Not much has changed between the end of Louie season 1 and the beginning of season 2, which premieres tonight. And that's impossibly good news for old and new viewers alike, though perhaps not so good for the character of Louie, played (and written, and directed, and produced, and edited) by Louis C.K., whose life as a divorced single dad and comedian in New York City is just as full of frustration, cynicism and dark surprise as ever. We don't necessarily pick up where we left off with Louie, because we didn't really leave off anywhere. Episodes take on a vaguely familiar frame with the way each inter-cuts segments of C.K.'s stand-up with short stories about the mundane, unavoidable, often depressing yet strangely rewarding tasks of daily life. The stories are more like vignettes, resembling documentary in the way a beginning or ending is never forced, a moral never arrived upon, though lessons happen often (and often cruelly).
Continuity happens not through plot, but through the character of Louie, whom we must constantly remind ourselves is not exactly C.K., but more like a potent version of his stand-up persona: Dark, honest and whip-smart, but gentle and self-deprecating at his core. The way he smiles at the end of his sets tells us that, for all his limitations as a parent, adult, lover, or neighbor, he's laughing at himself, too -- just as we all must if we want to keep from going completely insane.
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