Warning: SPOILERS IN THIS REVIEW

Episode Title: “Nice to Meet You, Walden Schmidt” (Season 9, Episode 1)

Original Airdate: September 19th, 2011 at 9:00 PM

Synopsis: Charlie Harper passes away with Walden Schmidt (Ashton Kutcher) and others looking to buy the Malibu residence.

Review: Two and a Half Men 2.0 debuted to almost 28 million viewers last night, definitely “winning” in former star Charlie Sheen’s eyes. However, while the first 10 minutes (Charlie’s funeral and the open house) were classic Two and a Half Men, the final ten minutes that introduced Kutcher seemed a bit stale.

For those of you that have yet to watch the premiere, spoilers start after the click.

The episode opened to Charlie’s funeral where Alan (Jon Cryer) is giving the eulogy to all of Charlie’s former girlfriends and the rest of the Harper family. It was nice to see the likes of Jeri Ryan, Jennifer Bini Taylor, and Melanie Lynskey among others at the funeral. The best part of the opening few minutes though was seeing John Stamos take a look at the Malibu residence in an attempt to buy it. After his cameo came Jenna Elfman and Thomas Gibson reprising their roles as Dharma & Greg from the comedy series of the same name (Dharma & Greg was created by Two and a Half Men creator Chuck Lorre). Gibson currently stars on CBS’s hit drama Criminal Minds and it was great to see him have the comedic timing we all loved ten years ago.

That sadly, is where the funny really ends. The whole set up with Walden Schmidt (Kutcher’s character) never really felt organic to the show. While it was funny to see Schmidt walking around the house naked, the sitcom felt that it went from a raunchy male sitcom to a standard sitcom that will eventually get lost in the shuffle.

The season premiere is a two-parter, so expect that next’s weeks numbers will be big as well before the ratings start slipping back down to normal.

Final Grade – 6.5/10