Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll
FX | Release Date: July 16, 2015
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
60
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 32 Critic Reviews
Positive:
15
Mixed:
14
Negative:
3
Watch Now
Stream On
Buy on
Stream On
Stream On
Expand

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
The Hollywood ReporterTim GoodmanJul 14, 2015
Season 1 Review: Superb, funny and wonderfully spot-on. Read full review
83
Boston HeraldMark A. PerigardJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: Leary is perfectly cast as the middle-aged wastrel with a modicum of talent and an ego the size of the Trump Tower.... Much of the show can’t be quoted. Many of the jokes you can see coming at you from the Zakim Bridge. They’re still funny. Read full review
83
Uncle BarkyEd BarkJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: It promises to be quite a juggling act, with Leary as balls-out as ever in the early going of his latest daring enterprise. Read full review
80
Reason.comGlenn GarvinJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: Leary, one of the sharpest comic writers in television, has a feast on this stuff, lampooning the infirmities of his geezer characters even as he lashes out at the current rock generation with the fury of a scorned old hippie. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsDavid HinckleyJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: The songs aren’t all terrific, but like “Rescue Me” at its best, S&D&R&R succeeds both as wild, uncontrolled, absurdist comedy and touching, quiet personal drama. Read full review
80
Kansas City StarSara SmithJul 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: The show’s salty-sweet themes of loyalty and redemption contrast nicely with the vile comedic speeches Leary has made a career out of delivering. Read full review
75
IndieWireLiz Shannon MillerJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: For those who appreciate a good joke about Bon Jovi's guitarist, or other arcane music trivia, Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll delivers. Those who enjoy Leary's particular talent for spitting out great dialogue like it tastes bad will also find this one easy to watch. Read full review
75
San Jose Mercury News/Contra Costa TimesChuck BarneyJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: [Dinosaur-rock] cliches still pack a comedic punch because, well, they're just so outlandish and evocative. The key is to bring some fresh twists to them, and for the most part, Leary's bunch succeeds in doing so. Read full review
75
USA TodayRobert BiancoJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: His targets and tone may occasionally come across as creaky or cranky. But the jokes and the sentiment seem honest, and the older-man howls may strike those who have tired of the media's incessant and insipid pandering to Millennials as a welcome change of pace. Read full review
75
The Lincoln Journal StarJeff KorbelikJul 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: Gillies is great when going toe to toe with Leary, and she can sing to boot. As for Leary, well, he’s playing himself again, and if you’re fan, you’ll love it, and if you’re not, you won’t. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterTim GoodmanJun 30, 2016
Season 2 Review: Season two quickly confirms, in the first four episodes, that Leary has found out what everyone does best from the growth seen last season. Hendrix gets a major storyline that continues her character's evolution. Read full review
70
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob OwenJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll may not be easy to swallow, but it digests comfortably. Read full review
70
Philadelphia Daily NewsEllen GrayJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: This one's helped considerably by the casting of Gillies--whose character, it turns out, actually can sing--and Corbett, who's as smooth as Leary is rough. Read full review
70
VarietyBrian LowryJul 14, 2015
Season 1 Review: Still fun in fits and starts, the series begins with enough energy to help it coast along, abetted by rock cameos that provide an additional helping of street cred. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubNoel MurrayJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll settles for a lot of broad comic situations, building off Johnny’s inability to function as a normal person. And yet the series has a certain scrappy charm, which is just as attributable to Leary as its faults. Read full review
60
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoJul 14, 2015
Season 1 Review: The first five episodes of the series are somewhat hit and miss, but Leary fans who miss either his stand-up or hit show “Rescue Me,” should be satisfied, and I can easily see the program working out its writing kinks and getting stronger as the cast gels. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesRobert LloydJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: It lurches in tone and an accelerated narrative that seems at times to leave holes in the storytelling, gaps that draw you up short where you should be just be sailing along. Still, if it's a bit of a mess, it's not an uninteresting one. Read full review
50
HitfixAlan SepinwallJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: A little of Leary goes a long way with me these days, but there are enough other elements here (the supporting cast also includes Bobby Kelly, John Ales and Elaine Hendrix as former Heathens reuniting to be part of the Gigi project) to potentially sample. But the father/daughter stuff is just too much. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeMatthew GilbertJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: The pluses of the show include watching Leary have a good time and seeing the way the cast gels around him.... Other TV series set in the music business--“Nashville,” “Empire”--have a lot more genre awareness and seem to make the characters’ enthusiasm believable enough. But on Sex&Drugs, even the costumes appear generic and unrealized. Read full review
50
The New York TimesMike HaleJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: Mr. Leary is trying to do something here that gets at the raunch and joy of the rock lifestyle but also offers a serious consideration of its consequences. He ends up not doing either very well. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleDavid WiegandJul 14, 2015
Season 1 Review: S&D&R&R has several things going for it that make it passably enjoyable, including some funny dialogue, good performances and, of course, Leary’s trademark grumpy charm. Read full review
50
TimeJames PoniewozikJul 14, 2015
Season 1 Review: There’s potential here for a sharp sitcom about a man who’s kept aging but stopped growing. But too often Sex&Drugs shares Johnny’s arrested development, at the expense of both relevance and comedy. Read full review
50
Washington PostHank StueverJun 17, 2015
Season 1 Review: With this vague sensibility and some outdated ideas about the music industry, Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll becomes the very thing Johnny claims to loathe most: It is inauthentic and forgettable. Read full review
42
NewsdayVerne GayJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll smells suspiciously like a vanity project that sat on Leary's shelf for a couple of decades. Read full review
40
Yahoo TVKen TuckerJun 29, 2016
Season 2 Review: SDRR places itself in the awkward position of having created--when you fold in John Corbett’s Flash--some likable characters (well, maybe not Johnny, but that’s the way Leary likes it; he’s a preening antihero to the end) who remain in search of the right vehicle to take them to another level of excellence. Read full review
40
Las Vegas WeeklyJosh BellJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: As a music-industry story, Sex & Drugs is confused and outdated, with irritating, one-dimensional characters and self-consciously edgy humor. Like its protagonist, it’s mostly a sad relic straining to appear hip. Read full review
40
SlateWilla PaskinJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: It’s a half-baked argument for the necessity of rock. Read full review
40
Yahoo TVKen TuckerJul 14, 2015
Season 1 Review: A warm family sitcom Sex&Drugs is not. Neither is it a very funny sitcom. Read full review
40
The OregonianKristi TurnquistJul 10, 2015
Season 1 Review: In the first few episodes, there are enough snappy lines and funny ideas to make me wish Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll was better. But the cringe-to-laugh ratio is too high for it to really sing. Read full review
30
New York Magazine (Vulture)Matt Zoller SeitzJul 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: It's the first heavily hyped new series of the year that could be described a total misfire. Read full review
30
SalonSonia SaraiyaJul 15, 2015
Season 1 Review: Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll merely has the dramatic backdrop of loud guitars and middling lyrics. The show is so abrasive I had to stop watching partway through the second episode; even though I individually appreciate Corbett, Leary, Gillies, and rock music, the combination in the show offered nothing for me. Read full review
25
NewsdayVerne GayJun 28, 2016
Season 2 Review: S&D&R&R don’t bring me anything but down. Read full review
Current TV Shows
By MetascoreBy User Score
1 92 The Pitt: Season 2
2 90 The Celebrity Traitors UK: Season 1
3 88 Rivals
4 87 Hacks: Season 5
5 87 Industry: Season 4
6 87 Genndy Tartakovsky's Primal:...
7 85 The Beatles Anthology
8 85 The Traitors [UK]: Season 4
9 85 Bait: Season 1
10 84 Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!
11 83 Lord of the Flies
12 83 Riot Women: Season 1
13 83 For All Mankind: Season 5
14 81 The Muppet Show (2026)
15 80 Outlander (2014): Season 8
16 80 The Other Bennet Sister: Season 1
17 80 The Mighty Nein: Season 1
18 80 The Comeback: Season 3
19 80 One Piece (2023): Season 2
20 80 Dark Winds: Season 4
SEE ALL