Review of Big Mistakes: Dan Levy’s Netflix crime comedy is chaotic but seriously lacking in logic or emotion

According to the CinemaDrame news agency, the Schitt’s Creek star appears alongside Taylor Ortega and Laurie Metcalf in the series, which follows a family that becomes entangled in the criminal underworld on the eve of a local election.

The dark comedy Weeds, starring Mary-Louise Parker and written by Jenji Kohan, is often remembered as one of those Showtime series that started out great, then became silly, and then stayed in a “silly” phase long enough to eventually circle back around to being “great.” There are at least half a dozen examples of this pattern.

Personally, I enjoyed several of the more absurd seasons, where Nancy Botwin’s criminal escapades expanded beyond plausibility and became almost unbearably ridiculous. Among Showtime’s long-running shows, I still preferred Weeds to most of the others that overstayed their welcome.

Big Mistakes
Summary
Overall funny, occasionally tense, but not very deep

Air date: Thursday, April 9 (Netflix)
Cast: Dan Levy, Taylor Ortega, Laurie Metcalf, Jack Inanen, Boran Kuzum, Abby Quinn, Elizabeth Perkins
Creators: Dan Levy and Rachel Sennott

This makes it strange that I had not previously considered how one of my favorite genres in recent years — dark comedies about ordinary people who get pulled into serious crime through the complexities of capitalism — is in some ways indebted to Weeds. I kept comparing series like Killing It, Deli Boys, and Sunny Nights, when in reality they are all children of Weeds, and if I had made that clearer, more viewers might have watched them.

That omission ends here. Netflix’s new series Big Mistakes, created by powerhouse duo Dan Levy and Rachel Sennott, is undoubtedly a direct descendant of Weeds and will likely appeal to viewers who have seen Killing It, Deli Boys, and Sunny Nights. I recognized the connection immediately in this case, largely due to the presence of Elizabeth Perkins — an Emmy nominee for Weeds — but also because, just as Weeds began sharp and incisive before descending into chaos and, yes, silliness, this series starts out already close to that final stage.

Big Mistakes has a strong cast, frequently smart dialogue, and (simply because almost nothing fully makes sense) repeated twists and surprises. So everything depends on how willing you are to suspend disbelief while watching a fairly superficial comedy.

Set in New Jersey, the story follows a family with a complex ethnic and religious background centered around hardware store owner Linda (Laurie Metcalf), who decides to run for mayor of her mid-sized town after her mother’s death. The series is not really about her, although Metcalf is so compelling and reliable that anything she appears in inevitably orbits around her. But it is better to start with her.

Linda’s campaign is managed by her daughter Natalie (Abby Quinn), one of her three children. But the series is not really about her either. Big Mistakes is about Linda’s son Nicky (Levy), a Christian sect preacher whose denomination allows gay clergy but forbids same-sex relationships, forcing him to hide his relationship with contractor Tariq (Jacob Gutierrez). It is also about her daughter Morgan, a struggling actress turned elementary school teacher stuck in a long-term loveless relationship with Max (Jack Inanen), whose moustache signals a lack of willpower and whose mother (Annette, played by Perkins) has extensive financial resources and a strong interest in local politics.

For reasons that only make sense if you never think about them for even a second — truly, do not think about it — Nicky and Morgan go to a thrift shop run by Yusuf (Boran Kuzum) to buy a gift for their dying grandmother. When Yusuf refuses to sell them a necklace, Morgan steals it, and it later turns out to be important to a Russian criminal group led by Ivan (Mark Ivanir). Soon, Nicky and Morgan are deeply entangled in a criminal network that repeatedly endangers their lives.

Levy has not made enough television for me to say this with certainty, but I will say it anyway: he likes to start with exaggeration and superficiality and then refine things if the audience sticks with it. At least that happened in Schitt’s Creek, a show so exaggerated at the beginning that I stopped after six episodes and only returned three seasons later, once I was convinced it had improved — which it had.

In Big Mistakes, there is no such turning point I can point to where the show suddenly becomes better, because unlike Schitt’s Creek, this series is built more on plot mechanics than character development.

Nicky is a priest or something, but after one or two sermon-like speeches designed purely to connect story points, there is no real exploration of his faith or spirituality. Morgan’s acting past matters more than her current job as a teacher. Her strained, unmotivated relationship with Max is more interesting than Nicky’s fairly predictable relationship with Tariq, which makes Morgan feel like the better-developed character — though she is still quite shallow at the start, apparently the basis for constant sibling conflict.

I kept forgetting there was a third sibling, which is odd because Quinn gives a fairly funny performance, even if there is no clear reason for anything her character does.

In truth, no one in Big Mistakes seems to have a clear reason for their actions — from Nicky and Morgan to Yusuf the shopkeeper working for a criminal organization, and even that organization itself. Part of this can be attributed to everyone being deliberately bad at what they do (except perhaps Nicky’s religious role, which makes it even more frustrating that he does not seem to care about it).

Still, making a crime comedy where motivations amount to “thoughtless bad decisions” is a choice — and not a particularly clever or emotionally engaging one. Weeds, Killing It, Deli Boys, and Sunny Nights all contain a sense of real, tangible economic pressure, whereas Big Mistakes feels more like the product of a writers’ room — albeit a very good one. The writing team includes Erin Levy of Mad Men (no relation to Dan Levy) and several other established creators. Still, it is strange that after eight episodes the show arrives at a major revelation that either depends on an implausible coincidence or an overly complex setup that was not properly established throughout the season.

Big Mistakes suffers from what physicist-critics of television might call an “observer effect”: close examination turns it from an entertaining series into a weaker one. Underneath, there is not much substance — but on the surface, it is entertaining.

If you accept the witty, sarcastic dialogue rather than resisting it, the show can be quite engaging, thanks to tight direction (including Dean Holland on the first two episodes), editing that leaves no room to breathe (or for full character development), and a soundtrack by Patches and Nora Kroll-Rosenbaum that sometimes evokes Run Lola Run, raising tension just enough to distract from the implausibility of events. You may get frustrated with Big Mistakes, but you will not be bored — and that is a kind of achievement.

Morgan becomes the emotional center thanks to stronger character work, and Ortega plays her with a mix of vulnerability and irritation. Levy also portrays his character’s fatigue and frustration with a controlled comedic edge, though again one wonders: why make him a priest when religion plays almost no real role in the story?

Kuzum delivers a mix of annoyance and menace, but just as his character seems ready to break out, he disappears from the narrative, draining interest in Yusuf. And Metcalf? When given more than just shouting, she is excellent — and even when she is shouting, the show is so heightened that it works.

The final twist, however implausible, made me think a second season could actually be entertaining. But if Big Mistakes is truly aiming for the emotional, human grounding of Schitt’s Cree