The Real O'Neals

What have you been watching?

The Real O'Neals

Postby cmsellers » Tue Dec 06, 2016 9:52 am

Has anybody been watching this show? I've mostly thought it was adorable, though not super-innovative.

The latest episode though is so awful so many levels:

1. The plotline of the younger family member who tries something the older family members does and ends up pushing the older family member out has been done so many times. (Anybody know the name for this trope?) This version does nothing remotely creative.
2. The subplot with Shannon makes no sense. Are wrestling cheerleaders really a thing? Why are they more problematic than other cheerleaders? And if cheerleading is sexist, why does it matter that the cheerleaders are sophisticated.
3. The cheerleaders are all overachievers with identical skills and interests. The comedy in the show has been grounded in realism, with over-the-top moments of surrealism being clearly Kenny's fantasies. It just seems incongruous.
4. Belief that GMO labeling is a vitally important issue is presented as a sign of intelligence.

I looked up the writer to see if he's written any other episodes. It turns out that he also wrote my least favorite episode from last season. It had two subplots:
1. Kenny feels the need to show his father that he's still manly.
2. Shannon doesn't believe in Catholicism.
I remember the manliness subplot as being kind of stupid, and the Catholicism subplot as being infuriating. As a non-religious person who makes an effort to understand religions, she was presented as stumping the priest despite asking mostly the sorts of questions Christian theologians and apologists have devoted a great deal of time to answering.

So based on these two episodes, I think that the writer--Adam Roberts--is the sort of smug, self-satisfied, clueless Hollywood liberal who infuriates almost everyone who doesn't inhabit left coast artistic circles. I hope that he's limited to writing one episode a season. Up until this point, when I noticed the writing on a show enough to notice the writer it was because the writer was exceptionally good (like Mindy Kaling on The Office). Adam Roberts is the first writer who as stood out as uniquely bad. I hope that he doesn't get to write another episode on this show.

Edit: I didn't finish the episode when I wrote this. I finished it now, and the ending actually is a nice twist. However I almost didn't get there because of how awful the rest of the episode was.
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