I’m still reeling
from this crop of sitcoms. As a group,
they are characterized by nothing so much as the concept of “reinforcing the patriarchy.” It’s disappointing. Frankly, I had hoped we as
a TV viewing public had moved past that.
It’s not like competent, multi-dimensional women are foreign to
television comedy. They have a long and proud
history. 30 Rock. Parks & Rec. Even The Mindy Project, in its way. And it's not just a recent thing: take Murphy Brown and Mary Tyler Moore. I could go on. So to be honest, I didn’t
expect to see so few of them in this this year’s comedies. I may be more attuned to gender stereotyping
than the average viewer, but even if I weren’t, the new crop would be a pretty
bleak experience.
Indeed, despite
its excellent cast (Tony Shalhoub! Kal Penn! Jerry O’Connell!) I can’t even
bring myself to watch We Are Men, which seems to be nothing more than a
celebration of male privilege. Sight
unseen, I assign it four SimonBakers.
So with that exception, the new crop so far:
Mom (CBS, new. Multi-camera
sitcom.)
Premise: Misadventures of a single mom who’s just trying
to hold it all together when her un-empathetic, and newly sober, mother breezes
back into her life.
Promise: The pilot’s
plot unfolds with a series of well-timed reveals, but the reveals were the only
things that I found particularly amusing.
It's steeped in stereotypes about what mothering is supposed to be, and how there are so very many ways for women to fail at it. It’s not that the show isn’t funny – it’s that it’s the same sort of
funny as all the other Chuck Lorre shows, which (aside from the occasional
episode of The Big Bang Theory) just isn’t my sort of funny. It’s conventional, cynical, and often deeply
sad. Apparently the rest of America
likes this sort of humor, but I’ve given up trying to figure out why.
Verdict: If you like Chuck Lorre shows, this is right
up your alley. It’s not for me.
The Goldbergs (ABC,
new. Single-camera sitcom.)
Premise: The exploits of an ordinary suburban family
in the ‘80s.
Promise: When The
Wonder Years offered nostalgia as humor, it was new. This show is less nostalgic, and I think less funny, too, although it may just be less fresh. Part of my distaste for it may
be idiosyncratic: it’s about a
particular sort of family that I have always found baffling (and found a bit
frightening when I was a kid): the family that does a lot of yelling at each
other as a way of expressing their love and caring. Since I don’t understand that sort of family,
I don’t really want to watch a show about one.
But that’s just me; others may love that dynamic.
Those that do, should also be ready for jokes about a father who
doesn’t express emotions easily, a mother who doesn’t have a life outside her
family, a teenage daughter who talks too much on the phone, a teenaged son who’s
not very bright, a grandfather who instructs his grandson about how to
objectify girls…these people exist, of course, but do we need another sitcom
about them?
Verdict: Heartfelt and sometimes cute, but I wish the
sitcom genre would move past this.
Trophy Wife (ABC,
new. Single-camera sitcom.)
Premise: Young woman marries a man with three kids and
two ex-wives, and struggles with her new matriarchal role.
Promise: I love the cast – Bradley Whitford, Malin
Akerman, Natalie Morales, to name a few – but I can’t make heads or tails of
the show itself. It’s more of a
half-hour dramedy than a sitcom. I think
I want it to be more surreal—which would move it into Arrested Development
territory—but instead, it’s basically a slightly outlandish family drama. Akerman’s and Whitford’s characters are sympathetic
but make bad decisions, and the ex-wives are well-meaning but
unsympathetic. The kids are sitcom kids. Together, they work out problems born of
stubbornness, assumptions, and bad communication. The three matriarchs present different archetypes
of womanhood: (a) professional/stern, (b) crunchy/flaky, and (c) beautiful/sweet
-- all inflexible and stereotype-based.
On one hand, I’m willing to give the show the benefit of the feminist
doubt since it’s a half-hour pilot without much time for developing character complexity. On the other, that’s an awful lot of gender
stereotyping in one place. In sum, it’s
not exactly groundbreaking, and in the end, my concern probably has less to do
with a shortage of originality than what may be a shortage of humor.
Verdict: The show
may develop into a heartwarming and/or funnier series as we become attached to
the characters, but it may just stay in that uncanny middle ground. I’m not sure whether I have the patience to stick
around and find out.
Back in the Game
(ABC, new. Single-camera sitcom.)
Premise: Single mom coaches Bad-News-Bears-style youth
baseball team.
Promise: Finally!
A new sitcom featuring a competent, multi-dimensional woman. I loved Maggie Lawson in Psych, and she’s good
in this, too, as a woman who played softball all through college to please a
distant father, and returns to the game to coach her wise-beyond-his-years but uncoordinated
son, along with all the other misfit kids who were cut from the local youth
baseball team. Don’t get me wrong, there’s
still a battle of the sexes problem going on here, but at least the woman at
the center of it is about defying stereotypes rather than embodying them. And there are still stereotypes, too: James Caan plays an alcoholic, crude, yet well-meaning
father straight out of central casting (although Caan does it well). The villain of the piece is a local father
who is the very embodiment of a male chauvinist pig. But at least he’s villainized for it, rather
than being lauded (or at the most, gently chided) for it like the older men in
Dads and The Goldbergs. And the show
will, undoubtedly, encounter some traps for the unwary--the misfit team members
all fall into some outsider group (uncoordinated, effeminate, fat, ill-bred, foreign,
etc.) but given the pilot, I’m inclined to trust that at least a good portion
of the time, the show won’t fall into the traps it’s set for itself. Why do I say that? The show certainly doesn’t portray the
central character as perfect—but her problems are, generally speaking, person
problems, not woman problems, and that makes all the difference. It even tackles the topic of bullying without
getting preachy. My chief complaint is
that the humor is mostly gentle rather than laugh-out-loud, which means that it
might not hold my (or America’s) attention.
Verdict: So far, so good. Or at least it’s on the good side of a bad crop
of new sitcoms. I’ll keep watching, at
least for a while.
The Crazy Ones
(CBS, new. Single-camera sitcom.)
Premise: Workplace comedy about an advertising
agency. Robin Williams and Sarah
Michelle Gellar star as the agency’s father-daughter principals.
Promise: The first minute and a half features jokes
about a male VP gets inside information via pillow talk with an assistant from
a competing company, a female assistant “flashing leg” to keep executives happy
as they wait, and a toy robot getting “beat by a girl.” So it’s not an auspicious start. But to my surprise, it ended up settling into
a warm vibe, focusing primarily on the relationship between the competent
career-woman (Gellar) and her not-quite-washed-up father (Williams). Although the daughter isn’t exactly
multi-dimensional (at least not in the pilot), I find her relatable and
generally sympathetic. Both father and
daughter are good at what they do, and appreciate each other while confronting each
other’s weaknesses—and they’re clearly proud of each other, which is a very
appealing dynamic. The show is very
slickly produced. What I’m not sure
about is the humor; it leans heavily on Williams’ outlandish mugging, which is hit
or miss. Take that away, and the show (at
least in the pilot) is reminiscent of Arli$$--executives willing to embarrass themselves
to get the attention of clients and celebrities—in other words, a concept that
works occasionally, but doesn’t have the broadest appeal of all time.
Verdict: On the bubble.
The Michael J. Fox
Show (NBC, new. Single-camera sitcom.)
Watched: First two
episodes.
Premise: Newscaster with Parkinson’s disease returns
to work after “spending more time with his family” turns out not to be all he’d
hoped.
Promise: I have deeply mixed feelings about this
show. Its meta-commentary is interesting: Fox is undoubtedly exorcising some of his
fears about returning to TV by playing a character who has fears about
returning to TV. Fox skillfully criticizes
the shallow sentimentalism that surrounds him by demonstrating how that same
sentimentalism affects his character. I
love that he’swilling to make light of his own situation in order to level a
(sometimes subtle, sometimes not) critique at the ableism of the world we live
in. And I love that the family members
mostly appreciate each other. But
despite all those good things, I don’t find the show particularly enjoyable to
watch. Fox’s character leads a charmed life,
with one very pronounced problem. And
although that problem is very real, and undoubtedly makes every aspect of his
life difficult, it’s hard to feel sympathy for someone who is just so darn
privileged. So he has to be the family
member who stays home to wait for repairmen.
Boo hoo. His family doesn’t
appreciate his efforts to bring them together.
Waah. I gather we’re supposed to identify
with his humiliation at being emasculated by his descent into traditionally
wifely duties, but I don’t feel particularly sorry for him. Now of course, anything would be a come-down
from “New York’s most beloved newsman,” so perhaps the gender angle wasn’t
intentional. But intended or not, it
alienated me.
As for the show’s
development, I understand why NBC decided to air a two-episode opener. The second episode settles into more
conventional sitcom territory—easily resolved marital spats and teen
shenanigans. I have mixed feelings about
this, too: in settling in, it veers away
from its overt critique of ableism while doing something even more convincing—just
being a normal show that incorporates Fox’s Parkinson’s without dwelling on
it. That’s great, but my original
criticism still stands. It continues to
harp on the problems of the privileged.
And a conventional sitcom about the problems of the privileged just isn’t
something I’m eager to watch every week, social commentary or not.
Verdict: I may give it another week, but I doubt it’ll
keep me engrossed.
On the DVR: Hello Ladies, a half-hour HBO comedy which aired
tonight...but which based on the promos, fits seamlessly with the theme of “preserving
the patriarchy.” We shall see. Plus,
a lot of hour-longs! In alphabetical
order: Betrayal, The Blacklist, Hostages,
Lucky 7, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Masters of Sex. Then, of course, more new shows to come. Stay tuned!
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