getting to know the bluths

Arrested Development is in my humble opinion, the funniest show on television. Now you may be thinking "Family Guy!" but boy do I have some harsh words for you. Not really, but I feel Family Guy is more a collection of jokes and feels too disjointed for me to fully enjoy. Also when I'm watching the show, I can tell what's coming next; it's too predictable.

Arrested Development is an award-winning sitcom, but I frankly don't think it's all that innovative. Like the Simpsons, Arrested Development does not have a laugh track and is all the better for it. It also has a narrator (much like in Winnie the Pooh, remember that movie?) who narrates with complete honesty. This does contrast with the characters who lie a lot...

Michael: Tell me the truth. There's been a lot of lying in this family
Lucille: And a lot of love.
Michael: More lies.

...so the viewer always knows what's going on. Lots of the times the narrator will simply just go "Actually he hadn't" or something like that after someone lies and the narrator also gives a lot of background information.

Seinfeld was the self-proclaimed "show about nothing" (but really, almost all sitcoms are about nothing), but its core was relationships, methinks. Jerry was dating girl after girl, George gets engaged and eventually kills his fiance off, Elaine dates man after man, and who the hell knows what Kramer's up to. It was something all of us (over age 10 anyways) could relate to, but it was always light viewing. Arrested Development tries to be more than that. It's a show about family. George Bluth owns the wealthy and crooked Bluth housing company (which is illegally building palaces for Saddam Hussein) but gets arrested. His son Michael (Jason Bateman) has to essentially hold his family together and get them through this, especially since they're all crazy. But the show doesn't try to get too preachy and there's usually an anti-climax after the touchy-feely "family is important!" scene undermining the whole thing. In other words, the show isn't afraid to make fun of itself...

Michael: What have we said is the most important thing?
George-Michael: Breakfast.
Michael: No, family.
G-M: Oh right. I thought you meant out of the things you eat.

George Michael (Michael Cera) is Michael's teenage son and the actor does a tremendous job playing the awkward geek. He also has a secret crush on Maeby (Alia Shawkat), his cousin, and their scenes together are just so awkward with George Michael stuttering and just agreeing to everything Maeby says (even if it makes no sense) and trying to kiss her. George Michael is loyal to his dad always and seems to spend too much time with his family (I mean, shouldn't he have friends and stuff?), but it fits in with his character. Besides, he gets a girlfriend in the next season. Anyways, how many ways can I say that he is absolutely perfect for the role. In fact, you get a sense that he is playing himself which is...kind of scary.

Before any of you guys go drooling over Maeby, keep in mind that she's 14. Come again in four years. Anyways, I felt her characater was kind of weak. She's just the typical rebellious teen. Her mother says something about being anti-leather, and she comes home the next day in a leather suit. If her mother wants to save the trees, she wants to cut them down. If her mother wants to cut down the trees, she wants to save them. All to get attention from her parents, who are too busy with their own lives to notice or care. I just felt that her character was too sterotypical, and I thought someone like her should have some friends outside of family.

Lindsay (Portia de Rossi) is that self-absorbed mother. She's probably in her early thirties and is the self-proclaimed "activist" in the family. You know the type, the people that don't know anything about anything but think they do? She's constantly holding fundraiser parties against circumcision (HOOP-hands off our penises) and the like and spends the rest of her time trying to look good and seduce her (maybe gay) husband, Tobias (David Cross). Cross (with the help of a fake mustache) does a great job as Tobias Funke, a doctor who lost his medical liscence and is trying to find himself as an actor. He gets lessons from Carl Weathers, who is more interested in teaching Tobias how to freeload ("Whoa, whoa, whoa. There's still plenty of meat on that bone. Now you take this home, throw it in a pot, add some broth, a potato. Baby, you've got a stew going...."). Everyone in the family is expecting Tobias to come out any second now. He's also a never-nude which means he never gets naked. Even the shower, in bed, he has to wear these silly cut-offs....

"Excuse me, do these effectively hide my thunder? "

...and he doesn't like to have sex with his (really pretty) wife. So when he expains the bird and bees to George Michael (who never asked for that discussion in the first place), he's all like "When a man and woman love each other, and if the man can obtain what is known as an erection" so maybe he just has ED and is straight. Whatever the case, Tobias is a hilarious character and kudos to Cross for being able to play a bad aspiring actor so well.

Lucille Bluth (Jessica Walter) is best summed up by these two quotes.

"I don't understand the question and I won't respond to it."
"Lucille Bluth: If that is a thinly veiled criticism of me, I won't hear it and I won't respond to it."

She is manipulative, elitist, and is having a terribly hard time adjusting not having a rich husband to buy her everything she needs. Still somehow, you feel for her. Kinda. She loves all her children, except for GOB.

GOB (Will Arnett) is George Oscar Bluth II, the eldest son and commonly accepted as an idiot.

Wife of GOB: I'm in love with your brother in law.
GOB Bluth: You're in love with your own brother? The one in the army.
Wife: No, your sister's husband.
GOB: Michael? Michael!
Wife: No, that's your sister's brother.
GOB: No, I'm my sister's brother, you're in love with me. Me?
Wife: I'm in love with Tobias.
GOB: My brother-in-law?
Wife: I know this can never be, so I'm leaving and enlisting in the army.
GOB: To be with your brother?
Wife: NO!

Yeah, he's a complete idiot. He's a magician who wants to be known as more than a sleight-of-hand artist. He can't stand it when people call what he does "tricks".

George: I don't have time for your tricks, Gob.
Gob: Illusions, Dad. You don't have time for my illusions.

Gob: Illusion, Michael. A trick is something a wh*re does for money...

Children nearby gasp.

Or candy! (in the extended pilot, he says "cocaine" instead).

He also forms the Magician's Alliance, dedicated to the idea that a magician should never reveal his secret, and cruises around on his Segway. Gob is the kind of guy who thinks he's really charming, and he is...sorta but not as much as he thinks he is, plus he's really stupid. Gob resents Michael at times because he's not smart enough to be the leader of the family, but he still loves his brother.

Well, one brother, anyways. The other is Buster (Tony Hale) who suffers from crippling panic attacks. He takes expensive classes in cartography, but still thinks the blue in the map is land. He's that kind of guy. He's also sickeningly attached to his mother and a lot of funny things arise out of that relationship.

George (Jeffrey Tambor) is the fugitive father who turns Jewish in jail. When he knows he's going to be arrested, he makes Lucille the president of the company. When Michael asks why, he goes...

George Bluth Sr: They can't convict a husband and wife of the same crime.
Michael: I don't think that's true dad.
George: Really?
Michael: Yeah.
George: Oh, I have the worst f*cking attorneys.

And Michael is the one who holds them all together. He does a great job as you see him struggle with his crazy family.

I'm guessing Arrested Development does poorly ratings-wise because you can't appreciate it as much without knowing the characters. Going straight into one of the later episodes will make the show seem like a Family Guy-type show, with disjointed jokes everywhere. That's why you should pick up Arrested Development Season 1 and get to know the Bluth family. There's so many funny subplots and the great thing about them is that most of them also develop the character. The extras are mostly boring (as usual) but some of the deleted scenes are actually quite good! The extended pilot, especially, is a hoot.

xo,

underdawg