What Do We Think About The Will And Grace Premiere?

NBC can quietly think (at this point) that Must See TV is potentially back on Thursday nights, thanks to a strong showing of the return of Will & Grace this week.  The show started off in a big way with 10.19 million viewers and a 3.0 in Adults 18-49 watching.  From what I understand, that is the biggest the network has seen for a comedy since the series finale of The Office a couple of years back.

I was not home in time to watch it on Thursday night, as I had dinner plans, but naturally I made sure to DVR it and watch it shortly after.  My roommate and our friend decided to watch it in a gay bar, which is a good idea for other shows like RuPaul's Drag Race, but this was something that didn't call for hundreds of other men to be laughing around me.  I have been a huge fan of the series since its premiere in 1998, and I really wanted to see if they could still capture that magic eleven years after its finale without all the extra noise.  

Did they capture it?  Somewhat, but it needs some time to breathe again. There were key points in the 22 minute episode that I thought brought me back to when it was on many years ago, but then there were points that I felt were just not necessary.

First of all, kudos to them for getting us up to speed with what really went down in the original finale of the show.  It's revealed that Grace and Will are single and living with each other again (no Leo and Vince, for now) and that whole weird ending where their kids marry each other didn't really happen.  Jack is still his immature yet lovable self throughout the episode, and I love the Grindr reference in the beginning about a guy being ten feet from him when in actuality it was Will.  LOL.

The first episode is totally political, which is fine to a certain extent although I really don't want it to stick this way going forward.  If you watched the original series, they didn't get too political during the course of the show, and more focused on the character development between the four of them, most notably Will and Grace as Jack and Karen were more the funny sidekicks. 

The episode shows that Karen is clearly a Donald Trump supporter as she's friends with him and Melania, and that plays to Grace's unfortunate interest as she gets the job of redecorating the oval office.  Whereas this is funny, and does play into some hilarious bits (the cheetos moment, for instance) its just a bit too off the bat as the show already threw their names into the political hat last year when they did a 10 minute video supporting Hillary Clinton.  It's just a bit bizarre that a random decorator from New York would get such a big job, but to each their own.  I just wish the first episode was a bit more emotional in a way to kick things off again.

Will's part in the episode is also political, as he has the hots for a "bad news" senator who is doing more harm than good to the EPA.  Of course, Jack goes with him and quickly tells that everyone in the secret service is gay which leads to one of the members (my future husband Kyle Bornheimer) cuddling up to him and being all cutesy.  The part where the Secret Service agent brings up"Just Jack" is hilarious as Jack himself wants nothing to do with that one-man show anymore, so there are elements like this that bring the show back to where it was for eight years.

From what I understand, the second episode strays away from the politics and its business as usual for these four characters that we love. I think that would be a great idea moving forward, as no matter what side of the coin you fall on politically, you have the chance to alienate some viewers if it becomes a bit force-fed with the same jokes over and over again.  That being said, I would give the premiere a 7 out of 10 with hopes that my number for it will increase as the episodes continue to air.

What are your thoughts on the premiere episode?