by Seila Rizvic
Recently, Netflix released another season of acclaimed Fox sitcom Arrested Development. In the weeks prior, the internet was abuzz
with people watching and re-watching the previous three seasons, tweeting the series’ best known jokes, sharing screen-caps of their favorite scenes, and generally brimming with anticipation for the upcoming release. Naming Arrested Development as a top pick among your favorite television shows was a safe bet for even normally finicky TV aficionados and media and culture critics. Fans lauded the show as a kind of anti-sitcom sitcom, with a self-awareness, subtly and layering that other sitcoms did not have. Knowing all this, I set out to watch the show for myself, with high expectations formed by this unanimously high praise.
I was disappointed.
Even just a few episodes in I could see the self-awareness and layering that my peers had so enthusiastically told me about. I could certainly see the charm of the well cast set of characters, each endearing and frustrating in their own way. I could even appreciate the frequent bouts of absurdity and quirky humor. Arrested Development has received all the praise it fairly deserves, but what seems to be lacking, from not only the shows’ writers but the fans as well, is an acknowledgement of the often lazy joke-telling that too often tries to play off tired stereotypes as insightful humor.
To begin with, the show’s main female characters, Lucille and Lindsay Bluth, can be almost completely defined as nagging and manipulative or vain and shopping-obsessed respectively. In other words, the extent of their character development is limited by a boring trope that’s been applied to women in television (and real life) for ages.
With the exception of Maeby, whose rebellion, aloofness and unexpected professional success were genuinely fun to watch, the show’s secondary female characters are limited to short-lived girlfriends of the male main characters and one long-term girlfriend whose unattractive appearance is frequently played for laughs. Oh, and also a sexually insatiable secretary who is prone to flashing people. Generally speaking, the show has nothing new to offer the 50% of their fan base and population who might have hoped to see themselves portrayed on screen in a way that actually reflects who they are.
The way that race is presented is equally disappointing. In the original seasons, people of color are mostly limited to stereotypes, playing Hispanic maids and laborers (with a few notable exceptions, like Ice the bounty hunter/party planner and Carl Weathers). The new season offered a few more roles for people of color, including George Michael’s roommate P-Hound and Herman Caine parody Herbert Love, but the show’s treatment of race still left a lot to be desired. Lindsay’s exoticization of Indian culture and the difficult to watch Chinese stereotypes used to depict China Garden and the Jade Dragon Triad featured prominently in this season, but didn’t seem to set off too many alarm bells in recent reviews of the show.
Previous seasons joked about trans women, hot but developmentally disabled women (played by Charlize Theron), and jokes that normalize the use of drugs typically used for date rape, and overall, there seems to be a disconnect between the show’s outlandishly racist and sexist jokes and the response of fans who seem to view themselves as otherwise progressive and typically critical of these issues.
It seems in many cases, Arrest Development fans view themselves as somehow so progressive, so media savvy, that their uncritical enjoyment of shows like Arrested Development is justified by their own good taste. Fans seem to view themselves as above the fray of the common viewer, occupying a space where obscure pop culture references and meta-jokes reign supreme, a place where their superior tastes are catered to and satiated–and at the same time, a place where people of color have few speaking roles and where women fall neatly in the ‘bitchy mom,’ ‘materialistic sister,’ or ‘short-lived girlfriend’ category. This sense of aesthetic superiority leads some viewers to believe that they are immune to internalizing the oppressive tropes they find in their favorite TV shows.
If this is a case of ‘laughing at’ racism rather than ‘laughing with’, as has been argued, then we must ask ourselves if Arrested Development is critiquing the tropes it presents or is it re-inscribing them? In other words, is the viewer made to deconstruct, question and criticize these tropes, or are they simply being played for a cheap laugh about Hispanic housekeepers? The most generous interpretation would be to say that viewers are supposed to be laughing at the absurdity of the Bluth family for their many faults, with racist remarks and gender stereotypes among these–but if the joke is meant to be “it’s bad when people say racist and sexist things,” this is hardly high social critique or humor. After all, transphobic slurs, date rape drugs, and exploitative internal adoptions weren’t invented by Arrested Development writers for a laugh–they are real things, with contexts, histories and implications, none of which are being engaged with in any real way within the show.
To be clear, my issue is not simply that Arrested Development is a problematic show (nearly every show is in some respect or another)–it’s that these problematic aspects seem to be so infrequently discussed among its viewers. I had never heard a word about them before I watched it–it seems like it’s assumed that the racism and sexism portrayed in the show, is “ironic” or that the show’s white, middle-class, young, educated fan base is somehow “in on the joke” regarding the family’s questionable quips and old fashioned attitudes. Except those attitudes aren’t really old fashioned at all, and this kind of ironic, detached attitude about television and media is part of the reason why–if we all think racism is a joke on TV, how will we react to it in real life?
How I feel about Arrested Development: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqFLXayD6e8
I’d say you’re disappointed in the characters because you’re supposed to be. They’re all terrible people. You say there are no good examples of well rounded female characters but then neglect to mention Gob and other negative male characters. While we do have Michael and maybe George Michael as positive examples all the other characters are bad people.
I think most offensive jokes are inherently absurdist; it’s funny because it’s ridiculous to imagine these horrible things or actions being said.
I have to say, I agree completely with this article. Arrested Development has gotten such a positive response that I decided to check it out myself and I was severely saddened at what I found.
I’d hoped that maybe the point of the show was that all the Bluths were horrible, but Michael’s continually (thus far) lauded as a good man and he continually does bad things – and objectifies Marta. I had huge problems with his possessive pining coupled with her lack of development. It got really hard to sit back and watch the show continually tell me that Michael’s ‘the good one’ when he’s, frankly, horrible. In a lot of ways I think a lot of people don’t notice. He just reinforces this ‘Nice Guy’ misogynistic trope that I’m so sick of.
But, anyway, I haven’t finished the show, but I’ve seen enough. Reading this and knowing about the transmisogyny that’s going to be coming up, I’m really disillusioned and disappointed. Especially since this is the only article I could find (so far) that’s reflected not just mine but any problems with this show. I don’t get why it’s so popular. On top of everything, it’s just not that funny.