The Kominsky Method - General Discussion

[Meredith Quill]

This topic replaces the old forum for this show which has been vaulted here:

https://forums.primetimer.com/forum/4454-the-kominsky-method-v/

[Bastet]

I had never heard of this series, but it recently popped up as a Netflix recommendation.  A quick internet search yielded multiple references to "the male version of Grace and Frankie" and the Netflix trailer really hyped the Michael Douglas/Kathleen Turner interaction, so I decided to give it a try.

I barely got through the first episode, but powered on and quickly came to generally enjoy it.  It's no Grace and Frankie, is more androcentric than I prefer, and rather hit and miss, but when it hit, it hit.  I thought season three was going to be a disaster without Norman, because the friendship between him and Sandy was the backbone of the show, and it would have been without Roz, but the Sandy/Roz relationship the show finally delivered on meant I, to my utter astonishment, didn't miss him at all.  I loved them as War of the Roses part two, but also adored them becoming "buddies" in the end (and that it happened before he knew she was dying).  The long friendship of the actors resulted in something truly beautiful; by the time Sandy dedicated his Emmy to her, I was in tears.

Mindy was a woefully under-developed character.  Most of the women were, but her most notably.  And Sandy was an idiot to just give her the money free and clear; Norman specifically did not want Martin having access to it, so rather than giving her five million dollars directly, he gave it to Sandy to handle for her.  As an inheritance, it would have been exempt from community property laws -- unless she turned it into that, e.g. by putting it into a joint account.  So when she makes the astoundingly stupid decision to get married without a pre-nup, what does Sandy do?  Have the funds deposited into her and Martin's joint account.  Poor Norman is spinning in his grave.  Oh, well; hopefully he kicks off before she wants to divorce him.  (He's not a bad guy, but their relationship is a big fat zero to me; no chemistry, nothing in common, absolutely no reason shown why she'd want to be with him, and the more of an old man he turns into, the more she's going to want out.)

I liked seeing Susan Sullivan what I thought was going to be briefly as Norman's death's door wife, so was pleasantly surprised when she stuck around for him to have visions of.  Jane Seymour was an odd casting choice as Norman's pre-Eileen relationship, given how much younger than Alan Arkin she is, but that's the typical Hollywood BS, so if I set that aside she had nice chemistry with him.  I don't know why they felt the need to turn Madelyn into a nutter at the funeral.  Chuck Lorre has possibly the most wildly inconsistent relationship with female characters I have ever seen. 

Anyway, not anything I'm likely to ever re-watch, but I'm glad I invested the time.  I don't watch Michael Douglas in much, but he did a great job with this.  Sandy was a big bundle of clichés, and it's always fun to mock Hollywood, but there has to be a fundamental realism to the character, and he nailed that.