With a little less than a week to go before the writer-backed web series portal Strike.TV launches, it’s time to take a closer look at some of the first shows on the debut lineup. Fresh off their announcement of a content distribution deal with YouTube and Joost, the site has released the trailer (above) for its highly-touted office comedy, Global Warming starring SNL’s Kristen Wiig and The Daily Show’s Aasif Mandvi. The series is written Daily Show writer Rob Kutner and Sheryl Zohn (Penn & Teller: Bullshit). Even Mindy Kaling (The Office) makes an appearance Mandvi’s heartless IT call center boss.
Aside from the recent Tina Fey as Sarah Palin hoopla, Kristen Wiig has been dominating the resurgence of Saturday Night Live with her zany, fully-committed Groundlings-bred characters. (See: “Surprise Party” and “Penelope“). Even her film roles are scene stealers, playing Katherine Heigl’s antagonizing co-worker Jill in Knocked Up and John C. Reilly’s girlfriend in Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story. This time she plays a more reserved, but still adorable Kristine, a office woman longing for a relationship that means something.
Aasif Mandvi is also no stranger to the TV-to-film crossover with roles opposite Ricky Gervais in Ghost Town and Robert De Niro in Analyze This. Comedy fans best know Mandvi as a staple for Jon Stewart’s Middle East coverage on The Daily Show. (See: “Aasif Mandvi is Brown“) In Global Warming, he’s a hopeless romantic tech support rep in India who strikes up a long distance relationship of sorts with Wiig through a series of mutally flirtatious IM chat sessions. The official premiere is Monday October 28th when Strike.TV finally cuts the ribbon and sets loose its wealth of professionally written series.
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I’m so excited for this! Aasif Mandvi is hilarious, and I love the premise…
I’ve seen the pilot and it’s pretty decent. Her character isn’t too over the top like an SNL sketch which should allow for it to sustain through the series. I love her SNL original characters, don’t get me wrong, just most of them aren’t really made for extended viewing beyond a 3-minute sketch.
Check it out when it launches monday.
I’m sorry but Kristen Wiig?!?! She is a jaw-droppingly awful, one-note comedian. Her “zany” characterizations are wildly erratic and often cringe-worthy. Marc, please stop perpetuating the myth that SNL is “resurgent.” Aside from the inspired Tina Fey as Palin sketches and WEEKEND UPDATE (which will no longer have the benefit of Amy Poehler’s presence), the show is as overlong and painfully unfunny as ever. Need proof? Watch the god-awful “Obama infomerical” sketch featuring the return of Maya Rudolph (another no-talent hack) as Michell Obama. Terrible stuff. If Wiig is so brilliant, why did it take dragging Tina Fey back into the fold for the show to catch fire? I cannot find a single person (or legitimate critic) who doesn’t say the same thing: Other than Fey as Palin and WU, the show sucks as much as ever (did you not read the damning review in EW a few issues back???). Sketches still run way too long (even the Palin sketches boarder on the gratuitous) and the audience tunes out en masse by the last half hour of the show. Every episode this season that saw a record audience opened with a Fey/Palin sketch. What happens after the election? We go back to the same dreadful show that has been polluting late night for years. Next you’re gonna tell me that Kenan Thompson is a comedic genius too.
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