It’s been over a decade since Tim Allen first returned to the world of sitcoms. Back in the halcyon days of 2011, the idea of Allen playing a conservative “alpha male” constantly whining about how things used to be seemed novel enough to anchor a show. Although, if you’ve been unfortunate enough to catch an episode of Last Man Standing, you’d know that it doesn’t exactly work. That didn’t stop the show from being popular though, running for 9 seasons between two networks. Now, ABC is returning to the well.
Shifting Gears focuses on Matt Parker (Allen), a widowed auto shop owner introduced complaining about how nobody “makes things” in America anymore. His life changes when his estranged daughter, Riley (Kat Dennings), returns looking for a place to stay. Riley is going through a divorce and she brings her two children, along with her dad’s old car with her. The circumstances of the divorce are both uninteresting and unfunny, but rest assured they come up often.
The show clearly wants to center on the comedic sparring between Allen and Dennings, but their verbal battles have zero energy. It doesn’t help that Allen seems to be the only one playing a defined character. One he has been playing off and on for over 3 decades, but a character still. Everyone else in the cast exists to deliver stale jokes. Dennings seems bored from the moment she appears on screen. The less said about the child actors, the better. Even the lively presence of Seann William Scott turns listless almost immediately.
The cast aren’t the only ones running on autopilot. With jokes and plotlines that were already prosaic during the Bush administration, Shifting Gears feels retrograde even by the standard of multi-cam sitcoms. The writing is so lazy that some episodes seem to lack actual conclusions. Instead, the show settles for a half-hearted appeal to our emotions, reminding us of Matt’s deceased wife. This would normally be a splendid chance for Allen to show off his dramatic range, but he doesn’t seem to buy it either.
Odds are, you already know what you’re going to get with Shifting Gears before you read this. This is a Tim Allen sitcom after all. The show quickly discards any lesson learned. All in pursuit of creating a program to put on in the background. A viewing experience perfect for waiting rooms and 12-hour blocks on cable. There may be nothing new under this show’s hood, but it will probably keep running for years to come.
Shifting Gears airs Wednesdays on ABC and streams on Hulu.