“You’re Double Crossing Me.” “I’m Not Double Crossing You. If Anything, I’m Backstabbing You.”
Since my Tuesday nights stayed relatively free TV wise, I kept watching Night Court in 2024 and 2025. While the cast change did help season 3, it was still uneven.
The core of the cast stayed the same. We are focusing on the staff of New York City’s night court. The judge is Abby Stone (Melissa Rauch), with bailiff Gurgs (Lacretta), defense attorney Dan Fielding (John Larroquette), and Wyatt (Nyambi Nyambi) as the court clerk. The cast changed I mentioned is on the prosecution side. Olivia is out and Julianne (Wendie Malick) is in. Honestly, I was excited about this change when the season started since I’d enjoyed her guest appearances. While they kept her back story from the first two seasons, she is a slightly less crazy version of the character, which works. I found she gelled with the cast better than Olivia did. No offense to India de Beaufort because I don’t think the writers could figure out how to make Olivia more than a one note character. I’m fully putting this on them.
The season starts where season two ended. Abby suspects that her new boyfriend, Jake (recurring guest star Ryan Hansen), is Dan’s son. What else happens this season? I’m glad you asked. The sanitation workers go on strike, leaving the courthouse a mess. A Christmas death treat leads to a wacky (for us) murder mystery. Dan has to deal with a bad customer review. And the appearance of a social media influencers looking for clicks comes as the court gets extra crazy.
One of the best episodes of the season guest starred Melissa’s former Big Bang costar Mayim Balik as a heightened version of herself. It’s crazy and fun in the best possible way.
We also get a couple of appearances from original cast member Marsha Warfield who returns as Roz. And the Wheeler family shows up again.
Even though Julianne is a good addition to the cast, the show still suffers from the modern sitcom problem of being over written. Writers don’t trust the material, so they pack so many jokes in that things start to feel forced. I’m watching older sitcoms, and they would allow the funny to build, sometimes having several lines that were just related to the story or the set up for a punch line. It was wonderful when we as the audience and the material were allowed to breath. It makes the jokes that much funnier when they come. It doesn’t help that some of the jokes are very off color in the most cringe inducing manner possible.
I’m not blaming this on the cast. They get as many laughs out of the material as they can.
I was excited when we met Jake’s mom, who was played by Julia Duffy. However, the material they gave her was cringeworthy and less than her talents deserved.
Then there’s the cliffhanger. I actually would have been curious to see where they were going to go with that. And the actor they got for the part made my geek heart happy. When the show was canceled after the episode aired, I was disappointed we wouldn’t get a resolution, but I just needed another two or three episodes. That’s it. I was okay with not getting a new season.
We did get another 18 episodes for season 3.
This Night Court reboot was always amusing at best. Now that it’s been off the air for a year, I’m finding that I don’t really miss it.
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