Review: Hot in Cleveland

I was recently looking for a nice, short (21 minute) sitcom to watch and once I noticed the first 4 seasons of ​Hot in Cleveland were free on Amazon Prime, I figured I'd give it a try. I just finished season 2 (the current season is #5), but I thought I'd write something up anyway. 

Synopsis:

Three 40-something best friends - Joy (Jane Leeves), Victoria (Wendie Malick)and Melanie (Valerie Bertinelli) - from Los Angeles are flying to Paris when their plane makes an emergency landing in Cleveland. Realizing that all the norms from Los Angeles don't apply anymore, they decide to celebrate a city that values real women and stay where they're still considered hot.

Pros: 

- It's pretty darn funny.

- As a big fan of Frasier, its fun to watch a show where Daphne and Ronee are two of the main leads. 

- Betty White. I'm pretty sure she just ad libs everything. 

- Joy says "Let's kill him" at least a dozen times. The other women note that's her go-to solution for pretty much everything. 

- There are guest appearances in season 2 by Roz Doyle (Peri Gilpin) and Gertrude Moon (Millicent Martin, Daphne's mother in Frasier)... and Martin Crane (John Mahoney) has a reoccurring character named Roy. Carl Reiner and Don Rickles also make guest appearances...as does Doris Roberts, Marie from Everybody Loves Raymond.  

Con:

- As in pretty much everything these days, sex is recreational...though it occasionally comes with bad consequences, like Melanie's one night stand their first night in Cleveland ruins her relationship is a pretty nice guy...because he turns out to be the first guy's brother. Whoops.

- A fair bit of innuendo...especially after Joy lends Elka her Sex and the City DVDs. Yowza. It could be worse...but still can get a little wearisome. 

- It's set in Cleveland.

Another fun sitcom that's just finishing up it's first season (and is apparently in danger of being cancelled) is Trophy Wife. A bit unorthodox, but really funny. 

So in case you you're looking for a slightly inappropriate, really funny sitcom that's more Cheers-like than Frasier-esque, I would suggest checking out Hot in Cleveland. 


Enjoy and happy Tuesday! :)

~ Katie