Grade: C- | Genre: Comedy Summary: While there are a handful of laughs that will catch you when you need it, the setup of these four single guys lends itself for a ridiculous comedy that never pays off. So after a feeble attempt to pull the old switcheroo of goofy Joey for the immortal Friends, NBC has decided to take a serious attempt at resurrecting "must-see" Thursday nights, fueled by last season's sleeper hit My Name is Earl and quirky critic darling, the Office. Evidently, they weren't aware that while they were refilling their drink at the bar, television's most popular drama CSI and surprise late bloomer Smallville moved in on their girl. Regardless, you have to give NBC credit for trying to hold on to the soap in this grimy prison shower. So to fill out their comedy line-up, they have brought in four single guys living in New York to remind us of Friends before they started pairing off. These gents are boyhood pals that all move in to their friend Ben's apartment that he inherits from his grandmother who has recently passed.

Last week's pilot showed intriguing promise. The four guys had a solid dynamic between them. It was classic guys sticking it to their friends, from ragging on their girlfriend's parachute underpants to the dangers of milkshake backwash. Its problem areas came in jokes that had the familiar execution that has been worn painfully thin on Will and Grace and doesn't try to breathe any life into the tired sitcom format. So the good moderately outweighed the bad, but since the pilot has to sell the series, can episode two flesh out the promise or be deflated from already exhausting all its laughs?

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Ben eyes a brunette hottie and tries to ply his newfound knowledge to disastrous results. He wisely regroups, quickly throws on himself, and before he knows it, it's on. Jason and Bobby turn picking up chicks into a contact sport, as they take turns shooting down their buddy's fledgling chances mid-conversation. The only thing they walk away with is a phone number to the morgue. Ben saunters into breakfast the next morning a smilin' man, chuck full from a night of fruitful research. The problem is that the coupling urge hits him like a Mack truck, and he can't help himself from laying down plans to spend the weekend in the Vineyard with her parents. His buds convince him to ditch the rebound girl and seal his inaugural one-night-stand. She calls him out for being a one-night-stand virgin, and we find out the player got played on this one. She was only looking for a quick romp between the sheets.

This episode was very weak. I mean painting Seth Green in makeup is funny for about ten seconds, but they just keep going back to the well for three or four minutes, trying to rehash the joke. We need original humor. Don't keep smacking us with the same joke time and time again. The one-night-stand is such a fertile breeding ground for laughs that they barely tapped the keg. And I don't want to hear any excuses about they only have 22 minutes to work with after they've sold their soul to the commercial machine. Look at how many original laughs they pack into Scrubs each week. Since Four Kings is from the brain trust that brought us Will and Grace, we expect it to come equipped with that snarky humor. Unfortunately, we also come to realize that this is from the creators from Will and Grace, so the joke delivery that's has grown tired over the years on stereotype heavy Will is just as stale here.

While there are a handful of laughs that will catch you when you need it, the setup of these four single guys lends itself for a ridiculous comedy that never pays off. Though it's much too early to resign the fate of Four Kings to the television bone yard, its not looking too promising for the boys at the moment. Maybe in the weeks ahead, we will see if they can unshackle themselves from the bounds of the sitcom and up the laugh quotient to help the series live up to its promise. I wouldn't hold your breath though.