3 Amazon pilots might be the last of a (dying) breed
on-screen, at least in this initial half-hour.
‘ The Climb’
The most jumbled yet most distinctive of the pilots is this piece about an office drone who dreams of being a social-media star.
“The Climb,” set and filmed in Detroit, is like a more-profane but also more buttoned-up — and no less cerebral — companion to the Issa Rae HBO comedy “Insecure.”
Nia, played by show creator Diarra Kilpatrick, appreciates the “genius” of a rival influencer — that she has “figured out how to be Barbie, how to be sexy for a living” — but what Nia really wants is to be fulfilled.
When she’s told that that’s a white-girl problem, she replies, “Isn’t that why Martin Luther King died — so that I could someday have white-girl problems?”
‘Love You More’
It’s easy to see how this collaboration of comedian and cabaret star Bridget Everett and showrunner Michael Patrick King (“Sex and the City”’) could translate into a fairly conventional series, even though some of its elements push boundaries.
Much of the half-hour — during which Everett’s character, Karen, works with the young residents of a home for people with Down syndrome — is standard sitcom stuff (even with an A plot that involves a teenager with a propensity for touching Karen’s breasts).
The show serves as the biggest showcase so far for Everett’s knowing, tough but vulnerable persona, and it gives her occasions to sing, including a production number about buying a bra.
In a supporting role as Karen’s guileless older roommate, Loni Anderson manages to steal attention from Everett.