I Love Tim Allen’s Shifting Gears, But Whenever I Explain Why, People Think It’s An Insult

I watch a lot of television. I could argue with a straight face that it’s for my job, but really, deep down, I kinda just love watching TV. I’d probably be consuming almost as much if I worked some other random job. It’s not confined to any specific genre either. Detective shows, prestige dramas, professional wrestling, reality competitions, sports, edgy comedies, Hallmark romances, game shows, it’s all on my DVR, and the thing is, I watch them all for different reasons. Like, for example, Shifting Gears, which I love because it feels like a TV show created and executed by sitcom veterans who time-traveled from the year 1994.

I was attempting to explain this to one of my friends a few weeks ago, and he legitimately thought I was trying to roast Tim Allen or mock Shifting Gears. I wasn’t. Last week, I tried to express the same opinion to a different friend, and she asked why I would consider “feeling dated” to be a positive quality. I don’t. That’s not what I was trying to say or what I think.

I’m not watching Shifting Gears because of some hipster irony thing or because I just can’t believe a show like this exists in 2025. I’m watching it because it makes me feel the same way watching a sitcom in 1994 made me feel, and there aren’t many shows on television trying to hit those emotional beats anymore. It’s simply a family sitcom that works for some of the same reasons many classic family sitcoms from the early 1990s worked.

That starts with the tone. Shifting Gears is about an estranged father and daughter, played by Tim Allen and Kat Dennings, who reconnect after the mom passes and the daughter’s marriage falls apart. She moves back in alongside her two kids, and they’re all forced to adjust to their new reality in a multi-generational household filled with different personalities and opposing worldviews. The show tackles all the issues you’d expect, but it does so with honest, yet superficial sincerity.

Not every show needs gritty realism. In fact, an overwhelming majority of television shows going for gritty realism suck at it and are far worse off for trying. Shifting Gears doesn’t try. Instead, it finds that 90s sweet spot where it’s honest enough to acknowledge and address serious and sometimes sad issues, but it doesn’t dwell on them or try to investigate them from every angle. It has the characters talk about them, connect in a heartfelt way, offer some common sense advice and then move on with a joke or two.

That’s why Shifting Gears can give us an episode where the A-plot is about a neighboring business putting a picnic bench in the alley and another episode where the A-plot is about Kat Dennings’ estranged husband coming back into the picture to reconnect with his kids, and it still feels like the same show working within the same emotional spectrum. In the latter, we get to see Tim Allen deliver a speech to his son-in-law about how he needs to step up as a father and as a man, but it’s peppered with just enough jokes and it’s taken well enough by the son-in-law that it doesn’t feel too heavy. And that’s what I want out of this show.

I also want consistent humor, and Shifting Gears is consistently pretty funny. I say pretty funny because it’s not hitting me with jokes that I want to immediately text to my wife, but it’s clever and amusing enough that I have a half-smile on my face throughout like 2/3rds of every episode. When there’s not one of those more serious plots I outlined above, much of the humor is about lower stake things like food or generational stereotypes or how the world is changing, but once again, that’s what I’m looking for out of this show.

I’m also looking for a lot of Tim Allen and Kat Dennings, which the show has no problem giving. Allen as the curmudgeonly dad that means well despite his attitude and Dennings as the snarky, alternative daughter with a sharp tongue is a great formula. Those two are among the best versions of those archetypes you can cast, and the show understands that. Almost every episode is written with several extended scenes where they’re able to play off one another, and they always squeeze the most out of the material.

You could say the same thing about the rest of the cast too. Shifting Gears is quite clearly Tim Allen’s show with Kat Dennings as the co-main character and primary foil, but the rest of the supporting cast is really well chosen too. Both of the kids are better than your average sitcom child actors and have some real personality to their roles, and the other recurrings are, like Allen and Dennings, among the best versions of people who play those types of roles.

Sean William Scott has made a career out of playing the friend who’s funny but kind of a jerk but also has some layers you don’t expect. He’s cast here as Tim Allen’s number two at work and maybe a possible love interest for Dennings and is obviously fantastic. He’s joined by Daryl Mitchell, who plays another dude at work who just fires off one-liners. You might remember him as the teacher from 10 Things I Hate About You, and if you remember that thing, I don’t need to tell you he’s perfect for this. Jenna Elfman is also recurring as a neighbor and competing business owner who’s an arch-nemesis but also maybe a love interest for Allen. As a Dharma and Greg fan, I’m into that. Even guest stars have been perfectly chosen too.

Long story short, I love Shifting Gears. It’s not a show I obsess about between episodes, but it is one that delivers exactly what I expect every single time I put it on. Unfortunately, that’s increasingly rare. We’re living in an age where a really high percentage of TV shows seem to have no idea what they’re good at or why people are watching them. Way too many of them think they need to be as serious or as deep as possible in order to improve themselves. That’s great for the a dozen or so things on television that are brilliant and innovative and have unique things to say, but for the rest of them, it’s often an annoying detour.

Shifting Gears would have crushed in 1994, even when there were 15 other shows on network TV trying to do exactly this. It’s currently crushing in 2025 when there's only a couple others, and if you put it into a time capsule and launch into the future, it’ll crush in 2056 when there might not be any. The awkward family dynamics sitcom filled with generational humor and well-intentioned misunderstandings just works. It might not be the coolest elevator pitch to a TV executive trying to win Emmys, but it’s a formula many of us relate to and find comfort in watching. Shifting Gears is just about the best version of that formula you’ll ever find, and that is not an insult. It's simply an observation and a reason why I watch it and love it every single week.