After his promised return with the Tampa Bay Rays is shot down before it even gets started, Kenny (Danny McBride) runs far away from his past life in Shelby. So much so, that he winds up in a small village in Mexico and goes by the alias Steve, who is a professional cock fighter. Oddly enough, the town has a minor league baseball team called the Charros, owned by millionaire Sebastian Cisneros (Michael Pena). Powers becomes a regular attendee along with his “sidekicks” Aaron (Deep Roy) and Hector (Joaquin Cosio), and is rather vocal about how bad the team sucks on a nightly basis. This is enough to catch the eye of Manager Roger Hernandez (Marco Rodriguez) who confronts “Steve” about Kenny Powers perhaps making a comeback with the Charros. After a night of deliberation, he takes him up on the offer and goes from corn rows back to the mullet and trades in fighting roosters for strike outs. Soon, he is revered in the village and becomes a fan favorite while being rejoined by assistant Stevie (Steve Little). He also nabs singer Vida (Ana de la Reguera), the hottest senorita around, all for his own. But his “showmanship” eventually starts to chip away at this performance, and even his sanity. This puts the pitcher’s professional life “on the ropes” once again, only this time it’ll take more than a steroids syringe to find the wheelhouse of success.
I found this season much more entertaining than the last. The varied cast of character around McBride really mesh with his foul mouthed role much better than the inhabitants of Shelby. Michael Pena’s part as the eccentric owner make for quite the conversations between he and his new star player. I’ve always though highly of Pena’s ability as an actor, no matter what genre or type of character. And he doesn’t disappoint with the limited screen time he gets in these seven episodes. Steve Little’s work is better by leaps and bounds in season two, and the exchanges he has with McBride are absolutely hilarious and are really effective in pushing the story along. Reguera’s role as Powers’ girlfriend adds more intrigue and interest compared to April in season one by Katy Mixon. Her drop dead gorgeous appearance coupled with our limited knowledge of her past makes for better storytelling and discovery. And although he doesn’t get much screen time at all, Deep Roy’s performance might just be the funniest of all the characters in the entire show. His delivery and screen presence produces hysterical laughter every single time he is in a scene.
Improvements in the acting department are met with upgrades to the writing as well. Jody Hill, Ben Best, Shawn Harwell, and McBride really find their groove this time around to come up with a plot line that is much more fast paced and multifaceted. The re-location to Mexico allows for Kenny to rediscover himself in ways that couldn’t be done in his hometown. Because virtually no one knows who he is or who he used to be, there’s no limit to the actions he takes or the things he says. And to be honest, this season’s script is just down right better than its predecessor. Also, shooting in Puerto Rico adds unexpected “sizzle” to the production, particularly in the cinematography. Just the fact that this loud mouthed, racist, know-it-all goes about his daily life within such an exotic backdrop is a conflicting dichotomy that makes everything that much funnier.
As with season one, the presentation is middle of the mile. Audio is once again mixed well and sounds good, but the picture quality is nothing to write home about. Sure, things look better on average, but that has more to do with set location than it does with actual technical aspects and HD mastery. The only real downgrade from the first Blu-Ray set is the special features. There are less this time around and they just aren’t as interesting and entertaining as the first batch.
– Invitation to the Set: short talk with cast and crew about where season one left off and season two begins. Also explains how everyone on set gets a chance to contribute to the Kenny Powers character and what makes him unique.
– Big Red Cockfighting: shows how the cockfighting scenes were captured, and the “smoke and mirrors” utilized to make the fights seem real.
There is also Deleted Scenes, Outtakes, and Audio Commentaries.