Tim Robinson has been a cult favorite comedian since his days writing for “Saturday Night Live” from 2012 to 2016. But with his smash hit 2019 Netflix sketch show “I Think You Should Leave,” Robinson has cemented himself as one of the most successful comedic actors working today.
His newest show, “The Chair Company,” takes Robinson’s signature cringe humor to new heights and closer to the realm of horror. Debuting on HBO on Oct. 12, the show follows Ron Trosper, played by Robinson, a middle manager at a mall development company. During the presentation of his new mall project, Ron moves to sit down in an office chair, but it collapses, and he falls over in front of everyone in his company.
This embarrassment drives Ron to seek revenge against Tecca, the fictional chair company, and leads him down an increasingly dark conspiracy rabbit hole. Ron is a milquetoast guy with an average family who love and support him, but he can’t help but risk his job, relationships, and well-being to pursue an outrageous investigation into the chair company that did him wrong.
The funniest part of Robinson’s performances, no matter what show or movie he is in, is his ability to play a scene completely normal for minutes at a time before exploding in the funniest, most cringe-worthy tantrum you’ve ever seen.
It’s his blend of so-droll-it’s-funny normal guy acting and over-the-top cartoon angry guy acting that makes him the perfect vessel for this story about suburban malaise, mid-life crisis, and the complexities of masculinity among Gen X men.
I don’t want to make the show sound like it’s some grand thematic exploration, even if it is layered enough to have something to say about these topics, since at the end of the day, it’s just a strange comedy.
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The overarching narrative, uncovering the corporate secrets of the chair company, doesn’t actually hold much weight in the story, as random characters and weird single-episode subplots distract Ron all the time.
As he goes down this darkly comic Odyssey of obsession, Ron meets a host of oddball characters, including a man very anxious about the dent in his head, a group of toy truck racers, and a very eager-to-help tough guy named Mike.
Mike becomes Ron’s investigative partner throughout the season, and the way their relationship develops ended up being my favorite part of the show. It’s impossible to tell when Mike is telling the truth, and sometimes his assistance in the investigation feels too well-timed, as if he’s in on it.
Once the truth about Mike is revealed later in the story, it recontextualizes the whole narrative and makes me want to rewatch. For an odd comedy with a tone I could never quite pin down, I was surprised how invested I became in the escalating conspiracy by the last episode.
I was reminded of “Twin Peaks” at times, just because of how ominous scenes could be before being punctuated with something awkward that makes the audience laugh. For example, Ron is being chased by an angry mob at one point, and he accidentally stumbles into a random man having an affair with someone. Ron doesn’t know these people, but the man pulls a gun and starts shouting threats at Ron.
The scene is shockingly intense, but it becomes funny when the man decides the only way he can let Ron leave and trust he won’t inform the spouses of the affair is if Ron has sex with the man too. This proposal shocks Ron so much, and the face of confusion Robinson makes nearly made me fall out of my chair laughing.
The whole show has this awkward, intense tone that kept me unable to look away and caused me to laugh out loud. I haven’t seen anything like it before, and it feels like a worthy evolution of Robinson’s career.