The pilot starts with Russ trying and failing to engage Lina in bed, then masturbating himself to sleep - creator and executive producer Andrew Gurland definitely knows what cable channel he’s on - and before long, Lina has told Russ that if he’s so dissatisfied with the frequency of their intimate contact, he should find someone else to pick up the slack.

The sexual spark left their marriage a long time ago - Russ has even “crunched the numbers” to figure out how many times he and Lina will probably have sex again before one of them dies - and while his body hasn’t begun wandering yet, his mind is strolling down the railroad tracks with a bindle stick over its shoulder. Married is about Russ and Lina Bowman, a couple who’ve been together long enough to sire a passel of girls. I hope the creators of FX’s Married and USA Network’s Satisfaction knew they’d be walking into a critical minefield with their new shows, each built around a husband and wife (played by Judy Greer and Nat Faxon on Married, and Matt Passmore and Stephanie Szostak on Satifaction) with offspring, a mortgage, and other responsibilities. Most reviewers don’t have the life experience to judge the veracity of a show about cops or doctors or spies, but whether firsthand or via their parents or friends, they understand enough about married life to give them a specific sense of what it means to be in a marriage - its daily ups and downs, its small and large compromises and sacrifices. As a result, the reaction to these sorts of shows is idiosyncratic and subjective because your gut is more capable of telling you whether the show rings true or not - whether it reflects a reality, or an emotional truth, that you recognize, or that means something to you.Īll of which is a rather long wind-up top before telling you that I found both of these new series problematic and in some ways deeply irritating, even though they’re clearly the work of smart, ambitious people who want to get at something real and who aren’t just killing screentime. Photo: Richard Ducree/USA Network, Prashant Gupta/FX

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