Critic Reviews

Season 3 proves it’s one of the most fundamentally sound sitcoms out there. From the performances (really, those kids are good!) to the direction to the writing to the ethereal collective chemistry that stems from great character-building, every layer is so well-executed that even for the few off episodes, there’s still plenty of laughs to be had.

For now the NBC sitcom is earnestly uncaring and delightfully unscrupulous. Jack is a legitimately bad teacher, but Howerton makes him a great source of chaotic comedy.

At times, A.P. Bio struggles to build a bridge between what’s happening in Jack’s classroom and the rest of Whitlock, but the performances in the B-plots are so uniformly strong, they practically justify these digressions all on their own.

A.P. Bio has become more confident in its tone and characters in Season 2.

From the casting to the writing, the show has class, leaving you with the hope that Jack will be destined to a long stay in Toledo.

It is sharp, occasionally mean, and dark enough, but never nasty – content, instead, to be daft. ... Rather than hanging on a clever-clever concept, this is a case of well-crafted execution, and it wins extra marks for having actors playing students who look within reaching distance of being teenagers themselves.

A.P. Bio is at times too straight-forward, lacking both School of Rock's freshness and the strangeness that made O'Brien's SNL shorts such standouts. [2/9 Feb 2018, p.95]

The humor is biting, which you would expect from Meyers, Michaels and Howerton, whose been at his biting best for 12 seasons on “Always Sunny.” And while Howerton is the star, it’s really the supporting players, especially the nerdy kids, who make this one kind of fun.

A.P. Bio works best when focused on Jack and his students.

There’s a good chance A.P. Bio will become part of that [NBC sitcom lineup] upgrade, if it can dig even deeper into the secondary characters and their strange quirks at the same time as it features Howerton. The more the ensemble clicks, the better.