Elijah Wood may well always be remembered for playing a short man with hairy feet and a borderline obsession with wearing gold accessories, but don’t forget that before he got into the habit of playing hobbits the blue-eyed star was in several dark, psychological films such as Ang Lee’s The Ice Storm, and even played a pantie-stealing loser in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
It should therefore come as no surprise that he now stars in a television series about a manic depressive man – a man no less who is the only one who sees his neighbour’s dog not as a loveable pooch, but as a fully grown Australian in a dog suit.
Wilfred, its title taken from the aforementioned man-stroke-dog, is the adventures of Wood’s Ryan Newman and his newly found hallucination, and in true bromance style the bond they begin to share as outcasts of the world.
It’s fair to say that Wilfred, played by Jason Gann (repeating his role from the original Australian series), is not such a great influence on Ryan, smoking pot and generally getting him into all kinds of trouble – but Ryan’s desperate to get to know Wilfred’s owner Jenna (Fiona Gubelmann) any way he can – and hey, if it means talking to Lassie’s Australian cousin then so be it.
But wait – you ask – isn’t there something exactly like this out at the moment? Yes, it’s true, Wilfred‘s use of brash laddish humour and imaginary friends does have more than a hint of Seth MacFarlane’s first foray into film, Ted. Although the crass Australian hound existed long before the potty mouthed teddy bear, the similarities are so striking that it damages the show’s quirky premise for newcomers.
Indeed, there are many times when you feel that Wilfred would have been much better as a film, or as a number of sketches, because once the main conceit has revealed itself, it becomes questionable how far it can be stretched to get the longevity generally needed for a television series.
Season 1 has 13 episodes and certainly the formula gets stretched rather a lot along the way, but it says a lot for Elijah Wood’s likeability as a loser that there are still plenty of laughs to be had, even when everything else begins to drag.
Released on DVD on Monday 20th August 2012 by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment.
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