"Pilot"

Terry tries out for a Lifetime television show he thinks is beneath him. Joe quivers in the face of a host of quasi-ethical issues—from the "mercy killing" of a surprisingly resilient possum to whether he should pay his bookie. Owen, trying to impress his tyrannical pops by getting in better shape, skips breakfast and goes on a strenuous hike with Joe and Terry—only to collapse in diabetic shock.

Of note here is the fact that when Joe and Terry try to whisk him away to the hospital, they’re distracted by a large-bosomed woman and nearly crash their car, sending the still unconscious Owen careening into the dashboard and breaking his nose.

In his hospital room, Owen tells his wife he simply can’t work for his father anymore: He’s been humiliated one too many times. She informs him that they have three kids and they’re redoing the kitchen.

"You just have to keep working, honey."

She says it sweetly and lovingly, and it’s a great scene—funny and pathetic and real all at the same time. Middle age is sometimes about compromise—when we reluctantly peel back youth’s oversize dreams. Turns out, mortgage payment trumps Corvette every time.

Let me back up a bit. Maybe I should say she says it sweetly and lovingly and profanely. That scene and many, many others are hindered by a barrage of unbleeped s-words. We also hear Joe’s kids talk about dildos, Joe talk about how he lost two pounds peeing, and the thump-thump sound of Joe’s truck as he runs over a possum three times.

"You’re kinda weird, Joe," his bookie tells him as Joe erects a cairn to the possum—which finally stops playing dead. Men of a Certain Age is kinda weird, too—and not always in a bad way. Through its sometimes hyperbolic, nearly always satirical vignettes we gain a small measure of appreciation for the value of family bonds, hard work, telling the truth and earning trust.

But its addiction to crass content is a heavy, lopsided weight at the top of a fragile pyramid. The result is a collapse as painful as Owen’s broken nose.