Now that recreational use of marijuana is legal (at the state level) in certain locales, including Washington and Colorado, cannabis-based programming is experiencing a bit of a renaissance. Sure, stoner comedies like Half Baked and Pineapple Express have always been around, but they were niche products, marketed mainly to longtime marijuana enthusiasts or teens with the munchies. They also tended to focus on the subversive side of the drug, drawing laughs from run-ins with police, unsavory dealers, and disapproving friends and neighbors.
Today, though, weed is increasingly mainstream — even from a tech standpoint. As a result, a new comedy, Disjointed, is taking a slightly different approach. Today, August 8, Netflix released the series’ first official trailer, opening with an introduction by Ruth Feldman (Bates), a self-proclaimed cannabis lawyer, activist, and user.
The humor throughout is strongly reminiscent of The Big Bang Theory and Two and a Half Men. That is, it’s fairly lazy, and relies on lame stereotypes — “You remind me of your father back in the day … Ambitious, determined, thirsty for young white women,” Bates tells her son (Aaron Moten), who has an African-American father. It also uses cartoon-like sequences where characters smoke weed (that they should have tested!) and enter hallucinogenic fantasy worlds.
A short scene at the end seems to be included just to tell the audience “We can curse on Netflix!” If there are Big Bang fans who always wished that show was more vulgar, this show is for them. In any case, the first season of Disjointed will hit Netflix on August 25. You’ve been warned.
Netflix fully committed to ‘Disjointed’
The series is a multicamera, scripted comedy that stars Kathy Bates as a longtime legalization advocate who ends up running a marijuana dispensary in Los Angeles. Along with her son, Bates’ character is joined by three “budtenders” (pot shops’ version of bartenders), and a security guard. As you might imagine, none of these characters are opposed to getting high on their own supply.
The series has been ordered for a 20-episode inaugural season and is the brainchild of Chuck Lorre, who created CBS’s hit comedies Two and a Half Men and The Big Bang Theory, and former ABC staple Dharma & Greg.
Multi-camera, scripted comedies like Fuller House and The Ranch have moved the needle for Netflix of late, and reports indicate that the streamer is looking to add more to its slate of original series.
Update: Added information on series’ first trailer.
