How To Make It In America: Season 2 Premiere

The boys are back to work, but unfortunately have learned nothing new. Cam (Victor Rasuk) and Ben (Bryan Greenberg) are riding the wave of their Japanese adventure and attempting to bring the flavor to NYC with their new hoodies. Which are boring. You barely get a good look at them. As in season one, all the characters seem to be making the same mistake: focusing on the money and not the product. They’re a bunch of lost souls wandering around New York City looking for cash instead of perfecting their craft.

Slipping past customs with their bags stuffed with smuggled clothing, Ben and Cam are ready to take on the fashion industry… again. When they bring their product to Lulu (Nicole Laliberte), she says she’ll take “two.” Not two thousand, just two. The boys see that they’re up against some stiff competition: the Neanderthals. A new hot line, created by a band of punk dudes, they’re selling themselves just as much as their “cool t-shirts.” They’ve got tattoos; spiked hair and metal studs and Ben and Cam have nothing. The duo realizes they need to work on their image and decide to have a pop-up store, the newest fashion trend nationwide, equipped with Japanese “fetish” girls and free beer. If they can get people to the show, they can get people to see their line.

The plan goes array when Ben smokes a joint with the Neanderthals and has a freak out. On the Subway he says he’s having a heart attack and literally runs off the train and into the tunnel. The incident had potential to be hilarious if Ben had maybe smoked crack and wasn’t such a bad actor. There’s no way we believe that he’s really tripping out, an experience that can actually be seriously scary, and so we don’t fear he won’t make it to the pop-up show. We should have been biting our fingernails that our heroic due wouldn’t make their own event! Oh no! And Rachel (Lake Bell) is back and has just met Ben’s new girlfriend! Ah! Ben runs to find a fountain and demands that Cam dunk his head in with him. After the two soaking buddies sit back on the pavement Cam remarks,  “This is Crisp! Loyalty!”  So dunking your head in a fountain strengthens your friendship? I guess…

The season two premiere was surprisingly sparse on its supporting characters. Rachel had a short scene with Lulu, complaining that getting back from traveling always means you have to deal with “real world” issues again. Rene’s (Luis Guzman) Rasta Monsta poster now graces a particular New York alley with a ten story half-naked woman. This woman being his wife, who was promised she’d be the face of Rasta Monsta. She’s furious when not only is the shot of her backside, but it’s not even her booty! Damn photoshop. Sadly Gingy (Shannyn Sossamon) and Edie (Martha Plimpton) are shown no love this episode and David (Eddie Kaye) and Domingo (Kid Cudi) only a little.

At the end of the day, Ben and Cam, as usual, have a little bit of luck. In a city like New York or LA, sometimes that’s all it comes down to. A business card here or a handshake there can lead to big things. But it seems our protagonist duo always has luck tossed in their laps, where successful people learn how to make their own. It’s hard to care about your main characters, when they don’t seem to have a journey whatsoever. They want money, money, money and to an audience, that’s nothing new and definitely not interesting. Seeing Ben sweat over sewing a hoodie or Cam slave over an art book might show us that our boys are really fighting for something. They don’t seem to care about fashion at all, and to those that do, it’s a little insulting.

Ok, so Wahlberg, Levinson and Weiss all sat in a room and said, “Think Entourage…in New York City.” Hey, I would’ve bought it too. But New York is a whole different beast. You’ve got Ben and Cam, with no actual skills whatsoever, walking the same streets of legends like Alexander McQueen and Tom Ford and calling themselves “designers.” What makes them uninteresting and nearly stupid characters is that they’re competing in an industry they know nothing about. If this series is a guide to how to make it in America, I guess that means skill and passion are worth nothing these days.