So, Outsourced has been the target of an unprecedented amount of internet skepticism. A lot of it was, I think, misplaced anger about Parks and Rec being pushed back to mid-season and there were some nebulous accusations of racial insensitivity.
But now it has aired and I think it’s actually pretty funny. Did anyone else bother to watch?
Fucking horrible.
Offensively awful, as well as being just absolutely offensive in general.
Debating whether it is cultural insensitivity on steroids or actually racist.
i watched about 15 minutes of it and was just agog.
Terrible, terrible, terrible.
To be more specific:
I grew up as an expat, and work with indian out-sourcing companies daily. This is exactly the show that I would expect an American who’s never left the country to make.
Also, is it just me, or was one call center worker clearly Hawaiian?
I half-watched it while working on stuff on my laptop. Thought it was terrible. I’d be surprised if it made it past 13 episodes.
What was up with the Sikh guy, anyway? Did we ever get any explanation for why he’s always walking away from his desk, glaring, when the hopeless schlub of a manager looks his way? Was it supposed to be funny?
And how many more jokes are we going to have to endure about Indian food being hard to digest for people unaccustomed to it?
This is an actual plot point though. Rajiv, the assistant manager, hired these people with the intention of getting bad people so Tod would either get caned or quit so he could become the manager.
- The tone of the show felt wrong: for as much slapstick/joke-moment as it was, it just didn’t mesh with faux documentary no-laugh-track style.
It’s not a faux documentary, nobody is talking to the camera and there is no shaky cam stuff.
- Male lead is not very good, and really quite annoying.
He didn’t bother me, to each his own.
- It didn’t feel like India, at all. The Office does a great job of making the set feel like an actual office park. This show felt like a set. This wouldn’t really be an issue, but it’s a concept that relies on a sense of alienation and novelty for the main character.
Having never been to India I’m not sure how it feels but I’ll agree that it felt like an American office park. This could be intentional.
I grew up as an expat, and work with indian out-sourcing companies daily. This is exactly the show that I would expect an American who’s never left the country to make.
Who do you think the target audience is? I think this goes with the above about the office park. I think the setting is intentionally Americanized to try to not alienate it’s audience too much and give them something they can relate to other than two or three characters. I would imagine the daily goings on at an Indian office would be completely foreign and unrelatable for the vast majority of North Americans. I’ll agree the show might be more interesting if it was more genuine about its environments but I think that would significantly damage its chances at success.
Overall I think the first episode was rather weak and I don’t have high hopes but nearly every show starts weak. I think we’ll have to wait and see if it gets better. Community started off terrible I thought but it’s decent now, not great but not terrible.
For the record, Community started off mediocre and got awesome. It’s one of the top 3 or 4 sitcoms on TV right now.
Community started out good and got awesome.
Wow, India is harsh.
While I don’t think the show went over to racist, I did think it was insanely weak. I know a pilot has a lot of setting up to do, but it’s still a comedy pilot and I still need to come remotely close to laughing.
I guess what bothered me most aside from not laughing was how typically American it felt, almost like it was pitched as a sitcom in an American call center, developed, etc. Then some last minute studio executive note who was looking for some reason to mention that he actually read a New Yorker article about India or somewhere came through. Quick recast and rewrite, going to have to go with the obvious jokes and insights because there’s no time to wikipedia India. Going to have to make the original sets work but at least all the car shots are green screened so that’s an easy swap. Make the shoe-horned in love interest an Aussie instead.
I also assume this novelty shop is going to put out a new catalog every week? If not, based on the pilot, this show is going to run out of material fast.
I don’t know if there is a real sitcom to be made from this premise that actually takes advantage of said premise, but the pilot for Outsourced wasn’t it.
I guess my issue with the lead is that he also seemed like a moron, which I guess is in keeping with the fictional world they’ve created.
I don’t disagree about that, but I think they’ve over-sanitized it to the point that doesn’t feel exotic at all. I think that I expected it to be trying for more of an layered effect, like, say, early Dilbert comics, where it’s funny by itself, but if you can recognize the characters and mannerisms based on your own real life interactions, it has another level of hilarious. Instead, we just get a single, undifferentiated sit-com layer.
I think they just Americanized it so much, they’ve made any kind of fish out of water plotline unbelievable. They didn’t even make it friendly-scary, they just made it friendly. I guess this is part of my issue with the lead, he didn’t really seem to react to his new situation at all.
Maybe I’m expecting too much from it, especially from a pilot. But it failed on almost all fronts for me. It’s possible that it grows in further episodes and manages to build on characters instead of premise, but I’m not optimistic about that.
No, it is adapted from the movie Outsourced.
I just want it to tank quickly so I can watch Parks and Rec.
Really bad. Also it’s like it takes place in an alternate universe where Americans are supposed to not know about Indian food or that cows are sacred and Indians don’t know how dating works in the States.
Sorry, but I think 2010 is a little late for “it’s another culture that’s different from ours, how crrrrrazy!” jokes to fly as the basis for a television show.
I did laugh at that one scene with the guy talking about grits, though.
I’m not saying my scenario should be taken literally, and while I haven’t seen the movie, it doesn’t change the point I was trying to get at. Basically I just thought the show had nothing to do with India except for a superficial wash that felt like an afterthought. If the movie felt this American, I would feel the same way about that as well (my gut says it probably doesn’t at all).
The movie was actually quite good. I work with remote indians daily, and a lot of it rang true. Haven’t seen the TV show yet, it’s on my TiVo at home.
I agree that we don’t need a one-joke laugh at the brown people “The Office in india!” sitcom, but the movie wasn’t really about that, it was a fish out of water drama/comedy. Much of the movie wasn’t in the office, it was out and about. The protagonist ended up falling in love with the country (and his indian love interest).
I can easily imagine NBC pushing aggressive notes to make it more like The Office, though, since it’s a hit show.
I could see this making a good film, but I can’t see how this is going to work in the show as it was presented in the pilot.
Can’t believe they made a show about this. This should go over well with the American middle class!
Just so we’re clear: this is a show where the entire premise is a white American middle manager is sent to India to oversee a call center which weirdly enough is full of Indians - but we don’t want to “alienate” American viewers by being too “foreign?”
It’s particularly frustrating for those of us who want to see more shows set somewhere other than the Whitest Stripes of America, but without the cheap unfunny ethnic stereotypes.
Might as well spotlight the one thing Outsourced definitely has going for it…
red chairs?