Party Down - Thank God that's over

Writing about TV. Oh well.
Anyway, when I first got into this new show on Starz, I thought it was a pleasant, if kinda derivative "sociological" sort of comedy. The kind of stuff that floats around in a post-Curb-Your-Enthusiasm comedic landscape. You know, the shaky camera, the awkward conversations. The grimace-inducing situations.
Despite the notion of having seen this stuff before, I was happy to see this great cast in a pretty well-written comedy series. The State's Ken Marino is at his best here as the pitifully ambitious Ron Donald, "team leader" of the Party Down catering crew the show is centered around. Said crew is equally strong, playing ne'er-do-well artists "doomed" to a life of the service industry. This damning notion of failure is basically Party Down's thesis. It's the classic slacker story retold with a great cast and a flexible premise. Sounds pretty samey, right? Keep watching.
As the 10-episode season unfolds and finally wraps, Party Down reveals that it does, in fact, have a distinct flavor of its own. While it was at once easy to compare this show to The Office or Reno 911!, consecutive episodes show a certain flair that is oddly unique. Thing is, it happened so gradually, that I didn't even notice until the 9th episode. Party Down had become its own show, with a brand of bitterness approaching Alexander Payne levels of saddiness. Perhaps it was only after a certain level of character development, which is handled quite well (including a workplace romance vein), that I empathized enough with these miserable characters for the cringe-comedy to take its desired effect. In any case, the loyal viewer is rewarded with an excellent last few episodes that make the beginning of the season better on subsequent re-watchings.
This scrappy cast and crew ended up with a perfectly successful first season, already warranting the greenlighting of least a second one. And while I thoroughly enjoyed Party Down in all its cynicism and gloom, in a way I'm relieved to just be done with it for now. Cause it can be pretty brutal. Of course I'm looking forward to season two, but having this one over with is kinda like ditching some of your less wholesome friends. As if to say, "yeah, I was in a bad scene for a while. I got out of it, though. It's cool now."
For a taste of what I'm talking about, here is a scene from episode 9, where Ron Donald caters his own high school reunion. If you do plan on watching this series, be warned that this is a pretty spoilerific scene. Enjoy.