When I heard they were bringing Roseanne back, I was excited. I loved the show back then and I still enjoy watching it in syndication ever now and again. Then I watched three screeners for the revival and I got sad. I thought if Will & Grace could make us feel like no time has passed than Roseanne would do the same exact thing. I was wrong.
What made the original version so great, is that it played for all of America. It was not really political but took on a lot of hot topics that everyone deals with, in their lives. This version is so political and Hollywood, I do not think the fans are going to like it. We are watching scripted television to get away from politics, not to have it shoved down our throats. For example tonight at 8p, Roseanne and Jackie (Laurie Metcalf) have not talked to each other since the election, so they are still fighting over all of the old issues that we have already gotten over.
The 8:30p episode deals with another political issue, Darlene’s son Mark (Sara Gilbert) likes to dress as a girl, but he identifies a boy. Roseanne and Dan (John Goodman) are afraid he will be picked on at his new school and they are right.
Then they deal with the 2 Beckys by having Lecy Goranson playing the oldest Conner child and Sarah Chalke as the upper-class Hipster who wants to hire Becky to be her surrogate. Roseanne and Dan do not agree with her choice and try everything in their power to stop it. The last time around, they would have been all for it.
You get my point. Let’s talk about the Conners now. Roseanne and Dan are getting older and with that comes medical issues. What comes with that? Expensive pills they cannot afford. Roseanne takes some painkillers and that means we will have an episode, where she is addicted to them. These are issues that many Americans can relate to, but it is just so in your face.
I will get to the kids in a second, but I want to talk about what I think is happening off camera. I do not think that Roseanne is as big of a part in the writers’ room as she was the first go around. This time around it feels like it is being written more by Gilbert and Whitney Cummings and that is a bad thing. Gilbert has no sense of humor and Cummings writes one-liners. Therefore, every line feels forced. It does not flow and you barely find yourself laughing with it like you used to. Yes, I am going to say it, I would rather watch the lottery year all over again than the revival. I feel better now.
Gilbert has become the lead, and she is as flat as her chest. She sucks the life out of every scene she is in. We just never noticed it before because she was younger and a better actress back then. Darlene has just moved home from Chicago with her two kids. Harris (Emma Kenney) is a mopey teenager and the spitting image of her TV mom. We do not know what to make of her because they have not given her anything to do just yet. Mark (Ames McNamara) is named for Mark, Becky’s husband, but there is no mention of what happened to him. Becky is childless, single and working as a waitress in a Mexican restaurant. The sisters still fight like when they were teens and it is not cute like it was then. Poor DJ (Michael Fishman) is barely on the show with his mixed-race daughter. His wife is still off fighting overseas and just returned home from service 3 months ago. Their fourth kid is mentioned but never seen. While Jackie’s son is neither mentioned nor seen. And then there is Jackie, the new writers do not know how to write for her. She has no endearing qualities and just comes off as annoying. Metcalfe is so much better than this.
Almost all of them are better than this. Chuck Lorre (Two and a Half Men), Joss Whedon (Buffy and the Vampire Slayer), Amy Sherman-Palladino (Gilmore Girls), Kevin Abbott (Reba) and Danny Zuker (Modern Family) all survived working as writers on the original show and look at the shows they created. No one is going to launch a career from this show.
So long review short, this is not the Roseanne we knew and loved. That makes me sad because I really thought it was going to be great and it is dud. I wish I could have given this is a glowing recommendation but I cannot and will not even try.
I would like to add, this review is not all negative because Roseanne is a Trump supporter. It is negative because I think they lost all the heart and soul that the original has and made it extremely political. It used to be the story about a struggling family making the best with what was handed them. Now, it is all about making a political statement. We have social media and the news do that, we do not need this show to do it for us too. If they wanted to do it, then do it like they did before with clever jokes and not just have the characters get on their soapbox in every scene. Get off your high horse, who do they think they are? Roy Moore.
