‘A Million Little Things’ Loses Vision in Execution

Eddie Saville (David Giuntoli) eulogizes his friend in "A Million Little Things" on ABC. By Courtesy of ABC

ABC’s latest drama “A Million Little Things” delivered an unimpressive debut, struggling to hit its tonal stride and tripping up over the “little things” that are supposed to come together for a compelling television experience. The episode presents decent performances and sets up several storylines and themes for the season to explore, but a number of writing and producing choices reflect that the show has not yet found its voice.

The show centers around a group of four friends whose lives are shaken when one of them, Jon (Ron Livingston), commits suicide and leaves everyone else to piece together what happened and how to move forward. His death prompts the others to confront the complacency and brokenness in their own lives and relationships, with his passing serving as a catalyst for change. Ed (David Giuntoli) struggles to leave a loveless marriage while having an affair with Delilah (Stephanie Szostak), Jon’s wife. Rome (Romany Malco) battles his own intense depression and suicidal ideation without telling his wife Regina (Christina Moses). And Gary (James Roday) lives in constant fear of his breast cancer returning. Nothing about the show is particularly innovative, and it hardly aims to be. Instead, it proposes all the makings of a heartfelt drama with a conversation about mental health at its core.

However, awkward tonal shifts and forced comedy confuse the delivery. No one knows why Jon killed himself, but instead of setting up an opportunity for his friends and family to explore a realistic and complex new understanding of him, the show presents a mystery involving his secretary, Ashley (Christina Ochoa), who hides his suicide note and deletes his files. The scenes regarding this mystery are paired with tense and suspenseful music, and each reveal adds more suspicion to the plot than the last, so it almost feels like clips from a crime show were edited into a melodrama.

The humor also tends to miss the mark. Network TV is no stranger to dramedies, but in an episode centered around two suicide attempts, a funeral, and protagonists that just lost one of their closest friends, jokes come across as being at best unnecessary and at worst uncomfortable. For instance, right after Ed says he almost expects Jon to “come walking through those doors” in his eulogy, Gary bursts in, late and with a date at his side. Later, when Ed, Gary, and Rome begin to reach a breakthrough in their long-stagnant friendship at a Bruins game, a bystander interjects by asking to cut them in line for beer. Rather than providing real comic relief, the execution ends up dampening tension that is entirely appropriate in the context and ultimately either feels unrealistic or develops disdain in the viewer for certain characters.

To make matters worse, multiple details do not feel like they fit in a 2018 show trying to encourage “progressive” conversations. The show features a man with breast cancer and a stay at home dad, yet these two men are also constantly made fun of by their closest friends for lacking “nips” and failing to “wear the pants in the family” respectively. While there are depictions of women supporting women, the first episode still barely passes the Bechdel test, and all the female characters are involved in the capacity of love interests aside from Ashley, the secretary. Furthermore, Ed’s wife, Katherine (Grace Park), is a career-driven woman portrayed as frigid and unfeeling as if to justify her husband’s affair.

This is not to say that there are no redeeming elements in the first episode, or even that it is wholly unenjoyable. The premiere does a good job of subverting expectations and maintaining threads of uncertainty throughout. It also succeeds in hitting key emotional beats when Gary reveals that his distress comes not from a relapse of cancer but rather from the prospect of spending the rest of his life in fear of it, and when Delilah breaks down for the first time only when she is finally alone. Yet these moments cannot carry a show on their own. Overall, much like the state of the protagonists in this premiere, “A Million Little Things” has the potential for growth but a long way to go.