Three years in the past, the quasi-scripted comedy “Jury Duty,” an unassuming providing on the now defunct streaming service Freevee, turned a social-media sensation via its specific model of light brazenness. Its creators, Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky, Frankensteined the collection by stitching collectively two moribund TV genres—the mockumentary sitcom and the prank present—to assemble one thing new, if nonetheless lumbering. Cameras adopted a handful of actors serving as the jurors in a faux trial alongside one unwitting civilian, a thirty-year-old photo voltaic contractor named Ronald Gladden, who believed that he was collaborating in a simple documentary about the workings of the justice system. Surrounded by weirdos, losers, and a preening film star (James Marsden, taking part in a fame-monster model of himself), Ronald spent three eventful weeks on his very personal “Truman Show.” At one level, he got here perilously near the reality, declaring, “This literally feels like reality TV.”
Since the days of “Candid Camera,” a practical-joke program that started on the radio in 1947 and jumped to tv the following 12 months, prank exhibits have been critiqued for his or her exploitative dynamics. “Jury Duty” strives to reassure the viewers by portraying its manufacturing as a good commerce: although the present deceives its fundamental character, it additionally presents him in a positive mild, takes pains to reduce his misery, and insures that jokes are by no means at his expense. (Gladden additionally acquired 100 thousand {dollars} and an over-all deal at Amazon for his hassle.) The collection’ fastidiously curated feel-good vibes appeared to exceed even the novel premise as the major supply of its enchantment: one evaluate praised its “life-affirming joy.” But that very high quality renders the follow-up, the awkwardly titled “Jury Duty Presents: Company Retreat,” pointless. Like so many sitcoms earlier than it, it withers underneath the drive of its personal unrelenting sunniness.
The sophomore season, now streaming on Prime Video, options a complete new solid, who play the tight-knit workers of a Los Angeles-based hot-sauce firm known as Rockin’ Grandma’s. Ronald’s successor at the middle of the story is Anthony Norman, one other younger man with an open face and an inviting disposition. Early on, Anthony is advised by the firm’s H.R. chief, Kevin (Ryan Perez), that he’s been employed as a temp to assist out at the annual employees retreat—the final such occasion for the agency’s founder, Doug (Jerry Hauck), who plans to retire. Poised to take over is his thirtysomething son, Dougie (Alex Bonifer), a failed ska-E.D.M. musician with a mop of bleached hair to match, who intends to implement some adjustments to the household enterprise.
Season 2’s grander ambitions are evident from the begin. While the authentic “Jury Duty” largely befell in a courtroom and in a resort the place the jurors have been sequestered, leaving the solid drably entrapped, “Company Retreat” feels much less cloistered. The workers of Rockin’ Grandma’s roam the grounds of the retreat website, which boasts a number of constructions, and are visited by a collection of visitor audio system whose lectures vary from the merely boring to the actually Dada. After Dougie bombs a presentation and will get dressed down by his father, he flees into the close by hills to lick his wounds. The actors’ hours-long dedication to the bit continues via meticulously choreographed stunts and persists even after they depart Anthony’s sight line.
These hyper-dedicated solid members are “Company Retreat” ’s biggest asset. Rockin’ Grandma’s is in contrast, with out irony, to a household, and its “employees” really feel extra distinctive than the inventory sorts who populated the first season. The most memorable embody a warehouse supervisor named Jimmy (Jim Woods), who’s intent on reforming his boorish methods however nonetheless can’t assist blurting out fake pas, as when he calls Martin Luther King, Jr., “the Tom Brady of civil rights.” A receptionist and aspiring snack-fluencer, PJ (Marc-Sully Saint-Fleur), who presents Anthony some octopus-wasabi chips on his first day, may very well be the hottest man in any office. Even Dougie, an inveterate screwup, isn’t with out hidden depths—and Anthony, a pure hype man for whoever’s round, takes his plea for emotional assist severely, rapidly turning into invested in a twisty succession disaster.
