Nobody Wants This

It’s as smart as anything else on TV right now, including more serious fare on other channels and streamers, and, like Joanne and Noah, it truly deserves all the love it’s got coming.

The true draw here was and will always be the palpable central romance. The dilemmas faced by Noah and Joanne feel relatable and serious, packaged and delivered in a lighthearted yet captivating manner. And as far as TV rom-coms go, it’s so easy to fall for this one.

With Nobody Wants This season 2, most everything remains compelling, interesting, funny, or romantic, and in a way that feels real and relatable.

The show is good at skewering LA and its personality types. It also hits the romcom beats by running through the stages in a relationship: introducing two sets of friends and family to each other, the honeymoon phase giving way to little irritations.

With a respectable joke rate – though we’re talking smirk-inducing wisecracks rather than belly laughs – and a steady stream of keenly observed details (Joanne’s palpable delight at getting the pious Noah to properly kvetch; Noah’s nice-guy credentials crumbling ever-so-slightly when Joanne finds out how he treated previous partners), Nobody Wants This is easy to buy into and easy to love.

Overall, Netflix's rom-com captivates with a season that is nearly as charming as its predecessor. A focus on Noah and Joanne's relationship after their honeymoon phase and having them work out their differences allows for the series to feel much more raw and real.

In terms of plot and purpose, this installment is essentially a placeholder. But hanging out with these two families is still mostly fun, if sometimes a bit frustrating. And as long as you’re tuning in just to be with these people, to perhaps laugh at their escapades, to maybe learn a bit about Judaism if you’re a goy, then you’ll be satisfied.

What follows is a well-paced, engaging season of television marred by a finale that feints toward originality but swerves. Still, there’s plenty to like.

We get self-contained episodes, a few guest stars, and a finale cliffhanger just intriguing enough to bring you back for more. Sustaining a TV romance is tricky, and “Nobody Wants This” proves how hard it is to keep love interesting on screen.

The new episodes reveal a show that’s chosen narrative stasis rather than risk developing its characters and premise beyond the safe boundaries established in season 1. The saving grace is Nobody's excellent ensemble cast, which elevates the predictable material into a breezy and pleasant — if not particularly memorable — viewing experience.

Less memorable than its first outing, the second season of Nobody Wants This still delivers an emotionally intelligent exploration of the complexities of inter-cultural romance – and Kristen Bell and Adam Brody remain eminently charming together.

There’s plenty to enjoy about the new episodes besides. Yet beneath its delightful surface, Nobody Wants This remains an uneven show—one that relies too heavily on its effervescent stars and, despite treating them with more kindness this time around, still struggles with its Jewish women.

Like any bored and self-obsessed person, the second season of Nobody Wants This is just looking to start drama when there really isn’t any there.

It’s still bingeable in a way that feels purpose-built to scratch a mid-thirties brain. It’s just equally clear that the show, having arrived at its final act showdown, is wandering in the wilderness. Sometimes, you just need to have a bit more faith in your premise.

As someone who cherishes an artfully executed romantic comedy over almost any other genre, it’s irritating to see so many missed opportunities amid so many promising parts.

In the process of expanding the profile for several supporting players, Brody and Bell are left playing often identical beats of uncertainty and insecurity to the ones that worked well in the first season. In the process, the chemistry and overall appeal dwindle dramatically.

“Nobody Wants This” is a more refined version of itself in Season 2. The self in question is just fundamentally slight and not especially ambitious.

Season 2 picks up with the couple still at an impasse over whether Joanne will convert … and pretty much camps out there all season. The last episode, incredibly, retreads many of the elements of the first season’s finale. .... It turns out the only thing more irritating than an extended love triangle might just be an extended will-they-or-won’t-they between a girl and a religion.

If Nobody Wants This was more focused on the mechanics of its comedy, maybe the flimsiness of these dilemmas would be fine—comforting, even. But the show seems to want to be about the hard parts of relationships without providing much insight.

It’s a crying shame that Noah and Joanne should be reduced to two anxious, lovesick nuisances. Brody and Bell’s chemistry is still off the charts, and they do their best to make their characters still likeable. .... The magic of the first season has been completely shattered by this disappointing, unnecessary second.