Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Dustin Rowles | TV | December 29, 2025
No one ever talks about Fox’s Animal Control. I have seen every episode, and I never talk about Fox’s Animal Control, which somehow returned for its fourth season last night, opening with the animal control team chasing down a literal white Bronco. I would not call it great, but it is a good sitcom, and although its creators did not come out of the Community, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, 30 Rock writers’ rooms, it shares some of that DNA.
The first two seasons have also landed on Netflix. Season three and season four will follow as part of the same deal.
Animal Control is an ensemble comedy starring Joel McHale, who at 54 may be the only guy in Hollywood who ages as well as Paul Rudd. He looks essentially unchanged from his Community days 15 years ago. He stars alongside the fantastic Vella Lovell (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Mr. Mayor), Michael Rowland, Ravi Patel, and Grace Palmer. It is a workplace comedy, except the workplace is animals, which gives the show a few fresh wrinkles to layer on top of the usual will-they-or-won’t-they romances, rivalries with other precincts, and buddy-cop dynamics across various pairings.
Like a lot of sitcoms, it takes a few episodes to find its footing, but it gets there around the midpoint of the first season. It is funny, it goes down easy, the characters are likable, and hopefully Netflix will help it find a wider audience, given the current dearth of decent sitcoms. Give it a shot, but not before watching Stumble.
