THE New Normal — Page 8

Oh and PJ's stripping GIF of him is from his cameo role (as a kinda superficial, gay man) in the very funny Bachelerotte. In that context his fat comment, etc, in that film didn't bother me. Actually as the now gay ex boyfriend of the lead in Girls, it doesn't bother me either (Ryan Murphy in that awful Vogue interview says he loves Girls and wish he wrote it--I';m glad he didn't, I could just imagine what it would be like--I wonder if he cast Ranndell based on his small role on that?)

I forgot about that but it, of course, drove me crazy! I guess Ryan just assumed he knew his Cabaret by heart when he wrote it, and obviously doesn't. As you say, it wasn't a quote (and even if it was, it's kinda a weird one given the context of the original song in Cabaret). And I won't just chalk it up to trying to make it look like Bryan is an idiot, but I'm sure Murphy would have some excuse like that, if asked.

The ending still bugs me. I know it was supposed to come across as an "aww, Nana and Bryan are bonding" moment, but it really just was a victory for Nana. She's not the only one who thinks/says some of the things she thinks/says! SHE'S the New Normal!

Seriously, it'd be like having an anti-violence show, then joining in some fist-punching at the end.

It would have been better if they did an accent and maybe pulled their eyes into slits. Maybe next week!

Good (as in well-conceived) bad review of 'The New Normal' from Phillip Maciak at Slant.com.

"If, however, the pilot ended with a title card that read, "Paid for by Americans for Mitt Romney," it wouldn't necessarily be surprising. All the teary-eyed monologues about love would be revealed as the seductively faulty logic of the depraved, and we would realize that we're supposed to be identifying with the bigoted grandmother played by Ellen Barkin the whole time. Instead, The New Normal is a nominally progressive comedy with more gay jokes and regular old racism than Gallagher's stand-up act."


Slant magazine review

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Yeah--me too.

I am not as familiar as some of you guys seem to be with Murphy's entire oeuvre. I watched 'Will & Grace' primarily for Megan Mullally, but I was rarely offended by the show--just a little bored when Karen was off-screen. I'm not a faithful consumer of 'Glee', but I have seen some episodes--or at lest scenes--that I found deeply moving, maybe more for the fact that I'm amazed and grateful that I 'lived to see the day' etc. than for any finesse or nuance in the writing.

But neither of them prepared me for the banality, offensiveness and sheer bad taste of 'the New Normal' The link and posts earlier in the thread regarding the show's use of Lesbians as an easy target for humor were, I think, spot on. It's all well and good for us (gay men) to joke about the mullets and the fanny packs in the privacy of real life. But to teach America that Lesbians are an acceptable target for humor is just SO not cool.

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That's fantastic--and exactly how I feel.

As a gay man, I do feel something of an obligation to take a look at our portrayals in entertainment, especially on network tv shows that have huge media blitzes. Sure, I have my anti-Ryan Murphy biases, but it's not like I'm not up front about them. I wish I could like this (and plenty of other shows/movies I swim against the tide on) but for the may reasons I've outlined, I just can't get on board. But this, like Glee before it, just seems to be throwing out so much nonsense and stereotype (that it wants so hard to be "anti-stereotype").

As for Rannells, I like him in his Book of Mormon performances, but the only other things I've seen him in are this and Girls (well, that and Bachelorette). And I did not like Girls, either (for reasons I outlined in the Girls thread, not just because other people liked it), and I didn't like him on that, either. Like New Normal, I think that show is just about a bunch of people in various shades of awful.

Updated On: 9/22/12 at 03:39 PM

I get daily podcasts from npr.org. For those of you interested, they recently did an interview with Rannells. This link is from their weekend update podcast which includes part of the interview with Rannells, Bob Dylan, and a piece on training dogs for search and rescue:

http://www.npr.org/2012/09/22/161550296/fresh-air-weekend-andrew-rannells-bob-dylan

this link is the full interview with Rannells:

http://www.npr.org/2012/09/10/160879686/andrew-rannells-gay-and-serious-in-new-normal

Ryan Murphy is an unabashed GIRLS fan which makes a lot of sense. He wishes he created Hannah Horvath (no, seriously when New York Magazine had a show-runners survey, that is who he put as a character he wished came from his mind). I've been waiting for the GIRLS fandom to spill over into the New York scenes of GLEE, but not yet except for maybe the fact Kurt and Rachel got an apartment in Bushwick even though they are taking classes and jobs in Manhattan, but Brooklyn is its own cliche at this point and Glee is in its vortex of reality bending in ways it one-ups itself episode to episode. Andrew's character Elijah in that is like night and day compared to this even if his sexuality being sort of obvious in GIRLS was a joke touched upon multiple times.

The Show-runner's survey Murphy did also notes his affection for Norman Lear sitcoms which I think he is really trying to do here and he seemed to liken his relatives to Norman Lear characters in the Vogue article that also served as inspiration for this show and clearly his other works.

Edit: Let me also note that I am a fan of GIRLS too but I can see what Ryan liked about it and think, 'I wish I wrote that.'. I agree with Eric though that there is no way he could have executed the scenes or written the scenes the way Lena Dunham did.

Updated On: 9/24/12 at 11:19 PM

Maybe Ryan should watch more of this instead of GIRLS:

http://youtu.be/AlFCKZkeBrg

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Well, that episode was subtle.

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I laughed, too. Despite myself.

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