What's New on TV: Man Seeking Woman

FXX has added a new original show to its schedule. Following It's Always Sunny on Wednesday, at 10:30 pm, Man Seeking Woman stars Jay Baruchel as down-on-his-love-life Josh. You may recognize Baruchel; he's part of Judd Apatow's crew. Apatow cast Baruchel as the lead in his short lived sitcom, Undeclared, as a socially awkward college freshman. Since then, he's mostly been a bit part actor in Apatow films. In Knocked Up, he plays a goofy stoner, and in This Is The End , where he plays a socially awkward pothead (You may remember him as Seth Rogen's friend who really hated Jonah Hill, even though Jonah was nothing but nice to him).

He's the lead opposite the stunning Alice Eve in She's Out of Your League, where he's also just a socially awkward underachiever (Interestingly, he's also the voice of Hiccup in How to Train Your Dragon). So, you can say he's been typecast. His performance in Man Seeking Women is in the same mold.

A typical Man Seeking Woman episode will take a classic dating trope, and take it very, very literally. In the pilot episode, Josh goes on a day with a literal troll:

In another, he's interrogated, quite literally (torture and all), about his love life by his mother:

The show is inventive and never very serious. However, it tackles very relatable issues, like being hypercritical of an ex's new boyfriend (who is literally Hitler), to being jealous of a friend's game with women, to obsessing over sending a perfect text. Man Seeking Woman is lacking in subtly, which makes it a perfect follow up to Sunny, and a great fit for what FXX is going for, which is to not take itself too seriously. Give it a look if you have time. I'd also recommend FX's You're the Worst, which is being moved to FXX for its second season (starting back up in July).