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Mocking Obama-Era P.C. : “The Goode Family”
By Kyle | May 26, 2009
Mike Judge’s new series about a family of well-meaning liberals, “The Goode Family,” which debuts tomorrow night at 9 pm, sounds intriguing. A vegan dog named Che? Priceless. Even better: The family adopts an African kid, Ubuntu. Imagine their disappointment when the kid turns out to be white.
From Variety:
What “King of the Hill” did for Texas rednecks, Mike Judge and crew accomplish with Prius-driving tree-huggers in “The Goode Family” — a smart, wryly funny animated comedy that’s going to need a strong word-of-mouth campaign to flourish. The sole qualifier is that the pilot chews through so many juicy storylines, the question of how fast the best plots will be exhausted represents a source of concern; still, assuming liberals can laugh at their own foibles, ABC might just have TV’s first true Obama-era sitcom on its hands.
I doubt ABC has the guts to keep this show on the air very long. I’m guessing they won’t promote it, no one will watch it, and then they’ll say, “Whoops! No one is in the mood to mock liberals these days. Our bad.” I give it a month. “Idiocracy” syndrome. Apparently ABC has been sitting on the show all season and didn’t even mention it with its fall schedule at the upfronts. If ever a show was primed for failure, it’s this one. My only hope is that another network will pick it up.
Topics: Barack Obama, Comedy, Politics, TV |
May 26th, 2009 at 9:42 am
It’s doomed.
If they really cared about the show, they’d hit the right-leaning blogosphere hard, offering clips/screeners, letting them get the word out.
I’ve been following this show for months and it’s been hard to find solid info on it till recently.
I’ve screened it now and will have my review posted tomorrow at PajamasMedia.com.
May 26th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
Strangely most of the adds are airing on ESPN (owned by the same company) and now Wall Street Journal is running a big thing on it too. I’ve been trying to press several of the right wing blogs for weeks to run with it and it looks like they are finally acknowledging it and pushing it.
You should see some of the bumper stickers on their Prius, naturally you have the Che sticker but my favortie is a sticker that says “Support Our Troops…And Their Opponents”. Hilarious!
May 26th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Sad to see this go so unnoticed, especially since it’s a sendup long waited for. Mike Judge, the most consistent animated genius of the last 15 years, yet without a home. Maybe Comedy Central will come calling.
May 26th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
I’m looking forward to getting the show on DVD. That’s assuming ABC will release it.
My take is that the producers of this show should have taken a page from Norman Lear if they were really interested in keeping the show around. “All in the Family” shows can represent both sides, with the bias being concealed by simply making the persons representing “the opponent’s” side slightly less sympathetic.
The left have mastered the technique and have been a lot more successful at it. Judging from the adverts alone, I’d say this kind of show instantly turns off a large percentage of the audience. It may feel good yo do some well deserved left bashing, but it isn’t going to play in New York, Frisco, LA et al.
May 26th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
Judge may be too keen a social satirist for his own good. And supposedly satire = ratings kryptonite. The ideal scenario would be for him to find a high-up enough benefactor (or benevolent malefactor, whatever) at some network who keeps him on the air and gives him carte blanche to do his thing. I’m not going to say “Beavis & Butthead” or “King of the Hill” were as consistently brilliant or ever topped the level of satirical genius of “The Simpsons,” but I have good faith he could get there if only he worked in an environment where he feels safe and doesn’t have to worry about “notes from the network.”
PS: Know that old saying, “Never trust anyone who doesn’t love Bob Dylan?” I also don’t trust anyone who doesn’t love “Idiocracy.”
May 26th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
The show isn’t mean-spirited, by the way. Something that can’t be said of the avg. Bill Maher rant.
May 26th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
Toto is right it’s not mean spirited from what I gather it’s simply shining light on how preposterous their behavior is.
No one doubts most of these Lefty whackjobs have good intentions (with some obvious exceptions…Hunter) but they have created so many “rules” with their political correctness that even they don’t know how to follow their own rules anymore.Combine that with the sheep with no shepherd mentality that results in endlessly copying each other, following trends, and obsessing over polls and you have a comedy goldmine.
This show will essentially have the same audience as King of the Hill I suspect and that was good enough for 13 years of air time. I suspect ABC will not hold onto it for long and it will end back up on Fox.
May 26th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
I downloaded the pilot this morning and thoroughly enjoyed it. The difference between the left and the right is the right cannot laugh at itself. For the record, I am probably as anti-PC as anyone on this board. Long may the show run.
May 26th, 2009 at 6:02 pm
Hunter I disagree with you, not surprisingly, the right has never had trouble laughing at itself which is a good thing seeing how as everything out of makes fun of us. The left traditionally has trouble laughing at itself because they take themselves so seriously and always think they’re saving the world.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:27 am
Check out the NY Times review of the show … there’s a liberal outlet incapable of laughing at itself.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:08 am
The difference between the left and the right is the right cannot laugh at itself.
But the left does, correct? Then how do you explain this?
If you watch “Real Time With Bill Maher” on HBO these days, you may have noticed something odd: the audience booing the host. It happens almost every week now, usually after Maher says something critical of the president. Of course, six months ago this same audience would have cheered wildly had Maher ripped the then-occupant of the White House. Now, you’d swear from the reaction that he’d violated some taboo too weird even for pay cable.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/chi-0421-bill-maher-tvapr21,0,6385992.story