Modern Family in which Heaven sounds a lot like Hell

Last night was the first time I’ve ever seen an episode of Modern Family. I know. I find it difficult to believe also. I’ve certainly heard good things about it. This week, I decided it was time to check it out. I think I need to go back and take a look at last season, though, for context. Last night was like walking in on somebody else’s family reunion: Because I don’t yet know these people, I didn’t know quite what to make of it.

That is code for, “I don’t get the love.” However, I definitely need to give it more time, because certain elements did shine through what was a pretty ordinary sitcom episode.

Cameron and Mitchell are great and have a great dynamic. The show is so fast-paced that I didn’t get much nuance out of it, but their affection for each other is clear. They had a lot of great one-liners, including Mitchell lamenting that their obnoxious friend Pepper (Nathan Lane) has made gay people dislike brunch. The funniest part of this storyline is that Cameron can’t lie effectively to Pepper about missing his brunch. Cam criticizes Mitchell for being a good liar, and Mitchell tells him he is a mob wife: He doesn’t want to get his hands dirty, but he’s happy to pick up the mink coat when it falls off the truck.

An earthquake interrupts everybody’s day, locking Claire in the bathroom with a plumber (who couldn’t be more contemptuous toward Phil). During the earthquake, a heavy cabinet falls, nearly clocking Luke. Phil, who has been nagged about securing the cabinet for months, takes advantage of Claire’s imprisonment to fix the cabinet, leaving Claire and the plumber to work their own way out of the bathroom. The funniest part of this was when Claire goes charging down the stairs (we already know one step is broken) to find Phil and falls on the stair. Bowen just exclaims and keeps on charging, which is great. It’s such a throwaway pratfall, but it works.

The part of the show that I liked the best was at Jay and Gloria’s house. I absolutely adored Gloria, Jay, and Manny. Ed O’Neill’s timing as Jay is wonderful, Sofia Vergara is fierce and energetic as Gloria, and Rico Rodriguez II is precocious as Manny. I could watch a show centered on these three alone. How can you not like a character who is given two pretty big signs that he should go to church (backing over his golf clubs, earthquake) and blithely ignores them to go golfing instead. Manny, who decides to ditch church for golf also, gets hoisted on his own petard when he engages Jay in a philosophical discussion about heaven and hell. When Jay posits that perhaps there is no heaven, and it doesn’t really matter anyway, Manny has an asthma attack and insists on being taken … to church.

I suppose my main problem is that I don’t know yet whether I like Claire and Phil. I enjoyed the kids, but mostly found Claire and Phil both to be annoying. Am I supposed to find them annoying? Is that part of the charm?

Clacked by Jen Creer
on Oct 07, 2010 @ 14:00 EST5EDT