1 Review: There's nothing here you couldn't imagine from the premise, but there's also nothing wrong with what's here: McGraw is a good foil for Grammer, and Grammer is good at what he does. Read full review
58
NewsdayVerne Gay
Season 1 Review: This isn't only "Frasier," recast as a standard family sitcom. It's "Green Acres." Read full review
50
Chicago Sun-TimesPaige Wiser
Season 1 Review: The basic concept isn't bad. It's nice to see a captain of industry humbled, particularly now, but even that is unsatisfying in Hank. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterBarry Garron
Season 1 Review: The show's main strength is the admirable comic acting ability of Kelsey Grammer and decent wordsmithing by sitcom veteran Tucker Cawley. But even with those assets, Hank comes across as familiar and formulaic--something you don't mind watching but wouldn't go out of your way to see. Read full review
50
The New York TimesAlessandra Stanley
Season 1 Review: The comedy pivots on Hank’s painful adjustment to middle-class living, but that joke is undercut with syrupy life lessons about parental responsibility and quality time. Read full review
50
USA TodayRobert Bianco
Season 1 Review: It just doesn't seem the best fit for Grammer. He's playing a character who's as pompous as Frasier but with less justification, less heart, less wit--and less able support. Read full review
50
Entertainment WeeklyKen Tucker
Season 1 Review: Lacking vividly drawn characters to react against, he must use his trademark crack timing and deadpan silences to carry the show, which just makes you feel bad for the star. Read full review
40
New York Daily NewsDavid Hinckley
Season 1 Review: It's a slight premise, and the odds of it morphing into a fresh, lively weekly adventure feel about the same. Slight. Read full review
40
TV Guide MagazineMatt Roush
Season 1 Review: Hank does fill a network void where family-friendly comedy is concerned, but Grammer is just going through the paces here. And I’m not sure a void actually deserves another void. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineKatherine Stevens
Season 1 Review: Hank is a multi-camera sitcom shot on a cheap-looking set with a forgettable supporting cast speaking rarely funny dialogue. Read full review
30
Boston GlobeMatthew Gilbert
Season 1 Review: A junky sitcom that isn’t old school so much as mold school. Read full review
30
VarietyBrian Lowry
Season 1 Review: While Hank doesn't promise to add much cachet to those Hall of Fame credentials, this is a show transparently designed for paychecks, not posterity. Read full review
30
Baltimore SunDavid Zurawik
Season 1 Review: The result is a silly, one-dimensional cartoon of a family that I am guessing viewers will start tuning out before the half hour ends. Read full review
30
Miami HeraldGlenn Garvin
Season 1 Review: There's an unfortunate whiff of Marie Antoinette about Grammer's breezily ungrounded Hank. Read full review
30
Philadelphia Daily NewsEllen Gray
Season 1 Review: In Hank, pompous comes off as merely pitiful. Or it would, if you could waste even a moment feeling sorry for anyone but the viewers, for whom the laugh track's likely to serve as a bitter reminder that somewhere, someone else is having a good time. Read full review
30
Philadelphia InquirerJonathan Storm
Season 1 Review: In a bad sitcom, everybody dies, as the laugh track gets louder and louder, and Hank, though it isn't a horror, has that loud laugh track and the slight, familiar scent of death. Read full review
30
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob Owen
Season 1 Review: Hank is the kind of show Dr. Frasier Crane would sneer at, which makes it particularly sad to see Kelsey Grammer reduced to starring in this ABC sitcom as a Dumb Daddy. Read full review
30
Newark Star-LedgerAlan Sepinwall
Season 1 Review: It’s lazy, predictable and spectacularly tone-deaf. Read full review
30
Washington PostHank Stuever
Season 1 Review: This new version works so hard to not fall flat on its face that of course it falls flat on its face. Read full review
25
New York PostLinda Stasi
Season 1 Review: Hank, is one of the worst new (or old) comedies of this or many other seasons. Read full review
25
Chicago TribuneMaureen Ryan
Season 1 Review: Grammer's so much better than the unfunny show that has been built around him. Read full review
0
San Francisco ChronicleTim Goodman
Season 1 Review: A moronic and ghastly effort that suffocates under the cloying and annoying blanket of a laugh track so disturbing it should be destroyed. Read full review
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