Nathan For You

Nathan For You is a lot of things. It boasts one of the strangest and most unique concepts for a comedy, something that could easily have been a disaster, but I think they managed to pull it off.

Nathan For You is a show about Nathan Fielder, as played by himself, and his attempts to help struggling businesses with the most bizarre ideas he can think of. The twist is that all of these businesses are real, the only scripted character in the show is Nathan, and the whole series is shot as a fake documentary. There are a lot of ways this could backfire, Nathan's plans often times have the potential to completely tank the show (The Claw Of Shame especially), and if treated poorly, the show can feel mean-spirited. However, Nathan For You rarely feels like that. The show rarely depicts anyone in a negative way unless they actively do something questionable, with Fielder himself usually the butt of the joke, and more often than not, Nathan's antics end up boosting the success of a lot of these real life businesses. Dumb Starbucks and "goat saves a pig" became internet hits, and even the private investigator Wolfe that Nathan helped ended up getting a TV show!

There's a lot of interesting things to think about when it comes to the line between fiction and real life that this show so consistently ties. Obviously, Nathan tells the people why they were being filmed eventually and to make sure they approved of being filmed, but a lot of these interactions are still incredibly genuine. Of course, this contributes to the show's cringe comedy as seeing Nathan play a character and embarrass himself in front of actual people is funny and uncomfortable, but it's the rare moments of bonding and success. Whenever a business strategy actually works and becomes a unexpected hit, it can be genuinely heartwarming. A highlight is in the Gas Station episode where Nathan goes on a hike with three other people and has an offbeat yet oddly sweet bonding experience. Even given the fact that so much of it is faked, there's something about the show that feels so honest and the way the writing and editing twists around the real life interactions really lets them speak for themselves. Another scene from the Gas Station episode is this bizarre conversation about grandma's pee that's just so bizarre, there's no way it could have been from a screenplay.

Part of what makes the show so great is definitely Nathan himself. I don't usually talk about the acting all that much in these reviews, but Nathan For You would not be the same if it wasn't for the titular character. It's a difficult task to have to play a fictional version of yourself in real conversations, but he rarely ever breaks character and maintains the nuances that make "Nathan" so interesting. It's also thoroughly impressive that Nathan manages to give his fictional persona a narrative and character arc throughout the show, each season ending with some big breakthrough or shift. I wasn't expecting the finales to actually feel like finales, but he somehow manages to pull it off (except Season 2's, that was actually one of the weaker episodes). But as good as the premise is, my favorite aspect of the show is easily how inventive so many of these episodes are. For a show about a guy with crazy unconventional ideas, Nathan Fielder has a real sense of ambition that he brings to the show. Even episodes that aren't as funny than others manage to be incredibly interesting, since the premise is the type of thing no other show can show you. He keeps one-upping himself as well, culminating in Nathan fooling the entire world with a fake celebrity story in the fourth and final season.

Since the show has four seasons, I'd also like to quickly discuss my verdicts on the show's seasons:

Season 1: An incredibly consistent first season, all things considered. There weren't really any episodes I found bad, though nothing I found amazing either, and the only segment I disliked was the Haunted House one which leaned a bit too into mean-spirited territory. It ended strong with The Claw Of Shame and the surprisingly solid finale, and it did a good job of selling me on the show with plenty of iconic moments. 

3/5 Stars

Season 2: Season 2 is an overall improvement compared to the first, but it definitely suffered from getting its length cut from 10 episodes to 8. At its best, ELAIFF and Dumb Starbucks were some of the series' best, the character arc was fun and Nathan did a great job of coming up with interesting new ideas. At its worst, however, was an underwhelming finale that serves as one of the few times Nathan went too far.

4/5 Stars

Season 3: Season 3 was easily the best season and it's not even close. Nathan went crazy with the creative and fun ideas, with some of his most gutsy and intricate plans yet. While one could argue that this season just had the highest percentage of good episodes, I feel Nathan was just the most creative. From starting a clothing line, to faking a movement, to actually giving himself a friend, to walking a tightrope, the episodes in this season just left me impressed from start to finish.

5/5 Stars

Season 4: Nathan For You's fourth season got off to a bit of a rough start where it really started to feel like the show was running out of steam (Episode 2 was my least favorite in the series), but it eventually got better by the halfway point. Stunts like the anecdote, the smoke detector instrument, and asexual computer repair were a lot of fun, and the movie-length finale Finding Frances is one of the show's best episodes, maybe second to Dumb Starbucks. While it wasn't as consistently great as Season 3, it was a strong final season for the series, and I'm glad Nathan ended the series on a high note.

4/5 Stars

While the quality remained high, these episodes were either the funniest or the most impressive, or both:

Santa/Petting Zoo: While the Teen Street segment was pretty funny, the most impressive part was the Petting Zoo part where Nathan fakes a viral video to promote a petting zoo. I enjoyed the show's premise from the start, but the sheer wow factor in looking up "goat saves a pig" and finding all of the articles on the matter was just the coolest thing to me.

The Claw Of Shame: Easily the gutsiest episode of Season 1, The Claw Of Shame has Nathan test himself to escape from handcuffs before a robot pulls down his pants. It's genuinely impressive how far he goes for comedy in this episode, all of the reality show-style editing and the usage of an actual robot just feels so ambitious for a comedy show. And I love how the episode flashes back to Nathan's childhood and his other failed business attempts which do a good job of fleshing out his persona. It's a funny, ambitious, and surprisingly tense highlight of the series.

Souvenir Shop/E.L.A.I.F.F: The first half of this episode is fairly standard, which is why the fact that Nathan had to revisit a previous plan that ended up being illegal was such a pleasant surprise. At this point, I've mentioned enough that I love episodes about the act of filmmaking, so it was a lot of fun to see Nathan try to edit his footage into some sort of a film. The screening of The Web is such a hilarious payoff to the whole episode, especially since we get to see the whole movie and how it utilizes prior scenes.

Dumb Starbucks: Dumb Starbucks was how I heard about this series. I didn't even realize it came from Nathan Fielder, but I remember hearing the discourse over this parody Starbucks. This isn't even the most complex of Nathan's plans, thought the parody artist scenes are absolutely hilarious, but the waves it managed to make are just so impressive. And even more impressive is the fact that Nathan managed to weave a phenomenal story around this real life event with some of the best humor in the show, thought-provoking ideas about art and unintentional messages, and a solid albeit fake character arc for Nathan.

Electronics Store: This season premiere was easily one of Nathan's most intricate episodes, starting with a plan to sell 1$ TVs and spiraling into an attempt to sue Best Buy. There were so many enjoyable setpieces this episode from the bizarre preventive measures to Nathan's "date" that I'd easily call it one of the quintessential episodes of the series.

Smokers Allowed: Similarly to ELAIFF, the concept of basing a play off of a real life recording of a bar is such a fascinating idea to me, but an incredibly funny one as well. Just like Dumb Starbucks, it's a funny commentary of what constitutes as art, and I love the running gag about the play's "climax" being just another uneventful segment. This episode also had probably the cringiest moment in the whole series, you'll know it when you see it.

The Hero: The Season 3 finale managed to top The Claw Of Shame in sheer ambition and risk. Nathan taking over someone else's lives to make them a hero is such a unique challenge that feels deserving of being a finale storyline, and the final sequence where Nathan tightropes on his own multiple times is just insane. This man actually put himself through nine months of preparation for a single thirty-minute episode, and it shows just how much work goes into this show. And the ending is a super poignant scene where Nathan is forced to confront the fact that he doesn't see himself a hero.

The Anecdote: Leave it to Nathan to completely bamboozle the entire world on live TV by fabricating the world's best late night celebrity story, and then actually trying to make it real through a bunch of loopholes. This episode took over $350,000 to make! And it was definitely worth it, especially the hilarious scene where Kirsten Dunst nearly copies Nathan's story on accident.

Computer Repair/Psychic: While this wasn't one of the show's best episodes, I have a personal appreciation for its Computer Repair segment, which somehow managed to be one of the better representations for asexuality I've seen in a TV show (depressing, I know). The concept of trusting asexuals with computer repair so they don't look at your private photos is the exact type of loving joke my friends would make about me and perfectly toes the line between respectful and hilarious. Once again, not one of the show's highlights, but it means a lot to me.

Finding Frances: It's hard to really describe this episode. It feels like a Nathan For You movie, an ambitious two-hour-long finale where Nathan tries to help Bill reunite with his past love. It's way more dramatic than it is funny, but it works as a compelling piece of media regardless. Bill's moral ambiguity made the whole episode incredibly tense, and the ending managed to be incredibly poignant and well-done. For a show that's pretty strictly episodic and based in reality, I feel like Finding Frances, its biggest and most emotionally resonant episode, works as the perfect series finale.

Overall, Nathan For You is easily one of the most ambitious and creative TV series I've ever watched. While its best episodes were probably more impressive than funny, the sheer devotion that Nathan had to both his character and his crazy ideas made this series an absolute joy to watch.

4/5 Stars

My ranking of Nathan For You's seasons is:

3 > 4 > 2 > 1

My ranking of Nathan For You's finales is:

4 > 3 > 1 > 2

Favorite Episode: Dumb Starbucks