Arrested Development: A Review

We are littered with cheap comedies *cough*howimetyourmother*cough* . But amongst them shines out a couple which will make your life worth living. Arrested Development is genuinely one of them; it is the successor of sitcoms like “Friends” and “Seinfeld”, and that speaks volumes.

His gaffes are pant wetting funny, and his journey of being an actor from psychiatrist will lighten up your mood, digest your stomach, and might even put you at a great risk of dying from perpetual laughter.

A.D is about the Bluth Family- a dysfunctional, eccentric and insanely insane family that owns a Real Estate Development firm. George Bluth, the head of the family is accused of cheating his investors, and sent to jail, where he converts into a Jewish Rabbi. So, the job of saving the denigrated reputation of the Bluth family, and getting his father out of jail was heaped on Michael Bluth’s shoulder – who is the second oldest son of George Bluth. Thus began the hell that Michael calls his life – the job of stopping his family from self destructing itself.

A.D is unique to the crux. It is a narrated by Ron Howard and viewed as a faux documentary with a single camera that follows around the characters, as their daily lives fly by. It gives a dense air of originality to the show, and goes oh-so-well with the plot, enhancing the storyline quite effusively. And Ron Howard’s witty remarks in between the characters’ dialogues just add an extra dimension to the show. Ron’s voice is seemingly tailor made to narrate this show; it blends so well with the environment and the characters that it is uncanny.

The characters in A.D is the most diversified, unique and flamboyant that I have ever seen. It even beats FRIENDS in this regard, and that is one hell of a compliment.

The progression of the story-line is simply excellent! It is the spine of the show, which most of the comedies these days forsake, and AD does not use SEX as the only humor. The plot starts as George Bluth celebrates his retirement as the President of the Bluth company, a house development firm, but his party has some uninvited guests, the SEC.

They arrest George for mass fraud, embezzlement and illegal accounting practices; these charges are topped by High Treason in later episodes. It was up to Michael, the only sane person in the family, to patch up the cracks his father has created and keep his family from falling apart. So, instead of joining another company with great reputation and salary, he became the President of the Bluth family, only to find out, his greatest obstacle is controlling his own family members!

The characters in A.D is the most diversified, unique and flamboyant that I have ever seen. It even beats FRIENDS in this regard, and that is one hell of a compliment. George Bluth II aka GOB is a self proclaimed ‘magician’ and a self proclaimed womanizer. His magic shows are, erm, I dunno what you call them other than comedy”! “But still, where did the lighter fluid come from, eh?” is his common dialogue after every magic show when he is supposed to shoot fire from his hands, but only shoots out un-lit lighter fluid.

Then comes Michael, the only sane and intellectual person in his family, who keeps on fighting against his own family members from blowing themselves up. His son, George Michael Bluth inherited only one thing from his dad, his outright and genuine desire to maintain work ethics, no matter….and I mean NO MATTER WHAT -_-.

Michael’s youngest brother, Buster, is an affable and unparalleled character. He is THE DEFINITION of MAMA’s boy. After studying cartography (the study of maps), he figures out that all the blue in the maps are land. Enuff said.

Michael’s mother Lucille and sister Lindsay are the ones you’ll hate. They are the paramount of irresponsible, reckless, and have no sense at all. But all of these make them so perfect, and so enjoyable to watch.

Lindsay’s daughter, Maebe, is the rebellious teen who will do exactly the opposite of what her parents tell her to do. Now, her father, Tobias Funke, is definitely the most amusing and weird of them all. He is a man confused about his sexuality, his identity and his passion.

Heck, he is confused about everything! His gaffes are pant wetting funny, and his journey of being an actor from psychiatrist will lighten up your mood, digest your stomach, and might even put you at a great risk of dying from perpetual laughter!

Arrested Development is a whole package, smart, funny as hell, with an excellent plot and characters that are truly unparalleled to any other character out there. They are Hollywood’s one of the rare “smart” productions.

So it was shocking when Fox abscised the show after three wonderful seasons. Critics were outraged by this imbecile decision, as they failed to write up a single negative review of it. You heard it right, A.D did not get a single bad review, even from sadistic hard core critics; they simply adored A.D. In its short four year reign, A.D scooped up two Golden Globe accolades (5 categories in 2004 and 1 category in 2005), and was nominated for ALL categories in 2004 and 2005,it also scooped up 23 other accolades including Art Director’s Guild awards and American Cinema Editors awards. The reason Fox gave for cutting it short was that it even it had critics rating, the viewers didn’t specifically dig it: it didn’t have good viewers rating. Well, that’s only because many Americans are stupid and needs laughing tracks to point them out the funny parts and where they are supposed to laugh. But as A.D doesn’t have laughing tracks as it is a mockumentary, its jokes just fly over the viewers’ heads. These are not my wise words, but of Tim Goodman of San Francisco Chronicle.

Now the good thing is, A.D is not totally screwed over. IT IS RETURNING. Mitchel Hurwitz has decided that Americans are finally smart enough to get Arrested Development’s jokes and is working on a script for Season 5, after five too-long years! But after seeing the American lawmakers legislating SOPA, I’m not so confident with Mitchel’s deduction.

So yeah, what are you waiting for?

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