THE MOTHER OF ALL KEATON POLLS : Family Ties

Short thread. Anyway, imagine if art had imitated life here.

can't believe no one voted elyse

she is the mother of all keatons

(except steven and his boring brother, of course)

A girl I knew in college grew up in LA and lived next door to the actor who played Skippy. She had all these photos of him hanging out in her home w/ her & her friends. So I guess she had her own irl Skippy! She must have been the envy of her friends.

woulda thought skippy'd get more votes then

Andy, meanwhile...

“Bonsall then said that he and Trujillo both are bipolar and like drugs,” according to the report. “Bonsall said that he takes a lot of drugs and sometimes those drugs make him forget things.”

only one for mallory? come on alls

It's clearly time for a reunion show.

clearly, Andy Keaton is not doing his part to challenge societal preconceptions of former child stars & their behavioral standards.

neck tats don't help the situation much, either, tbh

Found the whole "Uncle Ned" episode online.

http://www.bing.com/videos/watch/video/family-ties-say-uncle/230720118853CC261C72230720118853CC261C72

Classic premium American sitcom material, right here. It has the cheap laughs and the dumb jokes; it has some good jokes mixed in for good measure; it has a big dramatic moment (Uncle Ned gives Alex a smack and busts out in tears about it); it has Steven getting stern ("You admit you have a problem... or you get the hell out of my house."); and it even has a happy ending (Uncle Ned admits he has a problem and calls AA). But most of all, it's got Tom Hanks. If only all drunks were this funny.

I love it when Steven gets stern. He's all wise and even-handed. I love you, Dad!

In the gravitas department, Steven Keaton beats every TV dad before or since. I'll stand by that statement.

OMG -- the most special Very Special Episode ever!

http://www.bing.com/videos/watch/video/family-ties-speed-trap/10B61A4150CE67189B1B10B61A4150CE67189B1B

(Sorry about the ads. What can ya do.)

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/21949720/detail.html

damn andy is hardcore

I was just reminiscing last night about this episode. Anyone remember it? The first half is a traditional Very Special Episode, in which Alex copes with the death of a friend, but the second half is a strange piece of bleak, morose theater -- it's even staged as a play, with lighting cues and a black backdrop -- in which Alex talks to an unseen psychiatrist and acts out scenes from his past.

yeah, it's the best friend we never met before? alex is all broken up about his friend's death and whatnot, but we've known alex forever at this point and he's never mentioned the dude.

As an Ohioan, do you feel like you had a special angle on this show?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16PkhcfOEac

Some people age better than others, but MY GOD JUSTINE BATEMAN WHAT THE FUCK

I was just reminiscing last night about this episode. Anyone remember it? The first half is a traditional Very Special Episode, in which Alex copes with the death of a friend, but the second half is a strange piece of bleak, morose theater -- it's even staged as a play, with lighting cues and a black backdrop -- in which Alex talks to an unseen psychiatrist and acts out scenes from his past.

Just watched this last night--actually stands up really well.

The Agony Booth disagrees with the previous post.

Mallory's Clothes

I love that Mallory's Clothes just started up yesterday, and today it's already been found and endorsed by Justine Bateman.

I really wish I'd come up with idea myself, but I don't have Family Ties on dvd (and I'm not downloading all the seasons...that would max out my hard drive).

Weirdly, they never released the last 2 series on DVD.

This was my favourite show when I was 9-10. Recently, I started watching old episodes again, mostly from s1. While the acting and even some of the humour hold up, it's kind of fascinating as a cultural artifact. It seems incredible now that a show like this could have been a prime-time show that adults would actually watch. Even today's tamest sitcom contains much more overtly adult themes and references. And nearly every episode of Family Ties seems blatantly didactic, sometimes with actual on-screen debates or lectures about civics.

And when thinking about it, I wonder if this was a particularly 80s phenomenon. (Cosby Show is probably another example.) 70s sitcoms such as All in the Family or Good Times don't have the same sort of innocence (at all!) and deal with topical issues in a way that suggests they were meant for adults. Was it just that baby boomers had kids in the 80s and wanted shows they could watch with the family?

Perhaps the emergence of cable networks specifically intended for kids or teens since that time allowed prime time comedy to become more adult again? When I try to imagine what sort of show might feature storylines like this today, I can only think of childrens'/YA shows:

As the new editor of the school paper, Alex learns of an Algebra test cheating scandal that Mallory is involved in. He confronts Mallory, but when encouraged by his parents to "print truth," he writes an article. The teacher in charge praises his reporting, but tells him not to print it. Alex prints it anyway, his classmates think he's a "fink," and he loses the position of editor. Mallory blames cheating on trying to be as good as Alex in classes. Steven and Elyse tell Alex he should have printed the story without names. He apologizes to Mallory for hurting her. (from Wikipedia)

Or "High School Confidential", where Alex is finally able to help Nick learn the parts of speech (and get his high school diploma) by comparing them to parts of a motorcycle. (The verb, for example, is like the engine: It is the source of movement and action.)

(If Community were to do something like one of these, there would be additional levels of parody and cultural commentary.)

Another thought I had was that something like the father-son conflict and resolution in "I Never Killed for My Father" seems rather melodramatic and cliched to me now. Is this because it was already a cliche in 1982 or simply because I grew up with things like Family Ties? How did this come off to even teenage viewers in the 80s? In order to appreciate the subversion of cliches in a contemporary sitcom, it almost seems necessary to have gone through the cliches in the first place.

Much of this may seem obvious. Just random thoughts...

I was 9-10 in 1988-1989 so most of these were already after-school reruns even then, which may make a difference, I dunno.

Got nothing better to do tonight? Enjoy Nick Moore's turn as "A homeless street musician (who) becomes a demon when sexually aroused."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-uzruxIgV8

I recently signed up for Netflix and have been rewatching Family Ties.

"I don't go out with girls who have an IQ lower than room temperature". Oh, Alex!

Anyway, as Sund4r says, it is very didactic, but I find it enjoyable. I liked it as a kid, as well, but now that I'm older I appreciate all the references more.

I've not watched a lot of new TV shows, but it seems like few would create characters who reference what could be considered 'high culture' or high-brow academic concepts a lot. If anyone knows of any I'd love to watch them.

(Apart from shows with characters like Sheldon, whose character gets way too carried away a lot.)

I either forgot until today, or just never knew, that there was an episode of this show where River Phoenix played a socially maladjusted boy genius who falls in love with Jennifer and gives her an x-ray of his brain.