'Those Who Can't': Pilot Recap... Worth Watching?

In the Amazon Prime original, “Those Who Can’t,” we meet three teachers who haven’t seemed to develop a level of maturity much beyond that of their students.

There’s unfortunate gym teacher Coach Andy Fairbell (Andrew Orvedahl), whose own students beat him up at dodgeball, Spanish teacher Loren Payton (Adam Cayton-Holland), who obsessively teaches “proper” Spanish to Spanish-speaking students, and (people’s) history teacher Ben Shoemaker (Benjamin Roy), who throws his students into labor scenarios that may or may not injure them.

Principal Barry Quinn (Rory Scovel), a soft-spoken, guitar-playing hugging type, has to remind Loren that the end of the year will bring a lay-off for a bunch of teachers after he overhears Loren ribbing with the school jock, Bryce Turner. After Bryce tortures Andy and eggs Ben’s house, the teacher swear revenge on him.

Bryce Turner’s biggest love is lacrosse, so they go in search of drugs to plant in his locker so he won't be able to play. Ben goes to the park and buys from Yahtzee-playing thugs, while Loren buys from his students and Andy has his class do a pee-test.

When a tip leads the Principal to Bryce’s locker, he finds it chock-full of every drug imaginable, and some women’s multi-vitamins. Barry reluctantly takes Bryce to his office, bringing the badly behaving teachers as well.

Bryce’s father arrives and takes him home. The teachers eagerly ask Barry what punishment was doled, but Barry reminds them that the Turner family basically owns the school. The gym, in fact, is named for them. He gives the teachers written warnings—again—for their files.

The teachers settle for paying the street thugs to beat the crap out of Bryce.

Verdict:

The show seemed to pick up toward the end, but much of it played like a sort of inside joke the audience wasn’t quite in on, or a sketch comedy that stretched a little long. Not surprising, since the actors/writers are all comedians whose biggest break seemed to be a guest comic spot on "Conan" up to this point... and the show was developed based on a sketch.

A little shaky at times, it seems to have the potential to be funny in that raunchy, low-budget attitude that keeps CollegeHumor in business (the results of the pee test were worth the wait), if a few things can be tweaked here and there. Pilot episodes can be difficult to get off the ground, but if there is a clearer focus on character development (Loren seemed to be the most rounded of the characters, who otherwise play as stereotypes) and a little less predictable slapstick, it could most certainly be a good watch.

Final say: If you spend hours on Youtube watching your friends’ home-made comedies and old stand-up routines, you’ll do just fine.

QUOTES:

 “High five literacy.”

“You know what friends do; they squeeze each other.”

“You wanna go check the lost and found for cool hats?”

“You didn’t come up from the streets. You got those tattoos with student loan money.”

“What’s with the park bullshit? You said we were gonna buy drugs!”

“Well, they’re in your locker. Literally every pill I’ve ever seen in my life.”