Each episode – named for a given plight, such as “How to Survive Being a Plus One” and “How to Survive Losing Your Phone” – begins with a framing narration from Cooper as he explains his predicament (his face often smudged with dirt) and the eponymous lesson that will likely come out of it. The show then transitions to when the latest mess started, flashing back to a few hours or even several years prior, and proceeds from there. The looping narrative structure rewards even when it feels most predictable, because the show’s charm lies intentionally and evidently in the particulars of each episodic caper.
Lacopo does manage to create something genuinely enjoyable when he blends a touch of self-awareness into otherwise inane plots. As Cooper and his friends stumble through life, it’s most amusing to see their bro-ish mannerisms lightly skewered. In one moment in the second episode, “How to Survive Insufficient Funds,” a group of women approach Cooper and his roommates and invite them for drinks. The excited trio joins the women, and a boozy montage of the group transitions to a side conversation among the men. Cooper says, “Let’s be gentlemen, and let them all have sex with us.” His roommates agree, but when they turn around to greet the women, the camera reveals that they’ve been abandoned, and left with a $1,400 bill to boot.
In another glowing moment, Cooper and Kelly get caught on the Kiss Cam at Clippers game. After they give in to the jeers of the crowd around them and share a swoony kiss – an early and shamelessly unsubtle instance of romance baiting between the two leads – Cooper says, “I gotta take a leak,” and runs off. He admonishes himself in his subsequent narration for bungling a potentially great chance to ask Kelly out, to hilarious effect. It’s these types of moments, when the show admits that these men are more than a little bumbling, that lend Cooper Barrett’s Guide to Surviving Life its most genuine and uproarious beats.
The show does exhibit some obvious limitations, but it’s hard to fault its genuine tone. Cooper’s platitudes about growing up and enduring the mess of one’s twenties may not be universally accessible in the truest sense, but the show’s earnestness almost makes up for its more ridiculous or frustrating elements. Cutmore-Scott, Rath and the rest of the supporting cast commit fully to an at times pat but generally fun premise, and Lacopo holds onto a sliver of self-effacement in his narrative choices so that things never become excessively grating. It may not be that remarkable – frankly, it’s quite forgettable – but the show has promise.
I’ll admit that Cooper Barrett’s Guide to Surviving Life grew on me, but even though I’ve come around a bit, I can probably still survive without it.
