Family Matters has attempted to revamp the characters in a non-traditional way by throwing major characters into life-or-death situations, such as Carl Winslow (Reginald VelJohnson) falling into a frozen pond, Eddie (Darius McCrary) and his friends hanging precariously from a fire escape, Carl and Steve Urkel (Jaleel White) hanging from a tall building by their fingers, Steve nearly falling out of a hot-air balloon, and Carl discovering a bomb in a treadmill, and having ot get off the treadmill without causing the bomb to explode. Although these events are extreme and unfortunate, they are typically resolved within a few minutes allowing time for humor to be derived from another recurring theme: property damage.
If you have seen even one episode of Family Matters, I think it is still safe to say that you probably watched Urkel destroy something in the Winslow's home. Whether Urkel is knocking over a lamp, or breaking the Winslows' windows, completely destroying Carl's garage shelves, or having his "genius" inventions going wrong and ending up destroying various parts of the house, destroying something is always a great way to get a good laugh and unsurprisingly, the absurdity of the episodes only increased as the series went on.
2 comments:
Laura--I appreciate your specific examples regarding FAMILY MATTERS, but do you ever tell us how the show attempts to revamp the American sitcom? Do you think it does? If so, why (or why not)?
No, I suppose I did not clearly state how the show attempts to revamp the American sitcom, but in my opinion, it does. I believe that FAMILY MATTERS attempts to revamp the traditional American sitcom by including events and situations that would never really happen in reality. Yes, I would have to say that most traditional American sitcoms include milutiae of daily life and circumstances that family and groups of friends encounter each day, but not to the extent that FAMILY MATTERS does.
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