This week saw the premiere of the most anticipated TV reboot since the beginning of the craze a couple years ago. Originally debuting in 1988, Roseanne was must-see tv for much of its run on ABC. Starring Roseanne Barr as the matriarch of the working-class Conner family in fictional Lanford, Illinois and John Goodman as her husband Dan, the sitcom delivered razor-sharp sarcasm while also tackling some serious issues. One episode dealt with oldest daughter Becky (Lecy Goranson) asking her mom for birth control, and for several seasons youngest daughter Darlene (Sara Gilbert) went through a period of deep depression. The show even dealt with domestic violence: Roseanne's sister Jackie (Laurie Metcalf) was beaten by her young boyfriend Fisher (Matt Roth, who Metcalf actually married in real life and later divorced). Roseanne was notoriously difficult to work with behind the scenes; she was constantly firing her writers and having disagreements with cast members. In the final season the show went completely off the rails: the Conners won the lottery, and plots revolving around the family struggling to make ends meet were replaced by Roseanne and Jackie taking trips to spas and meeting royalty. Goodman even left the show for much of this season due to disputes with his onscreen wife. The final episode was a bizarre mess, revealing that the entire last season had been a figment of Roseanne's imagination: the lottery win never happened, and Dan was actually dead.
The reboot is thankfully ignoring the original's ending, and even poking fun at it. The opening scene showed Roseanne and Dan in bed, older but still the same (Dan wearing a sleep apnea mask):
Roseanne: "Dan! I thought you were dead!"
Dan: "Why does everyone keep saying that?"
The show has also seemingly returned to its working-class roots, with the pilot featuring a subplot about Roseanne and Dan trading pills due to high prescription costs (see video below).
Dan and Roseanne trade pills
Unfortunately, after the first five minutes the episode was taken over by politics: Roseanne (a Trump supporter, which doesn't even make sense since her character was quite liberal on the original) and Jackie (who voted for Hillary) bicker back and forth and criticize each other's political views, but they mercifully make up by the closing credits. For some reason NBC made politics the focus of the Will and Grace reboot premiere as well, which nearly ruined it for me and almost made me stop watching. Please keep politics out of my beloved sitcoms!
Echoing the economic realities of adult children today, divorced Darlene has moved back home with her parents, her two kids in tow. Teenage daughter Harris, played by Emma Kenney (whose character was born at the end of the original show, even though the timing doesn't exactly make sense), is a typical rebellious teen. Young son Mark (Ames McNamara) is the standout character of the new show. He's a bit effeminate and likes to wear skirts and sparkly clothes. The second episode revolved around the family worrying about him getting bullied at school for his choice of attire. It delivered a touching message of acceptance along with the show's usual laughs, narrowly avoiding after-school special cheesy preachiness. Becky is now a world-weary middle-aged waitress ("embalmed in Mike's Hard Lemoande", as Darlene puts it). She has decided to become a surrogate mother for a rich woman named Andrea to make some money. In the show's most meta twist ever, Andrea is played by Sarah Chalke, who portrayed Becky on the original show after Goranson left around halfway through the show's run. Andrea is a better version of Becky and represents how she wishes her life had turned out. DJ (Michael Fishman), a young child on the original, is now an Army man with a young daughter (his wife is still overseas in Syria). He had all of one or two lines in the first two episodes, maybe because adult Fishman isn't that great of an actor? This remains to be seen, and he may play a bigger role in future episodes.
While the first two episodes did leave a few question marks (Where is Jackie's son Andy?; Are Roseanne and Dan still working?; What happened to Darlene's ex David?), they did deliver quite a few belly laughs, even if some of the jokes felt a little forced. The nods to the original show were also spot-on: the set of the Conner house was meticulously recreated from scratch, and young Mark's teacher was Darlene's teacher in the pilot of the original. The premiere delivered monstrous ratings for ABC this week, so I'm thinking that ABC will do anything and everything to keep the reboot going beyond this planned short season of nine episodes. If the show continues to stay away from politics and keeps its wit sharp, then I'll welcome additional seasons. NBC has already promised at least two more seasons of Will and Grace, but the Roseanne revival already seems to be much more creatively and financially successful for ABC. Long live the Conners!
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