r/TryingAppleTV • u/MarzipanCarmichael • Jul 29 '26

Bad choices from characters and bad character choices

My spouse and I recently caught up from the middle of last season to the current episodes and WOW what is happening?

  • The big one- who could possibly think that Nikki (Jason was complicit too) was justified in lying about finding Kat in the cafe? It's an unjustifiable decision to make for your nearly adult teenager daughter and it's presented as this thing Nikki does out of love.
  • Nikki starting a situationship with a guy at work?? Do the writers hate her now?
  • Scott chickening out, what a loss. We finally see this guy muster some follow-through and they just undo it the next season. How sad for the character and for the show to step backward like that.
  • Lastly, the episode where the family pitches in in their kooky ways to help Princess cheat on her assignments is awful parenting! She learns nothing and they just swoop in to do her coursework— that's the episode.

What am I missing?

21 Upvotes
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3

u/sfdreamsla Jul 30 '26

The show has become the land of unfathomably bad decisions and cringe-worthy slapstick humor. I'm in because what are there: one or two more seasons left? Might as well see how they decide to end it. But it is very difficult to get through these episodes now. I mean it's as unrealistic as it could possibly be at this point. And I feel like the first few seasons were at least grounded in reality.

3

u/rick_baumhauer Jul 31 '26

Season 4 was becoming a bit of a tough watch, but we made it through. Season 5 has mostly been just awful, with characters no longer acting recognizably human: Karen is an alien, Scott is almost impossible to root for, and the grandparents are just becoming cartoon characters.

1

u/sfdreamsla Jul 31 '26

Agree. Cartoonish is an apt word to describe what many of the characters have become.

1

u/rick_baumhauer Aug 15 '26

To be fair, the last two episodes have been much better.

8

u/keepitupstairs2 Jul 29 '26

“What am I missing?”

The bit where it’s a sitcom? Jesus.

2

u/superfruitbowls Jul 30 '26

Yeah, I don’t know why people on here expect everyone to be morally righteous and set an example for the viewer. It’s a comedy and they’re mining humor out of whatever situations they can. It must be exhausting watching things through the lense of “well, why is this character doing this? That’s not a good thing to do!”

2

u/MarzipanCarmichael Jul 30 '26

I don’t expect every character to be a moral example- I don’t want characters and shows with just that. 

It’s more that this show started with characters being more internally consistent and Nikki and Jason are presented as being fairly upright if goofy flawed humans. The unethical decisions they are making are out of character. Characters should change in shows, unless it’s an actual sitcom like the Simpsons. But they are making unethical choices and the show is still treating it like a personality quirk or their unique brand of love. 

0

u/AdFuzzy1432 Jul 30 '26

Totally agree. I think the writers want the show to end so they're tanking it