• Network: HBO
  • Series Premiere Date: Mar 8, 2026
Metascore
68

Generally favorable reviews - based on 28 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 18 out of 28
  2. Negative: 0 out of 28

Critic Reviews

  1. Reviewed by: Anita Singh
    Mar 9, 2026
    60
    If you’ve never seen Carell in anything, you will find Rooster charming and quite funny. Even if you have, you could put this series on in the background of whatever else you’re doing, and it’s perfectly pleasant. But it could be so much more if the writers weren’t clearly trying to create another Ted Lasso, with which Rooster shares a writer.
  2. Reviewed by: Brian Lowry
    Mar 6, 2026
    60
    The show manages to be both intermittently amusing and highly disposable.
  3. Reviewed by: Jen Chaney
    Mar 5, 2026
    60
    As good as these actors are, they can’t quite overcome the fact that “Rooster” is tonally too shifty to effectively work.
  4. Reviewed by: Ally Johnson
    Mar 5, 2026
    59
    Unmoored and unpolished, “Rooster” doesn’t quite clear the bar.
  5. Reviewed by: Sam Adams
    Mar 9, 2026
    50
    Carell still has small-screen charisma to burn, and the show is charming in an insubstantial way. But it’s also forgettable, lacking both the hangout appeal of a classic sitcom and the richness that might sustain a yearslong storyline.
  6. Reviewed by: Nick Schager
    Mar 5, 2026
    50
    Aside from the occasional choice gag, its geniality dampens its silliness.
  7. Reviewed by: Michael Savio
    Mar 5, 2026
    50
    Apart from some indistinct secondary characters, the cast is largely game, but the banter-heavy dialogue can grow stale, especially when the jokes have a habit of undercutting any emotional heft.
  8. Reviewed by: Mike Hale
    Mar 9, 2026
    40
    “Rooster” is a mess, but Carell is never less than entertaining in it. .... “Rooster” remains amorphous, though; it tries for a mix of naturalistic prestige comedy and rapid-fire, stylized sitcom and just misses both.
  9. Reviewed by: Daniel Fienberg
    Mar 5, 2026
    40
    It’s a show with an excess of underdeveloped identities, rather than a lack of identity, spackling over its poorly fused story elements with a sense of humor that’s sometimes appealing and frequently desperately hacky.
  10. Reviewed by: Aramide Tinubu
    Mar 5, 2026
    40
    Unfortunately, “Rooster” is full of predictable characters and circumstances, adding up to a lackluster narrative.