RAMY

It is, miraculously, as good — if not better than — its predecessor. ... Season 2 is moving and profane. Stupid funny, then scary serious. Topical and evergreen. Hyperspecific with wide appeal.

With excellent pacing, solid structure, and a keen sense of humor, “Ramy” finds the kind of emotional assuredness its main character craves. It’s a smarter, better show for being so hard on Ramy, in part because it knows him well enough to not let the whole story rest on one young millennial’s shoulders.

As was the case in the outstanding first season, the new episodes toggle between Ramy’s misadventures on the road to enlightenment and poignant spotlights on other members of his family.

Boldly seriocomic. ... Rich portrait of an underexplored culture. [25 May - 7 Jun 2020, p.3]

Despite a couple of misses in the middle, season two is a remarkable experience that retains Ramy’s charming storytelling and comedic nuances.

Season two gets serious when a meeting with a traumatised Iraq war veteran lands the Sufi mosque in big trouble, and it looks as if Ramy’s fuzzy millennial approach to Islam may finally have proper consequences. It’s a difficult tonal shift that the series can be trusted to pull off. Very few other shows would even try.

The show is often better when it branches out to parallel stories about Ramy’s friends and family. ... Through it all, the show exhibits a nimble command of mood, meaning, personal integrity and the quirks of family life.

While flawed in its gender representation with regards to its writing, “Ramy” remains just as funny and wildly unique.

While Ramy’s second season ultimately turns that into an interesting, meaningful collapse for its protagonist, there’s no getting around the fact that especially in the early episodes, viewers have to spend an awful lot of time with a guy whose sweaty efforts to try to be good are only slightly less annoying than his previous dirtbag low points.

The ambition is admirable, but the results are bound to be polarizing. For my tastes, these 10 episodes are nowhere near as bracing or hilarious as last year's, while exposing the structural limitations of the series' creative team. But it's also hard to fault a bold showrunner like Youssef for taking as many big swings as he does here.