‘English Teacher’ Review: Fall TV Starts the Semester with a Razor-Sharp Comedy of Oddballs
Evan Marquez (Brian Jordan Alvarez) is going through it.
The high school English teacher in suburban Texas recently broke up with boyfriend Malcolm (Jordan Firstman), is under investigation by the school board for kissing him in front of students, doesn’t want to be a local queer hero, and is also expressly forbidden from dating fellow teachers, like handsome new hire Harry (Langston Kerman).
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FX’s latest comedy stays true to its genre, with laugh-out-loud dialogue, casually outrageous characters, and scenarios that could be out of the sitcom handbook on the surface, but get sharpened to a 2024 clip by Alvarez and fellow writers Stephanie Koenig, Jake Bender, Zach Dunn, and Dave King. Jokes fly so fast that they could be improvised, setting the bar from the very first scene for a show bursting with humor even when the plot goes off course.
“English Teacher” has been percolating since summer of 2022, when it was ordered as a pilot with Alvarez teamed up with “What We Do in the Shadows” showrunner Paul Simms as executive producer. Dave King and Jonathan Krisel also serve as executive producers, and split directing duty with Alvarez and Koenig. Six of Season 1’s eight episodes were screened for critics.
But back to Evan’s very hard life. All of the aforementioned struggles come up in the pilot, ostensibly as the arc of Season 1 — but they’re (mostly) resolved by episode’s end. Harry takes a back seat to Evan and his friends’ professional misadventures, and the installments that follow pick up with various day-to-day battles at school; the gender dynamics of powderpuff, teen sensitivities in the modern era, tenuous workplace (and real-world) politics, and an off-site field trip.
The teen actors are genuinely hilarious but underutilized as the show somewhat forcibly spotlights its title character, and a few parents interspersed in the later episodes are a midseason treat worth the wait (the best seed planted in the premiere turns out to be irate mother Linda Harrison, a superb Jenn Lyon). Fellow teachers Gwen (Koenig), Markey (Sean Patton), college counselor Rick (Carmen Christopher), and principal Grant (Enrico Colantoni) are all scene stealers in their own right, peppering every subplot with uniquely chaotic personalities and quirks.
With so much eccentricity around him, Alvarez is tasked with making Evan the straight man (comedically!), and the character starts to feel out-of-place for not matching the level of freak in his surroundings. After six episodes, there’s still no clear arc for the season (except the ongoing subplot of Gwen’s boyfriend building a pool “by hand,” a gift that keeps on giving). But “English Teacher” doesn’t lose sight of the students, and therefore of the fact that there is might in learning, growing, and improving week-to-week as time passes. With a promising starts, there’s still plenty of time to keep pushing its comedic potential.
Grade: B
“English Teacher” airs Mondays at 10 p.m. on FX and streams on Hulu.
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