Articles by Rob Buckley

In the US: Sundays, 10pm, HBO
In the UK: Acquired by Sky Atlantic. No air date set

Three strikes and you’re out. Wrong American game, I know, but that would generally be the rule at this point for a show that scored as poorly as Ballers on the Barrometer, the all-singing, all-dancing, all-smiling guide to quality television.

Yet for some reason I’m almost inclined to keep watching. The show is effectively Entourage, relocated to Miami and set in the world of sports and sports agencies, rather than acting. Okay, it’s got a heroic, good natured agent you want to root for (Dwayne Johnson), rather than a complete git (Jeremy Piven). And yes, the cast is almost entirely black, not the generally paler shades of Entourage.

But black, East Coast Entourage is what it is, right down to the epic misogyny, wanton excess, man-children behaving badly and cameos by famous players – none of whom, of course, I recognised.

Unfortunately, despite the presence of Rob Cordry (The Daily Show, Childrens Hospital), the big differences are:

1. It’s about as funny as a routine echocardiogram picking up a suspicious murmur
2. Other than Dwayne, there’s no one at all you can root for.

The first episode was just hideous in every way possible. As was the third episode. The second was marginally better, I grant you, with some moments where you could almost bring yourself to like some other characters and there were signs of jokes.

But overall? Hideous, reprehensible, nasty and almost certainly true to life, unfortunately.

And to some extent, perhaps that’s why there’s part of me that wants to keep watching. The Rock, of course, is great, which helps, too. But I think it’s the fact that it’s like having your worst nightmares confirmed, like on some depressing Channel 4 ‘documentary’ that invites you to judge its participants, that makes me want to keep watching.

So if you like sports and watching people with oodles of cash and car-crash lives, but can’t bear yourself to watch The Real Housewives of anywhere, maybe this is the show for you. If not, do avoid at all costs. It might just suck you in.

Barrometer rating: 4
TMINE prediction: Cancelled by the end of the season, but could last another if HBO thinks it can build an audience

In the US: Sundays, 10.30pm/9.30c, HBO
In the UK: Mondays, 10.10pm, Sky Atlantic

It’s fair to say the final two minutes of the third episode of The Brink made me change my mind about it a little. It’s slightly smarter than it first seemed, perhaps being more about political gamemanship than about a genuinely crazy Pakistani general taking over his country, causing the world to worry it’s on the brink of war. The US’s – and perhaps the world’s – only hopes are the asian-addicted US Secretary of State (Tim Robbins) and a hapless, idiotic US civil servant in Pakistan (Jack Black).

But it’s still not great. No siree.

The show has been consistent since day one in giving us a world run by hopelessly childish, corrupt and often stupid men who might nevertheless be quite good at their jobs – well, some of them.

It’s also been consistently unfunny, although it’s constantly firing a broad spectrum of attempted jokes that would probably sit well in any Judd Apatow movie comedy. Some of these make it through to their targets, whether it’s a simple swear off between two important officials or a sight gag involving a man with a very large penis.

But largely they follow a simple, uninspiring formula that juxtaposes the seriousness of the position or person with their conversation or vice versa – eg Pakistani president in a conspirators’ meeting talking about his brother’s cheap choice in wine, Secretary of State arguing with an Indian politician while in a urinal.

There is some intelligence behind it all, as I intimated earlier, and there’s certainly some wit to it at times. But the humour’s so broad that it neutralises most of that intelligence.

The Brink’s certainly not the worst programme you could watch and it’s not the least funny comedy on TV by a long shot. But it could and should have been a whole lot better.

Barrometer rating: 4
TMINE prediction: Should be dead by the end of the season