Episode Guide
Countdown to Prologue The I of the Tiger A Wolf in the Torque House Guess Who’s Coming to Lunch J1: Judgement Day The Binx Ultimatum Homicide: Life in the Mons The Last Horchata PUP-E Q. Barkington Exes and OS’s Dia de Los Robots The Brain Job Ultra-Max Back for a second season, Future Man returns, picking up where it left off for a more reserved and somewhat underwhelming 13 episodes of sci-fi comedy. Set entirely in the future, Future Man strips out the clever time jumps of old and instead replaces it with deeper characterisation and a simpler mission for the trio to complete. Most of the season is just enjoyable enough to keep you watching but there are moments that feel unnecessarily bloated and overlong. Thankfully the final few episodes bring the focus and fun vibes of the first season back to deliver an exciting and intriguingly controversial end to this show. We left Josh last season to the confines of his government prison cell after blowing up the building and presumably saving the world. Wolf and Tiger return to the future and all seems to be right with the world. That is, until Josh wakes up in the future to discover he’s a prisoner of a strange organisation. It’s this time zone where the entire season takes place. While the overarching story sees the trio teaming up again to find Stu and stop whatever he has planned for the future of humanity, there’s an equal focus on the TTD too, with both stories joining together and inevitably raising a few niggling questions around continuity. Part of the allure with the first season was just how much off-the-wall fun the team had with its constant time jumps and clever pacing. With a more grounded focus and a story set predominantly in the future, Future Man feels a lot slower in comparison, losing focus on what made the first so great. Having said that, Future Man is still a whole lot of fun and seeing deeper storylines for each of the characters really helps add some dimension to the main players here. Wolf’s intimate confliction around his newfound family is nicely written as is Tiger’s dilemma regarding Stu’s simulations. Having said that, while Josh remains the focal point of the whole story, he’s not given a whole lot to work with her. While the crude humour and generally funny moments are still here, they feel a lot less commonplace compared to last season. Some of this is thanks to the pacing which does feel decidedly slower compared to the first where the jokes came thick and fast. Perhaps with a few more time jumps and a return to the clever antics this brought Future Man could have matched its first but aside from a few nicely worked set pieces late on, Future Man feels a little lacklustre as a follow up season. At this present time massive question marks remain around the future of Future Man. I may be proven wrong of course but given the way this season ends, it feels a lot more conclusive and suitably crazy compared to what we received last year. With deeper characterisation and a more streamlined story, fans of the first season are sure to enjoy this continuation of the story but likely with less enthusiasm than before. The characters and humour is still here but it’s far more reserved than before. This one is well worth a watch to see how it plays out but be prepared to sit through a fair amount of bloat before this one settles into a decent rhythm.
