"Modern Family" takes a satirical look at a strain of trivial problems that plague several intensely comedic families. The show's structure is unique among serial TV shows. Instead of centering on one nuclear family, "Modern Family" focuses on three chaotic households that play equally major roles in the various plots. Despite the fact that these three households have virtually nothing in common, the members are related by blood or through marriage; thus, all the characters are a part of one big, dysfunctional family.
The oldest character, Jay , is a successful businessman who is married to the gorgeous Gloria . Their son Manny is the same age as Jay's grandson Luke, whose mother Claire is actually older than Gloria. While Luke's older sisters' antics carry on, his father Phil attempts to manage the family's constant bedlam, which he causes more often than not. Jay has a son slightly younger than Claire named Mitchell , who is a gay lawyer and whom Jay cannot stand. Mitchell is married to Cam , who is the funniest and most likeable character. Cam humorously serves as a mother to Lily, the couple's adopted child.
The show has maintained strong qualities during its three seasons. The characters are lovable, the writing is beautiful, the jokes are clever, and the episodes are funny. The first season of "Modern Family" was classic and unforgettable; it seemed simply unbeatable by any subsequent season. The second season came around and managed to do the impossible, surpassing the first in every way. The current season is rough, but it hasn't been entirely bad.
There have been several highlights. The second episode of this third season, "When Good Kids Go Bad" showed promise. In that one, Cam and Mitchell planned on throwing a family dinner to announce their decision to adopt another child; however, plans started going awry when they discovered that their daughter, Lily, would not take well to another baby in the house. After all, Cam has only had so much "momness" to go around. The characters' reactions to Lily were entertaining.
The best episode of the season, "Little Bo Bleep," had a subplot focused on Lily as well. Cam's weakness for children's swearing led him to laugh whenever his daughter unknowingly swore. She quickly developed a habit that Cam and Mitchell had to try to clean up before her big day as a flower girl. In this same episode, Jay's dog Stella kept trying to commit suicide, presumably because of Gloria's inherent distaste for the dog, as Claire ran for office against an opponent whose careless demeanor brought out Claire's negative characteristics.
A couple of other episodes lived up to the expectations set by the first two seasons, including "Treehouse," episode seven, and "Eggdrop," episode twelve.
Nonetheless, the ratio of good episodes to mediocre ones has been distressing. So why is this season so bad? "Modern Family" has recently adopted an annoyingly formulaic structure in the last set of episodes, resulting in unforgivable predictability and an overall lack of engaging humor. Quite simply, the number of clever jokes has decreased. The few jokes that manage to generate laughter are often childish and unoriginal. Also, the writing has changed for the worse: the screenwriters seem to take fewer risks when it comes to working with the basic conflictresolution pattern of Americanstyle TV comedy. Additionally, they try too hard to make the characters fit rigidly into molds of brief descriptions, unlike in previous seasons when these characters tended to emerge as multidimensional.
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