Dr. Ken

The whole show runs medium-medium, with humor plainer than Dr. Ken’s khakis.

The Dr. Ken pilot is a tough watch--a relentlessly mediocre and formulaic half-hour of family comedy that appears to have no aspirations to satire.

Its problem is too much Ken Jeong. His manic energy takes over every frame of the pilot, at the expense of anything and anyone else in the show.

A family comedy has to have heart and humor, and Dr. Ken has neither.

Dr. Ken lacks any of the warmth, subtlety or cleverness of network sibling Fresh Off the Boat, instead relying on listless sitcom clichés and broad, obvious jokes (accompanied by loud, unwarranted audience laughter). It’s completely tone-deaf when it comes to depicting modern youth culture, and it wastes talented supporting players.

At home, Dr. Ken is just another sitcom-patented dumb daddy, although with an added shading of self-absorption. Mr. Jeong’s performance can best be described as over-the-top back around the other side and over-the-top a second time.

The show is deadly and Jeong, who did nice work in “Community” and those “Hangover” movies, is wooden and completely lacking in credibility. There isn’t a funny line in the entire first episode.