The Comeback is an American sitcom produced by HBO. The series stars Lisa Kudrow as sitcom actress Valerie Cherish in modern-day Los Angeles, and was created by Kudrow herself in collaboration with Michael Patrick King, a former executive producer of Sex and the City. Kudrow and King additionally serve as screenwriters and executive producers of the series, with King also having directed several episodes. The series originally aired for a single season of 13 episodes from June 5 to September 4, 2005, before being canceled. Nine years later, The Comeback was revived for a second season of eight episodes that aired from November 9 to December 28, 2014. The third and final season premiered on March 22, 2026.
The Comeback is a satirical and comedic look inside the entertainment television industry. It was shot by a two-camera crew. The first season is presented as found footage shot for the fictional reality show within the series, also called The Comeback. The second season is presented as found footage shot by a camera crew originally commissioned by Valerie to pitch a pilot to noted reality TV producer Andy Cohen, later repurposed as behind the scenes web content, and then into a full-scale documentary. The third season is presented as a mix of found footage and single-camera scenes shot by returning filmmaker Jane Benson and a social media assistant, later incorporating digital and security footage of ValerieâÂÂs role in an AI-written sitcom.
The series initially follows Valerie Cherish (Kudrow), a veteran B-list sitcom actress who found fame on a sitcom called I'm It!, which ran from 1989 to 1993. Thereafter, she failed to find substantial acting work and fell out of the spotlight for more than a decade. In 2005, Valerie is cast as Aunt Sassy on a new network sitcom called Room and Bored and as part of landing the role, agrees to chronicle her return to the television industry on a reality television series called The Comeback. However, she continuously struggles with the matter of being an aging, non-influential performer in an increasingly youthful Hollywood, while her every move on and off the set is being documented for the companion reality series.
In 2014, Valerie initially attempts to produce her own reality television pilot for producer Andy Cohen, having found that reality television has become significantly more popular since she made The Comeback nine years earlier. After she is cast as a fictionalized version of herself on an HBO series called Seeing Red, which chronicles the career of the sitcom writer and producer who tormented her nine years earlier on Room and Bored, the footage is repurposed as a documentary film capturing her second career resurgence as it threatens to destroy her personal life.
In 2026, Valerie returns for a third and final season, finding herself in a television landscape increasingly dominated by AI. After a brief, self-proclaimed "sabbatical" during the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes, Valerie is cast in a new sitcom at her former network, only to discover the series is the first to be written entirely by AI. The season, captured by her new social media manager, Patience, and returning documentary producer Jane, follows Valerie as she attempts to navigate her "new chapter" while struggling with the technologyâÂÂs impact on her craft and personal life.
Because the show is set in modern-day Hollywood, celebrities and media personalities such as Andy Cohen, Chelsea Handler, Jane Kaczmarek, Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien, RuPaul, and Jane Fonda, among others, often play themselves in cameo appearances.
The Comeback was conceived in 2004 by Lisa Kudrow and Michael Patrick King, following the final seasons of the sitcom Friends (in which Kudrow starred as Phoebe Buffay) and the HBO comedy Sex and the City, on which King was a director, writer, and executive producer. The central character, Valerie Cherish, was an extension of a recurring character that Kudrow invented while doing improvisational comedy with The Groundlings in Los Angeles. The character, which Kudrow named "your favourite actress on a talkshow", was an egotistical celebrity who lacked self-awareness. Kudrow has cited The Office as an influence on the show's found-footage documentary format, as well as being inspired by the rise of reality television, and the humiliation such shows inflicted upon their participants.
The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported an approval rating for the first season of 65% based on 20 critic reviews. The website's critical consensus states, "Intriguingly cynical, The Comeback unfortunately lacks the sharp insight and sympathetic characters needed to skewer showbiz conventions." Metacritic calculated a weighted average score of 58 out of 100 based on 25 critics.
Despite a coveted time slot after the hit series Entourage, The Comeback debuted to low ratings. It was also met with a mixed critical response, yet it was nominated for three Primetime Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for Kudrow. HBO confirmed on September 21, 2005, that the series had been canceled after being on the air only 13 weeks. Its initial lukewarm reception and short run notwithstanding, The Comeback was retrospectively lauded.
The show placed #79 on Entertainment Weeklys "New TV Classics" list. In 2009, the publication named The Comeback one of the 10 best shows of the decade, calling it "the most brilliantly brutal satire of reality TV ever captured on screen." In 2012, the magazine listed the show at No. 8 in the "25 Best Cult TV Shows from the Past 25 Years," saying, "Both painfully uncomfortable and deadpan hilarious, The Comeback was spot-on in its inside-showbiz look at the making of a sitcom â while featuring one of the decade's biggest sitcom stars, no less. But it was so inside, it was too inaccessible to a mass audience, or even an audience that might have returned for a second season on HBO." Entertainment Weekly also voted Valerie Cherish on The Comeback as Lisa Kudrow's second best performance.
The New York Times gave the show a lukewarm review, dubbing it "interesting", but also complaining about a lack of originality in the concept and finding The Comeback ultimately less entertaining than its fellow HBO series Entourage.
In a commemorative article in 2012, UK newspaper The Guardian praised the show for its "bittersweet comedy" and Lisa Kudrow for her "ego-free acting." The newspaper questions whether, in an era where "you can't move for meta-sitcoms," this sitcom was just "too far ahead of its time."
The second season was met with critical acclaim. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes the second season received an 86% approval rating based on 35 critic reviews, giving it a "fresh" rating. The website's critical consensus states, "Substantially similar to its predecessor in all the best ways, The Comeback<nowiki/>'s resurrection season thrives on Lisa Kudrow's starring performance as Valerie Cherish." It also scored a 71 out of 100 on Metacritic based on 24 reviews. Robert Lloyd of the Los Angeles Times praised the show saying "The current episodes have more weight and intensity; they come off a shade darker and yet more sympathetic to its cast of co-dependent lost souls." Joshua Alston of The A.V. Club also praised it, writing: "The Comeback is the same as it ever was, and more highly concentrated. It still out-metas anything else on television. The performances remain stellar all around." On the other hand, Kristi Turnquist gave the show a mixed review, writing: "While the first few episodes of the new Comeback make stingingly accurate points about the sexism and ageism Valerie has to contend with, The Comeback has its own problems. As in the first go-round, Valerie comes off as cartoonish, a caricature of a so-so celebrity." The last episode of Season 2, "Valerie Gets What She Really Wants", received almost universal praise, scoring 10/10 and A scores across the board.
The third and final season received critical acclaim. On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes the third season received an 97% approval rating based on 31 critic reviews. The website's critical consensus states, "Lisa Kudrow once again leads the illustrious Comeback with renewed vigor and purpose, remaining on the pulse of the media's current moment, marking a welcome and long-awaited victory lap." Metacritic calculated a weighted average score of 80 out of 100 based on 21 critics.
Jen Chaney of RogerEbert.com wrote, "In many ways, The Comeback comes across as both a love letter to and a eulogy for the television comedy. It can also be seen as a TV-focused complement to The Studio, Seth RogenâÂÂs Apple TV+ series about the insanity of working in the modern movie business, except The Comeback does an even better job of reflecting the panicky energy that has become the norm for anyone who makes a living in Los AngelesâÂÂor anywhere, for that matterâÂÂtrying to tell stories." IndieWires Ben Travers gave an A- for the season and wrote, "Concurrently an avowal of HollywoodâÂÂs imminent collapse and a rebuttal to the doomerism that traps show business in a deleterious cycle of fear, The Comeback Season 3 regularly achieves what seems unachievable, which includes adding to the legacy of a classic." Varietys Alison Herman wrote, "The Comeback may look like a reality show, but at heart, itâÂÂs a Hollywood fantasy that knows itâÂÂs an endangered species."
According to HBO, the second season drew an average of 1.4 million viewers across its channels and on demand â Kudrow said she had not "heard it officially," but that she and King had gotten the impression that the door was open for more. Soon, she hoped she and King would begin to "talk about what more would look like." In a 2014 interview with E!, Kudrow also had this to say: "I would love to do more. In 2005, that was an ending, that was definitely an ending because I guess now we see that those episodes were a piece and these episodes were a piece and then if we do more then we will be doing that piece."
On July 21, 2020, the cast reunited on the live streamed web series Stars in the House, raising money for Actors Fund of America.
In June 2025, the series was renewed for a third and final season which premiered on March 22, 2026.
"The Comeback â The Complete Only Season" was released on Region 1 DVD on August 1, 2006, with the Region 2 version released on September 18, 2006. The discs include all thirteen aired episodes as well as the following special features:
Season 2 was released on DVD on August 4, 2015, in a combo-pack along with Season 1 entitled "The Comeback: Limited Series". It contains all 21 episodes of the series.
, both full seasons of The Comeback are available on HBO Max, Hulu and Amazon Prime.