"Tell Me You Love Me" Recap & Review - "Premiere Episode"

Tell Me You Love Me
"Series Premiere"

Original Air Date: Sunday September 9, 2007


Kristen - TwoCents Staff Writer

Having been a fan of many previous HBO series, I was eagerly anticipating the beginning of "Tell Me You Love Me". I was expecting the riveting drama of Six Feet Under, or the intensity of The Sopranos. Little did I know I was getting ready to settle in on the couch for an evening of soft core porn. Yes you read that correctly, I said porn.

The show is about three couples, who are all negotiating the ups and downs of their relationships with the help of a couples therapist. The drama starts off during the morning routine of a middle class couple, Dave and Katie. It's clear they have let the mediocrity of everyday life create some distance between them. Just as I start to become interested in their story…WHAMMO, we spy Dave masturbating after his wife goes in for her shower. Come on it's been five minutes! I can't even remember this characters name, now you want to show me his most intimate moments??!!

As I am recuperating from the jarring first five minutes, the show then introduces us to its next couple, Palek and Carolyn. Apparently they are trying to have a baby and it appears they have been unsuccessful thus far. Somehow I just don't care. I found this couple to be the least interesting of the three. The whole "we-are-trying-to-get-pregnant-and-now-sex-has-become-a-chore-thing" is so overdone.

The third couple, Jaime and Hugo, is newly engaged. Jaime overhears Hugo make some snide remarks to his friends at their engagement party that makes her question his commitment to monogamy. This starts a huge argument which somehow lands them in bed. During this scene I had to remind myself that I was watching cable. I saw testicles for God's sake! Despite the gratuitous nudity, I thought this couple's story was the most interesting. There is something very relatable about great chemistry masking the obvious downsides of the relationship. Or maybe that's just me.

While I have not given up hope that I may still become hooked on "Tell Me You Love Me", so far I was less than impressed. There seemed too little time focused on investing in these characters stories and too much time on how else we might see them naked. I want to care about who these people are before I see them get busy. Even the montage at the end of the episode found couples therapist, Dr. May Foster (who is at least in her late 60's), climbing into bed with her husband. I literally yelled out "Eeww not the old couple too?!" Thankfully HBO spared me that image, that I think would have been burned on my brain for days to come.