Perfect Harmony Review: Hunting Season (Season 1 Episode 4)
Perfect Harmony Season 1 Episode 4 “Hunting Season” lacks flash but finally gives Tymberlee Hill a platform to showcase her comedic range.
As a whole, the show still struggles to induce genuine belly laughs or snickers but it is funny in its subtleties, which is an art within itself.
Four episodes in and a clear pattern is emerging: the stories are rarely compelling on a macro level but the small details — particularly the quirky one liners — are working.
Impish statements likening Arthur to an “angry Wolf Blitzer” or clarifying that good is “the lonely, chubby stepsister of great” continue to be what the show does best and I’m anxious every week to see what the writers come up with.
With that said, I’m frustrated that Perfect Harmony struggles so much to bring all of its components into…well, harmony.
Eventually, the strengths of its small bits or the skills of individual performers are not going to be enough to keep audiences if the overarching storylines and ensemble don’t coalesce effectively.
To quote Reverend Jax (and Demi Lovato): Sorry, not sorry. Someone has to say it. It needs to find its rhythm, and soon.
That’s not to say this episode is a wash. Like I mentioned, Tymberlee Hill finally gets a platform for her talent and damn, does she milk every moment of it. The woman oozes charisma.
While Ginny (Anna Camp) and Arthur (Bradley Whitford) have been the frequent scene partners, the dynamic between Arthur and Adams (Tymberlee Hill) is a fun one and I hope that the show leans into it more.
Both Arthur and Adams are accustomed to being the alphas in their respective spheres so naturally, they are going to clash. The episode plays with this in a few different ways, even turning some tropes on their head, like the fact that Adams, not Arthur, is an expert hunter and marksman.
While their exchanges amount to a pissing content for dominance, it feels fresh because of Hill’s performance. Every retort, eye roll, and inflection are imbued with humor.
In fact, the best moments of the night belong to Tymberlee: the first, when she intentionally mumbles the year she won a pageant (so as to mask her age) and the second, when she very half heartedly calls out Arthur’s name when he’s lost, not particularly invested in helping find him.
If Perfect Harmony doesn’t get renewed for a second season, someone else has to give Hill a show. She’s just too funny not to have a regular showcase for talent.
While I’m consistently endeared toward Dwayne (Gene Segers), the friendship between Dwayne and Wayne (Will Greenberg) has confounded me from the start. Other than the fact that they grew up together, it hasn’t made much sense why these two are best friends.
I can tell that the show is trying to develop this story but I’m still struggling to buy it.
The most significant barrier is how they’ve written Wayne. Over and over again we get the message that he’s dumb and a little insensitive, brutish, and selfish but then something happens, and maybe he has more depth and sensitivity to him after all?
His character could come off as complex if they didn’t keep writing the same beats for him week after week, but Wayne’s storylines seem to always follow the same template.
Rather than coming off as someone misunderstood or possessing hidden depths, he mostly comes off as a hapless jerk who makes a selfless or kind decision only after he’s consistently made several unkind ones.
When Dwayne shared that he believed Wayne would be able to connect with Cash and accept him fully because Wayne had always embraced Dwayne for who he was, I simply didn’t believe it.
This Wayne? Really? The same guy who also asked out the girl you had a crush on and then married her? Huh?
Dwayne is so introspective (and comes off even more so on this episode as he discusses “the prison of toxic masculinity”) and because of that, I find it harder and harder to suspend belief that he would ever actually be friends with Wayne.
While the Dwayne/Wayne story wasn’t the focus of this episode, I am finding the whole relationship quite distracting, and I want them to spend more time developing both of these characters, particularly Wayne.
Lastly, while the show is clearly trying to find ways to develop its characters in settings outside of the choir room, I’m eager for the characters to spend more time together in rehearsal.
Those scenes were part of what made the pilot work, and I think there’s plenty of comedy and pathos to be found in the process of making music together.
What did you think of this episode of Perfect Harmony? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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Perfect Harmony airs Thursdays at 8:30/7:30c on NBC
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Cristina Iskander
Cristina is a Broadway enthusiast, book lover, and pop-culture fanatic living in New York City. She once won a Fantasy Bachelor contest (yes, like Fantasy Football, but for The Bachelor), and can banter about old school WB (Pacey + Joey FTW) just as well as Stranger Things and Pen15. She's still upset Benson and Stabler never got together and is worried Rollins and Carisi are headed down the same road, wants justice for Shangela, and hopes to one day walk-and-talk down a hallway with Aaron Sorkin.