HBO's New Comedy Show With A Major Ted Lasso Reunion Debuts To Stellar Rotten Tomatoes Score

The new HBO comedy Rooster, which includes a major Ted Lasso reunion, has debuted to a solid score on Rotten Tomatoes.

Created by Bill Lawrence and Matt Tarses, and consisting of ten episodes, Rooster is set to debut on March 8 on HBO and stream on HBO Max. It stars Academy Award nominee Steve Carell as a successful author who has a complicated relationship with his daughter, viewing the premise through the eccentric world of academia. Helped along by a strong supporting cast, the dramedy is off to a great start.

Ahead of its HBO launch, Rooster currently holds an 86% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 14 reviews. The score is not expected to hold, since it will change as more reviews are added. However, as of now, only two reviews are listed as negative.

The dramedy begins by zeroing in on Carell's character, a best-selling novelist who gets a job as writer-in-residence at a small New England college. In the process, he reunites him with his daughter (The Lazarus Project alum Charly Clive), an art history professor. But to be sure, she has her own problems to contend with.

The cast includes Danielle Deadwyler, known for Till, John C. McGinley of Scrubs, Lauren Tsai from Legion, and Ted Lasso's Phil Dunster, with recurring guests including Annie Mumolo, who co-wrote and appeared in Bridesmaids, Connie Britton of Friday Night Lights, comedian Robby Hoffman from Hacks, and Scott MacArthur of The Righteous Gemstones.

It's a double reunion for Rooster creator Bill Lawrence, who worked with Dunster when he played Jamie Tartt on Ted Lasso. McGinley, meanwhile, is well-known for his performance as Dr. Cox in the popular medical comedy Scrubs. That resume is something of a double-edged sword for Rooster, which does get compared to Lawrence's past work in reviews.

On the positive side, several critics find that the upcoming HBO Original is a continuation of a hot streak for Lawrence, who is also behind Apple TV's Bad Monkey and Shrinking. In his Rooster review for ScreenRant, Grant Hermanns writes, in part: “One thing that immediately proved a welcome element of Rooster's first six episodes was that it had the same cozy vibe of Lawrence's prior shows.”

Hermanns does mention that the new dramedy doesn't quite live up to Lawrence's best work, nor his frequent collaborator in Tarses. But with a cast and crew this strong, there’s no reason to worry about the future of Rooster. The college-set saga could easily find its footing as it goes along, getting funnier and sharper over time and earning its place as a truly worthy Carell show.

Rooster premieres Sunday, March 8 at 10 PM ET on HBO