Critic Reviews

The series has something of a “True Lies” feel, with its plot winking at itself. There is plenty of action and suspense and even a “Timecop” twist. J-C, though, is a different sort of action-figure, filled with more self-doubt and regret then you usually see in the movies. But even with that, the series smartly never takes itself too seriously.

While the emu farm itself is funny (because emus), the story takes something of a deeper turn towards the end of the season, as an emotionally beleaguered JCVD learns to love and accept himself first. It’s what makes Jean-Claude Van Johnson something beyond one long SNL spoof; but having said that, the joy of Jean-Claude Van Johnson is how breezy and silly it can be.

In celebrating who Van Damme was at the peak of his career and who he is after his long fall from grace, about which the actor has been brutally honest, Callaham and Van Damme grant this series a balance of absurdity and gentle earnestness, even allowing it to end on a warm existential note.

All the elements work well together, but Van Damme owns the show’s six episodes. Even when he’s dead serious playing himself, he has an almost Buster Keaton-like skill at deadpan humor.

Van Damme--older, wiser and slower, also wrinkled, hunched and melancholy--salvages an otherwise fascinating, uneven mess.

The overarching parody of the series becomes repetitive when an already implausible plot literally doubles down on the absurd. ... The entire enterprise is undergirded only by Van Damme's performance; his athleticism lends itself to physical humor that the actor amplifies with surprising comedic timing.

JCVJ does a better job of playfully incorporating its homages, but they still don’t build to anything more meaningful. Van Damme himself has a bit of fun playing another character, but exhibits little enthusiasm as “himself.” All in all, it’s a rather forgettable, and even if “JCVJ” finds an audience, this diversion could’ve resonated with a wider niche.

Although occasionally funny, Jean-Claude Van Johnson sits in an odd no-man’s-land between clever self-parody and aggrieved vanity project.

The six-episode season gets increasingly outlandish, eventually including time travel, doppelgangers and a machine that controls the weather. It’s not quite enough to transcend the mediocre comedy, thin characters and rote fight scenes, but at least it’s more entertaining than another assembly-line D-level action movie.

To be fair, the idea underlying the show isn't a bad one. It's just in the execution where it would help if the star really could turn back time.