Master of None Season-Premiere Epitomize: A Trip to Italy

Aziz Ansari as Dev. Photo: Netflix

When Master of None last left Dev, his girlfriend, Rachel (Noël Wells), dumped him to move to Tokyo, he was cut out of a big sci-fi moving-picture show, and he made a rash decision to motility to Italy to learn how to make pasta. For a food-obsessed, emotionally and romantically adrift 30-something, a pasta-motivated transatlantic move makes some sense. Is it a little lightheaded? Sure. But blowing up your old life for something potentially improve always seems a little ridiculous, especially for people looking in from the outside.

Main of None picks up three months after the events of the first flavour with Dev living a comfortable life in Modena, a small urban center in northern Italy. He makes pasta by day and spends his off hours with friends, who include Francesca (Alessandra Mastronardi), the granddaughter of Dev'south pasta mentor; her partner Pino (Riccardo Scamarcio); and a immature male child named Mario (Nicolo Ambrosio). While Dev clearly enjoys the culinary lifestyle, "The Thief" illustrates how lonely his life has go, despite his newfound Italian buddies. He even plans to celebrate his altogether alone.

Fortunately, Dev meets Sara (Clare-Hope Ashitey), a charismatic British woman, when he arrives at the hard-to-book eating place Hosteria Giusti for that birthday meal. After Sara realizes she accidentally booked her luncheon for the next month, Dev offers to share his table and so she can enjoy the food and good visitor. The ii chop-chop hitting it off and brand plans to run across upwardly in Puglia, where Sara and her friends have rented a house for the weekend. Sadly for Dev, things go due south when a thief (Daniel De Maio) steals his phone and he loses Sara's number.

Though the black-and-white cinematography and the art-house opening credits might give the impression of a dissimilar management for Chief of None, "The Thief" generally functions as a standard episode of the ambling, lovelorn series. Ansari may have uprooted the series to Italy, only the song more or less remains the same. Dev is simply as "lost" in his new abode as he was in New York, and Principal of None will follow him through his adventures in food and love. (Similar on most sitcoms, this location change largely serves as a superficial transformation while holding on to what people dearest about the series.)

More than than annihilation else, the low-stakes first one-half of "The Thief" is a comforting reintroduction to the series. Ansari and Yang usually succeed when they focus on montages and sweet banter, even if it tin autumn a bit as well far on the saccharine side, while Ansari and Ashitey have nice enough chemistry to go on Dev and Sara'southward scenes peppy and low-cal. Ultimately those performances save the blandness of their meet-cute, which feels both too drawn out and like a strange alibi for Ansari to bear witness off his Italian.

The episode'due south second half features an extended Bicycle Thieves riff that basically covers the entire plot of Vittorio De Sica's 1948 picture (minus the fatalistic ending), merely information technology feels as well contrived to have much of an effect. Non to unfairly compare a comedian's sitcom to a neorealist classic, simply Bicycle Thieves succeeds while "The Thief" doesn't, partially because of narrative urgency. In the picture show, if Antonio (Lamberto Maggiorani) doesn't retrieve his stolen bicycle, he will lose his job and be unable to support his family. In "The Thief," if Dev doesn't retrieve his phone, he won't see Sara again, a grapheme whom the audience has known for all of ten minutes. Information technology's difficult to be invested in a story similar this if the actual issue feels irrelevant and largely depends on the audience siding with the protagonist at every single turn, fifty-fifty if "The Thief" is a pleasant enough episode. Information technology might take been better if Dev'southward search was funnier or more than compelling, simply alas, that was not the example.

In the end, Dev celebrates his altogether with his Italian friends and eventually decides to get back in touch with Rachel, but merely after Google searches like "Sara Finance New York" and "Sara Diane Lane Fan" don't offering whatsoever promise. If Master of None chronicles the trials and tribulations of dating, Dev losing Sara's phone number to a dastardly Italian thief is just another drop in the bucket. More joy, more romance, and more heartbreak is sure to come for our hero this season, even if it doesn't arrive in the places he expects.

• Dev loves saying the Italian give-and-take "Allora," which means "Well …" He says it to start or terminate almost every sentence.

• After Mario spots his favorite soccer actor outside, he begs Dev to takes a photo of them on his phone. When asked by the player if Mario is his son, Dev responds in Italian, "He's a baby I sometimes play with," much to everyone'southward defoliation.

• Though the bodily mechanics of Dev's phone search aren't super interesting, it'due south good that they addressed the obvious elephant in the room: Why doesn't he accept his "Find My iPhone" app turned on? Answer: International data charges.

Master of None Season-Premiere Recap: A Trip to Italian republic