The two-part series finale of CBS' Two and a Half Men doesn't arrive until 8 p.m. Thursday, but we have other stuff to cover then. So, let's bid farewell today.
Full disclosure: I haven't watched but a half dozen episodes of Two and a Half Men since Jake (Angus T. Jones), the titular "half man," grew up. Jake was a funny foil as a little boy, not so much as a lazy, marijuana-smoking, porn-loving teen.
I did sample the reboot three seasons ago (Season 9) when Ashton Kutcher replaced Charlie Sheen after Sheen's infamous Season 8 meltdown. Sheen had been phoning it in for some time anyway.
CBS should have killed off the series when it killed off Sheen's Charlie Harper. It would have been an opportune time, but you don't kill the goose while it's still laying golden eggs.
Television follows the money until it reaches the point of diminishing returns. That, evidently, is Thursday.
There is never any real satisfactory explanation for what makes a sitcom popular. Plenty of quality comedies have died untimely deaths. Others inexplicably carry on season after season.
After Sheen was fired, the 2011-2012 season ratings actually rose 13 percent, to 15 million viewers. Kutcher's debut episode as Walden Schmidt was seen by an astonishing 28.7 million. Kutcher, whose previous claim to fame was as the dimwitted Michael Kelso on That '70s Show (and as Demi Moore's husband), was hailed as the savior of Two and a Half Men.
Kutcher seems affable enough. I met him and the rest of the cast on a press tour in '98 shortly before That '70s Show debuted. He was a former model, only 20 years old, and gave no inkling of his financial promise. Kutcher topped Forbes' annual list of top-paid TV actors when he earned an estimated $24 million between June 2012 and June 2013.
It was a young cast on That '70s Show. The oldest "teen" was Danny Masterson (Steven Hyde) at 22. Kutcher's co-star (and future fiancee/baby mama) Mila Kunis was youngest at not quite 15.
Maybe starting even younger was what happened to Jones. He was only 9 when Two and a Half Men began, but 19 when he got religion and bit the hand that was feeding him. In a 2012 Christian website interview, Jones famously denounced his own show as "filth."
"If you watch Two and a Half Men," Jones said, "please stop watching Two and a Half Men. I'm on Two and a Half Men. I don't want to be on it. Please stop watching it. Please stop filling your head with filth. People say it's just entertainment, [but] do some research on the effects of television on your brain and you'll have a decision to make."
I'll be the first to agree that one man's lighthearted bawdy ribaldry is another's smutty vulgarity, but for me Two and a Half Men had simply gotten lazy. The incessant sexual innuendo and adult content had grown boring.
Jones tried to apologize the next day (maybe someone pointed out the small fortune he was being paid), but it was too late. Jake and Jones disappeared at the end of Season 10.
Adding Amber Tamblyn, who plays Charlie's long-lost illegitimate, boozing, lesbian daughter, in Season 11 didn't help. And this season's foster child/adoption storyline with sassy 6-year-old Louis (Edan Alexander) was a desperate attempt to add another "half man." It was too late.
Finally, it's always nice to see Glenwood native Clark Duke on the small screen. He joined the series as Walden's friend Barry Foster last season, but after Thursday he'll be able to get back into his hot tub time machine.
The series may have lost me long ago, but 10.7 million or so still tune in each week. Thursday's finale (episode No. 262) will see the return of many curious viewers. I'll be watching just for the history of witnessing a 12-season sitcom sail away from the Malibu beach house into the sunset. That's increasingly rare.
• Coming. Ellen DeGeneres' new hidden camera series Repeat After Me debuts at 7:30 p.m. today on ABC. Host Wendi McLendon-Covey (The Goldbergs) guides celebrities, via earpiece, to interact with everyday people. First guest stars are Ellen Pompeo, Taye Diggs and Harry Connick Jr.
• Going. Jon Stewart will be missed. Last week he announced he'll step down from Comedy Central's The Daily Show sometime this year. His contract is up in September. I vote for John Oliver as his replacement.
• Gone. NBC has suspended NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams for six months without pay because he "misrepresented events" concerning his role in a helicopter incident in Iraq in 2003. Basically, Williams made it all up. He recently signed a $10 million annual contract, so at the least it was a $5 million tall tale.
The TV Column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Email:
mstorey@arkansasonline.com
Style on 02/17/2015