This is the show my friends. This show inspired me to get my degree in psychology. It seemed fun; I could make jokes all day and who doesn’t want to talk to Ray Romano once a week? Then, I looked at the amount of time and effort that would take, and reevaluated my decision. So, I made the decision to be in a relationship with a “would be” psychologist so I could live the only life better: that of Ben Katz. Why didn’t I think of it before? I can lie around all day, eat what I want, harass her employees and do whatever I want. Monday I may want to start a farm inside our apartment. Tuesday I may want to raise pigs. The rest of the week may be dedicated to babysitting, getting an earring and rearranging our feng shui. Yes, the life of Ben Katz for me. Though that paragraph probably sunk any hopes of that since my lady likely thinks of gold diggers like Kanye West does.
“Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist” starred Dr. Jonathan Katz and his son Ben. They live together in a New York like city. The doctor goes to work every day to listen to comedians do their act and the son stays home all day and like I said before, follows flights of fancy. Ben is 24, but since his parents’ divorce ruined his fragile self-esteem, he has done little maturing since his early teens. His father tries to nudge him along in life, unsuccessfully, and the only real issue is that even though he makes bank, Jon is unable to really make headway since he’s still supporting his frivolous son.
The main person they both deal with, other than each other, is Laura.
She pretty much hates them. The Katz boys shouldn’t take it personally, because Laura hates almost everyone. She hates all the patients she’s forced to deal with. She hates the Katz men, but oddly seems to like them the most due to sheer availability. Since she is the only female Ben ever sees, he of course is madly in love with her. Jon wishes she would warm up, but he comes to learn that some people just aren’t going to appreciate an old man that delivers one liners every other sentence. I don’t know why, because I would love that.
The only other main cast to speak of is the bar friends of Dr. Katz. Stan is his friend that is mainly just a big liar and the bartender Julie, that for some reason likes the two old guys at the end of the bar that just tell bad jokes. In later seasons Ben actually makes a friend in video stores clerk Todd, who sounds oddly like one of his father’s patients. All people named Todd must have some kind of serotonin issues.
"Sara Tonin? I think I went to high school with her."
The big selling point of the show is the patients that show up each week. Normally two celebrities show up and talk to Katz. Some of them manage to string together what seems to be a real conversation, and others just do their act and leave it at that. Some guests were amazing and kept visiting the good doctor. In fact you can hear Ray Romano hash out his sitcom ideas on the couch of Dr. Katz in season one. After he took off though, other great comedians took the show on. Dom Irrera was the most frequent patient, and if you see any of his episodes, you’ll see that he has a ton of issues to work out. Another stand out was similarly whiney sounding to Ray, in Fred Stoller. What do these men have in common? That’s right, they’re old and white. That theme keeps coming, we’ve got Louis C.K., Ron Lynch, Kevin Meaney, Dave Attell, Bill Braudis, Any Kindler, and so on. There is a lot. This show proves that old, weird white fellas are in need of therapy.
If you’re looking for story structure and deep meaning, you’re in the wrong place. This show is all about the jokes. The only real story is that Ben loves Laura, and that goes pretty much nowhere the entire six season run. If you just want some funny jokes and weird situations, this is worth checking out. I will say, if you have any illness that’s triggered by squiggling, you may want to avoid the show. It was animated in a very cheap way, so that there was no motion. Very rarely did character move on screen. It was always a still to create the illusion of motion. How did they fix this? They made all the lines move. So much so that I’m pretty sure they could have been sued for causing seizures. It really was a shaky premise.
After that joke, I should take a page out of Ben's book. (that was another bad joke by the way)
This is one of my favorite shows of all time. I saw one episode had to see them all. I love the one line jokes, the bad jokes, all the improve banter, and just the comedy. The show is a comedy. It has a bunch of jokes that make sense and relate to each other. This is why having someone record in the room with another person is great, and all these great animated films that are released today could be even better if they would let these great actors play off each other. I wholeheartedly recommend that everyone watch this show. If anything, just to see what a comedic genius Jonathan Katz is.
"Well Dave, maybe we should explore that thought."
Credit goes to: Comedycentral.com, squigglevision.tumblr.com, ericsnider.com, tvlistings.zap2it.com, electricalaudio.com, and sharetv.org.