Unfocused and mediocre.
It wasn’t boring I’ll give them that (which is the worst sin a show can commit in my opinion) but Smash should be much better by now. The production has displayed glimmers of wonderful moments and characters but things aren’t pulling through as much as I would have liked.
In fact there’s a lot of general lameness and eye-rolling contrivances (such as Ivy’s threat to Karen at the end or how everyone jumped on our favorite evil director for simply proposing this new experiment). The hour just felt forced and unhinged. Of course, there’s still a relative charm to proceedings but the show can’t coast on that for long. (Meryl Streep’s daughter as a guest-star was surprisingly good and the musical numbers are always pleasant enough)
Hopefully, now that it has been renewed for a second season, Smash will tap into the potential we all know it has. It just needs to work harder.
Nad Rating
D+