I’m continuing my rare drive of solo TV watching while my wife and I split nights with our new baby. Ballers should be the perfect show for this – total fluff, 100% targeted to a male audience, absolutely nothing that I have to worry my wife would miss. I think she would probably rate this season higher than I did, because she loves the worst kind of drama and this season is all about bad drama.
Season 2 still has most of the better parts of season 1. The characters and actors continue to be fine, and Rob Corddry in particular excels as the comedic sidekick. However, for some reason the drama is dialed up this season. Just like in Entourage (the other Mark Wahlberg show), nobody is tuning in to see how hard these guys have it. The whole point is it should be an easy, no stress viewing experience. I’ll go over specifics in the spoilers section, but this show is at its best when it understands why people are watching this, and not something with an actually serious subject matter. That’s not to say that there isn’t a world out there for a serious look at ex-pro athletes and their struggles, but Mark Wahlberg is not the guy to take us there.
Spoilers
From drug use, to a breakup, to father issues, to a heartfelt speech about bad acts in the past… there’s a lot of manufactured drama that just doesn’t need to be here.
My Score
IMDB Score
RT Critics
70
RT Audience
93