There are two breaking developments on the Office spinoff front, one confirmed, another still basically grist for the rumor mill.

This week, the first official cast member was hired for the new sitcom, and he is Human Giant star and Flight of the Conchords guest star Aziz Ansari. Says spinoff co-executive producer Greg Daniels, “We met him pretty early on and thought he was very funny.”

Variety speculates in its article on Ansari’s casting that the new show will not be a spinoff in the traditional sense because it appears that none of the regular characters on the original series will morph into starring roles on the new series. However, a character from the new show might appear on the older one first before showing up on the spinoff.

Meanwhile, over at E! Online, there’s a rumor report claiming a possibility that The Office’s Karen Filippelli, known in real life as former Unhitched star Rashida Jones, might score a starring gig on the spinoff. Yet there haven’t been any official confirmations of that information — sources have actually given conflicting details, stating that Jones has and has not been offered a role — which is why it remains a rumor at present.

Former Office worker Rashida Jones stopped by the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson last week to help promote her new Fox sitcom Unhitched.

As viewers know, tonight’s episode “Pole-Dancing Toddler” is the show’s first-season finale. If you check out the video of the interview after the jump, you can get a sneak peek at a scene from the installment.

There’s also plenty of interesting conversation, most of it about Unhitched’s premise, Craig’s cool accent, and cults — yes, cults — in Los Angeles.

Unhitched airs Sundays on Fox at 9:30pm EST.

NOTE: If you require closed captions, you can enable that feature on the video player by clicking the CC symbol in the top right-hand corner.

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It’s a finale for Fox’s latest sitcom, Unhitched. And, the Farrelly Brothers show has at least a little to celebrate since it made it this far despite all the early negative reviews.

On “Pole-Dancing Toddler,” both Gator and Kate become involved with people who work around other species: Gator an animal-rights proponent and Kate an exterminator (Ew!). What that has to do with poles, pole-dancing, or toddlers is beyond me, though.

Unhitched airs Sundays on Fox at 9:30pm EST.

Unhitched is starting the spring television season with two episodes on one night, “Mardi Gras Croc Attack” at the special time of 8:30pm EST and “Yorkshire Terrier Sucked Into the Internet” in the regular 9:30pm time slot.

On the first episode, Gator and Kate get into all kinds of trouble at her boxing gym, and on the second, Kate hooks up with Gator’s employee.

Freddy and Tommy are around, too, learning all about tantric sex in the first episode and online dating in the second.

Unhitched airs Sundays on Fox at 9:30pm EST.

…and a shorts-wearing Will Ferrell — get a look at those legs!

Former Office worker Rashida Jones took some time out of her busy schedule a few weeks ago to promote her new Farrelly Brothers sitcom Unhitched on Late Night with Conan O’Brien.

After O’Brien got over his pleasant surprise that Jones is one quarter Irish — thanks to her mother Peggy Lipton’s mother — she and the host discussed lots of things.

O’Brien is well aware of the Farrelly style of outlandish comedy, although he’s never met the siblings. But, even he recognizes a lawsuit just waiting to happen when Jones describes Peter Farrelly’s extremely unique and moronic manner of greeting the actress. Lucky for him Jones apparently has a tolerant sense of humor.

Jones also tells about her painful encounter with Michael Jackson’s chimpanzee Bubbles when she was just ten years old. I guess those are the kinds of memories you get to have when your dad is the music biz’s legendary Quincy Jones.

Check out the video of the interview after the jump, and remember that Unhitched airs Sundays on Fox at 9:30pm EST.

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The next episode of Unhitched, “Conjoined Twins Pitch No-Hitter,” goes international — sort of — when Gator and Freddy hook up with two women from Iceland. One of the ladies is played by actress Valerie Azlynn, who had/has a regular role on CBS’ recent, ill-conceived new sitcom Welcome to the Captain.

Elsewhere, cowardly Kate persuades Tommy to accompany her to a party because her former significant other will also be going.

Unhitched airs Sundays on Fox at 9:30pm EST.

On the “Woman Marries Horse” episode of Unhitched, the ill-fated hookups range from a not-so-perfect potential partner for one of the singles to a musician with a unique talent for another. I’m guessing true love will continue to elude them both, as well.

Unhitched airs Sundays on Fox at 9:30pm EST.

Original Air Date: March 2, 2008

Finally we get the new series that everyone’s been dumping on so much lately. Is all of the flak justified? Kinda.

I expected the premiere episode to be stupid in an offensive and/or repulsive way, Farrelly Brothers-style. That wasn’t the problem for me, though. Instead, I felt the “comedy” was too tame and, of course, not particularly amusing.

Even worse, the funniest moments were courtesy of guest stars playing peripheral characters, such as Jackass star Johnny Knoxville’s jackass pimp Chuck and Ben Giroux’s very enthusiastic Tim, also known as Kate’s short-statured date who does double duty as Boston Celtics mascot Lucky the Leprechaun.

In other words, the show is similar to CBS’ Welcome to the Captain — while watching you wonder why any network executive thought the world needed to see such nondescript and forgettable material. Will they ever learn? Probably not, so on to the recap…

Main character GATOR walks his date home, and she asks him if he’d like to come up to her apartment. When they get inside, the entire unit is decked out with green, leafy plants everywhere you look. The woman tells Gator the foliage reminds her roommate, a small orangutan, of his home in Borneo.

She then puts on a video of gorillas mating during her recent trip to the region, and she informs Gator that in the primates’ species, females initiate sex. Gator’s all for it when she asks if he’d like to do what the apes are doing on tape … until the orangutan gets excited, as well, drops its pants, hops on his naked backside, and you get the idea

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Fox has been doing everything possible to counteract the tide of negative reviews for the network’s latest new sitcom, Unhitched, including releasing three Sneak Peeks on YouTube. I’ve embedded all three in this post so interested readers can take a look at them in one place.

The first clip features the series’ central character Gator (Craig Bierko) getting a little couch therapy.

In the second video, the show’s main female player, Kate (Rashida Jones), experiences a shock when a performer takes the stage at a nightspot.

And, in the third snippet, Gator, Kate, and Tommy (Johnny Sneed) have one of I presume many conversations about a person they encounter while out on the town.

Check out the previews after the jump. If it helps any, I laughed, especially during Jones’ part in the second video.

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Tonight at 9:30pm EST, Fox will debut its latest sitcom, the Farrelly Brothers concoction Unhitched. Siblings Bobby and Peter are the creative production team behind the series, and they’re also the same comedic minds that brought the world such feature films as Dumb & Dumber starring Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels, There’s Something About Mary with Ben Stiller and Cameron Diaz, and Me, Myself & Irene featuring Jim Carrey again, along with Renée Zellweger.

All of those flicks have their fair share of fans, not to mention a number of individuals who think they’re just plain silly. It’s not an exaggeration, then, to characterize Farrelly humor, often dependent upon sight gags and gross-out situations, as an acquired taste for many.

The same seems to go for Unhitched, with the majority of reviews thus far landing on the “No thanks” side. I have, however, come across two that are overwhelmingly favorable, although I wonder how the pair of reviewers feel being the odd positive needles in a haystack of derision.

What’s What

The premise of the Boston-based show is straightforward. Four thirty-something friends, three guys and one woman, in various stages of singlehood tackle life in the contemporary dating lane, regardless of whether or not they and their potential romantic interests have a clue. Jack “Gator” Gately (Boston Legal alum Craig Bierko) is the nice guy the series revolves around, a bachelor anew who naively thought he’d be coupled forever.

His male pals are Tommy (real-life lawyer and recurring TV presence Johnny Sneed), a microbrewery owner and serial divorcé now exiting his third marriage, and Freddy (popular Canadian actor Shaun Majumder), an unlucky-in-love but professionally successful surgeon. Kate (Office transplant Rashida Jones), the lone series regular of the female persuasion, happens to be all three men’s divorce attorney, as well as recently returned to the dating game herself after a failed seven-year engagement.

I take it from the network’s official series description that if all goes well — or if the show manages to hang around long enough, which isn’t a given — Gator and Kate might discover they’re meant for each other. Follow the ups and downs of their slow (and hopefully funny) journey to one another starting tonight.

Resources

As usual, Comedy Centric also has an Unhitched Episode Guide available 24/7/365 to help keep you up-to-date on the show.