'Close Enough' Review
TV-14
Runtime: 11-minute segments per 22-minute episodes
Production Companies: Cartoon Network Studios, Studio T
Distributor: HBOMax
Created By: J. G. Quintel
Voice Cast: J. G. Quintel, Gabrielle Walsh, Jason Mantzoukas, Kimiko Glenn, Jessica DiCicco, James Adomian, Danielle Brooks
Release Date: July 9, 2020 (8 Episodes)
Well, it’s about GODDAMN TIME! How long has it been?
If you’re unaware of how long it took this series to be released, let me give you a bit of a history lesson. During 2017’s San Diego Comic-Con, TBS revealed a lineup of original adult animated programming they were producing aside from draining… I mean… producing new episodes of American Dad. You had Olan Rogers’s Final Space, some show called Tarantula and, last but not least, Close Enough, the sophomore series from J.G. Quintel. Close Enough would follow hot on the heels of Quintel’s Emmy Award-winning hit series Regular Show, which had ended earlier that year. The trailer was released online and many people were hyped for all the right reasons. I would argue that Regular Show and Adventure Time saved Cartoon Network, for they arrived during the lowest point of the channel’s history, aka the CN Real era, aka The Dark Ages. Remember when Cartoon Network had nothing but live-action original programming?! ON A CHANNEL CALLED CARTOON FRIGGIN’ NETWORK?!
Adventure Time and Regular Show helped me throughout middle school and high school. Heck, I have a pic with J.G. Quintel from my first NYCC in 2015 when he was promoting Regular Show: The Movie.
So, believe me when I say how exhausting the three-year wait for this show was. Close Enough received an official trailer (which was oddly enough was the pitch trailer than official which TBS just showed to the public as the official trailer) and a Fall 2017/early 2018 release date, then all traces of it disappeared and TBS went radio silent about it. Final Space was released (then moved to Adult Swim because nobody really watches TBS), Tarantula was released (and canceled), but there was no word on Close Enough for nearly THREE goddamn years. Lo and behold, WarnerMedia’s HBO Max came into the picture and snatched the series off of TBS’s shelf.
People who grew up watching Regular Show will find solace in Close Enough, which tackles relatable themes of a domestic lifestyle with a blend of familiarity and adult humor. It’s comforting to see J.G. Quintel focus on the many trials and tribulations of aging with his own brand and creative sense of humor. The show follows a millennial married couple — Emily (a singer-songwriter) and Josh (a game developer) — their five-year-old daughter Candice, and their divorced friends, Alex and Bridget, living in a duplex in L.A. while navigating through life in your 30s and adapting to modern society. Each episode contains a premise but follows wild and random scenarios that don’t make a lick of sense. However, it’s so damn imaginative and hilarious that you have no other choice but to appreciate it.
Close Enough is an adult version of Regular Show through and through. It’s more relatable in terms of characters but less nuanced with the stories. After 250 episodes of Regular Show, you start to get the sense of Quintel’s — and his team’s — style of storytelling. While Close Enough feels nostalgic due to the familiar structure, the novelty quickly wears off, especially once you realize that many adult animated shows tackle the same themes. I highly recommend NOT binge-watching this show. Watch a few episodes at a time, but don’t overdo it. Close Enough is hilarious, but when it gets weird, it gets fucking WEIRD, which isn’t new coming from the same people who delivered shit like this:
Produced at Cartoon Network Studios, Close Enough consists of two 11-minute segments per episode but does this strange thing where it cuts to black in the middle of a segment. This could definitely catch viewers off guard until they realize it was simply trying to abide by the frustrating TBS format that cuts to commercials way too often. Now that it has found a home on HBO Max, we can only hope that future episodes — if this lives to see a second season — won’t have to abide by a cable channel format. That said, J.G. Quintel's Close Enough is a fun and energetic adult animated series that works best when it presents adult themes through realized and focused ideas. The episodes are so random that if you blink, you’ll miss the context of a joke or a gag that turns into a story element, but much like its predecessor, it’s too damn creative and charming not to appreciate.
