Michael Schur’s A Man on the Inside didn’t look like a series built to last, but its second season cleverly extends the series. This light comedy follows the second, post-retirement career of engineer Charles Nieuwendyk (Ted Danson), who is recruited by private investigator Julie Kovalenko (Lilah Richcreek Estrada) to go undercover in a retirement home to help her solve a crime. Since the first season is based on a documentary and has a natural endpoint, a second season seemed like an unlikely proposition, but Schur and company nicely flesh out the world to present a new chapter.
Charles’s triumph in the retirement home case is well in the rearview mirror as the season begins, as he continues an extended — and boring — private detective mentorship with Julie. Eventually, though, a juicy new case presents itself at Wheeler College, where a stolen laptop threatens to derail a key donation from billionaire douchebag Brad Vinick (Gary Cole). Julie is hired by gladhanding president Jack Beringer (Max Greenfield) and dedicated provost Holly Bodgemark (Jill Talley) to locate the missing laptop; to help, Charles is inserted as a guest professor, which affords him the opportunity to investigate the many quirky suspects on the faculty. Among these is free-spirited music professor Mona Margadoff (Mary Steenburgen), with whom Charles develops an instant, unexpected romantic attraction.
Once again, I don’t think A Man on the Inside is Schur’s funniest sitcom, but it’s just so refreshingly pleasant, and Danson such a dashing, likeable presence, that it doesn’t need all that many laughs to still feel rewarding. The mystery at the center of the season isn’t especially clever or interesting, but it doesn’t matter, because the show isn’t really about the plot, but how that plot serves as a framework for challenging the characters to move past barriers and out of their comfort zones. The most impressive element of season two is the way it integrates the new milieu (Wheeler College) with the already established world and characters of season one — even finding ways to convincingly integrate fan favorites (Stephanie Beatriz, Mary Elizabeth Ellis, Stephen McKinley Henderson) into the story. This continuity might have required backwards-bending contrivances, but the writers manage to make it all look organic. By the time a Thanksgiving dinner episode rolls around, the show more or less abandons the mystery entirely for a half an hour, without at all feeling jarring. It’s a delightful, relaxing show from a committed and capable team.
