The past two years, I reviewed Brothers and Sisters for TV Squad. I began this season on leave because of a large work project. However, I haven’t been able to bring myself to begin reviewing the show here for CliqueClack because I haven’t been willing to commit to watching the show this season.
Oh, Brothers and Sisters. I loved you. What happened? I loved Callista Flockhart’s three-dimensionality with Kitty, and now I wince at her shrillness. I loved Rob Lowe’s intelligence, warmth, compassion, and humor. And I watched in amazement as he tore into Nora at a family dinner. Tommy has never been much of a character, and I’m sick of the show throwing his children under the bus in order to give Balhazar Ghetty a storyline.
I don’t even recognize Kevin anymore. Who is he? Instead of the bumbling, abrasive gay lawyer we all loved, he’s confused, torn between work and his husband, and has now quit being a lawyer to go work for a Republican? Are you kidding me? What, have all the writers been fired and the new writers are being forced to watch the show without having read the past two seasons’ scripts?
Even if Sarah and Joe had no chemistry, their marriage was much better to watch than Sarah’s current, uneven life. Could we just have one stable character? Please? And all of these problems pale in comparison to the Rebecca Disaster Storyline. The extent of Very Bad Things that William Walker was guilty of was so unbelievably melodramatic for one television character, that he became like a woman who is wearing too many pieces of jewelry at a party: It’s impossible to concentrate on any one piece, so the overall effect becomes gaudy. Could we have eliminated the extortion in exchange for the mistress and daughter?
Just because Dave Annable and Emily VanKamp have great chemistry and start dating in real life doesn’t mean you trash an entire story line that you have built over an entire season and commit the ultimate Sam and Diane from Cheers sin that leads to death of chemistry and death, ultimately, of the show. The Justin/Rebecca romance has no tension, therefore no interest. I don’t care about their ups and downs as they figure out how to be together; they are now so boring that I don’t care if the relationship ends or not. But I was interested in watching the siblings struggle with their attraction to each other, even if that is a creepy and disturbing line to pursue on television.
And, okay, so they have made the decision to change this storyline significantly. Do they have to make it even worse by deciding to plunge ahead with the illegitimate child (which means yet another affair, which makes his affair with Holly seem insignificant) storyline? To what end? Holly is already intractably attached to the family now, with or without Rebbecca being William’s daughter. Even though Holly never has anything interesting to do….
I think I’ve made my point. What do you think? Are you still watching the show? Is there a reason for me to start watching it again?
Clacked by Jen Creer
on Dec 02, 2008 @ 15:00 EST5EDT
I’m hanging on thread with this show.
I DVR it and have seen myself fast forward more and more than usual.
When I started to do this with Boston Legal the next season became the last. Alan Shore rambling in court is what the DVR was made for.
Well, when ABC fired the show’s creator and guiding force at the end of last season, you had to know changes not for the better were in store!
I guess I’m in the minority of this being the show’s best season by far. The first was too melodramatic, the second too loose, now this one is a perfect mixture of comedy and drama.
This is the first season that made me consider this show as in my Top 10 network shows.
Actually, I think the show is still doing great without its creator, Jon Robin Baitz. Many people worried they were gonna sexed up the younger siblings and toned down Kevin’s gay plot after Baitz left, but the show hasn’t turn that way at all, it’s still pretty in tact with Baitz vision. many of the episodes done after Baitz left the show were very strong, those including Kevin and Scotty’s wedding.
The show does have problem with the way they handle Holly and Tommy. I don’t understand why they have to hate Holly so unconditionally just because she was the other woman. Honestly I saw no problem with her running the wine business, but the entire Walker clan always made her out to be this evil mogul stepping on their family business. It seems like the writers can only make her out to be the bad guy instead of coming up with new ideas. The same goes for Tommy, the invisible brother, what an uninteresting character.
The most unbelievable plot this season has got to be liberal Kevin working for Republican Robert. What is he doing there? Just so the writers can keep Robert in the loop now that the weak political aspect of the show is pretty much gone? Please get Kevin out of there! It makes no sense whatsoever.
Still watching and still loving it. This is one of the best ensemble casts on television and the show has some of the most interesting, creative (if at times off the wall) storylines out there. At least I don’t feel like I’m watching the same rehashed junk I’ve seen on 20 previous dramas.
I dropped Brothers & Sisters halfway through last season. Too much drama, too little substance. It was a trainwreck and I couldn’t stand it anymore.