Not Dead Yet Season 1 Episodes 1 and 2 Review: Pilot and Not a Tiger Yet

Ghosts are getting a moment in the sitcom spotlight. Though we meet these spirits for much less time than on CBS’s Ghosts, they still have plenty to offer on Not Dead Yet Season 1 Episode 1, “Pilot,” and Not Dead Yet Season 1 Episode 2, “Not a Tiger Yet.”

Our heroine here is Nell, who by her own description set her rising professional life aside for a love that fell apart. She returns to the newsroom where she once showed great promise, but will now be memorializing the dead instead of penning feature stories.

The good news is that she has help! The bad news is the form that help comes in—the very people she’s writing about, visible only to her, and all too eager to help her as much as themselves in a way that can be hard to appreciate for someone at a low point.

Though the spin is unique, the show’s main messages—about living one’s life to the fullest and honoring the stories of those who are no longer with us—are nothing new. We’re promised a mostly episodic format of one heartwarming pep speech per half-hour.

The real strength of Not Dead Yet lies in its characters, and it’s hard to find a weak link in the bunch. It’s not that they’re all always lovable, and that’s the point. These are truly human characters with flaws that make them even more relatable.

Of course, most of that falls on the shoulders of Gina Rodriguez, playing the series lead. Nell is frankly a mess a lot of the time, especially when she gets sloppy drunk and insults a former coworker who is now both a potential work friend and her boss.

It’s at this point that the ghosts start showing up: first a jingle writer named Monty who leaves behind a wife and his own regrets about a fulfilling career and then Jane, an overly-intense motivational speaker who leaves…well, mostly a lot of ex-husbands.

Nell actually sees quite a few of these visitors in her first days back on the job, but these two are the focuses of their respective episodes. Though neither has much time for her self-pity, they are both determined to help her in very different ways.

They do, to varying degrees of success. Nell almost gets herself fired again by publishing a sensational environmental activism story at Jane’s urging, and Monty’s reflections are poignant and sweet, if a bit sappy. Most importantly, they introduce us to his widow, Cricket, who I adore.

The cast is rounded out by Nell’s ride-or-die BFF Sam, the aforementioned boss Lexi, and her roommate Edward, who can be hard to live with but is easy to warm up to and gives us a decent portrayal of an autistic character.

My biggest concern for Not Dead Yet is that it could become too repetitive, with a different character telling Nell essentially the same thing every week. Again, it’s the character dynamics themselves that really shine, both in the main cast and our ghost of the episode.

 If the show finds a way to move its characters forward at a realistic pace while still having reason to keep its supernatural revolving door open, the potential for new characters and respective hijinks is almost endless. And Nell does have a long way to go.

This is a true “feel-good comedy,” and while that’s a great thing, it can mean that audiences, like Nell, might sometimes feel preached to about appreciating their own lives and potential. Thankfully, there’s enough warmth and humor to keep us coming back all the same.

What did you think of this episode of Not Dead Yet? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Not Dead Yet airs Wednesdays at 9:30/8:30C on ABC.

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