9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- New York Times
What Does Shane Gillis Want (to Get Away With)?
How do you profit from a sudden windfall of attention?
That's what's confronting the man-children of 'Tires,' the Netflix sitcom from the comedian Shane Gillis, at the beginning of its recently released second season. The question digs at them both onscreen and behind the cameras.
The show's first season, which aired last year, felt like a tentative demo — a lo-fi experiment in bawdy, blue-collar yuksmanship. Season 2 is crisper and slicker. The clothes fit better. The lighting is sharper. And the auto repair shop at the show's center is thriving, or something like it. The spoils of success are trickling in.
Gillis, a frisky bear of a man who deftly tangles with the absurdities of contemporary culture and politics, is one of the standout comedic talents of the past few years. His humor is playful and plugged in, and delivered approachably. But he has at times deployed offense, or the appearance of it, in ways that have rendered him still something of an outsider from the mainstream, despite his huge popularity.
'Tires,' an episodic sitcom on a major streaming platform, is first and foremost an opportunity to bridge that divide. Can the edgelord comedy that's defined the nü-bro movement of the past few years come out and play?
That remains to be seen. 'Tires' is too inert to be offensive — curiously (purposely?) stakesless and edgeless for one of the few performers capable of making comedic hay of the current paroxysms around ideological purity (on all sides). Itchier provocations can be found in one Michael Scott monologue on a random episode of 'The Office,' or truer right-leaning red meat on any of Tim Allen's sitcoms.
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