“Extended Family”: Season 1 (2023) starring Jon Cryer / Z-View

Posted on by

Extended Family: Season 1 (2023)

Created by:  Mike O’Malley

Directors:  James Widdoes (eps. 1, 3); Ali LeRoi (eps. 2)

Screenplay: Mike O’Malley (ep. 1); Jim Vallely  (ep. 2); Ajay Sahgal (ep. 3)

Stars: Jon Cryer, Donald Faison, Abigail Spencer, Sofia Capanna, Finn Sweeney and Lenny Clarke.

Tagline:  Marriages End. Families Don’t.

The Plot…

Jim (Cryer) and Julia (Spencer) are divorced.  Rather than have the kids move back and forth between parents, the parents have decided the children will stay in the same house and they parents will move in during their periods of custody.  Matters are complicated when Julia gets engaged to Trey Taylor, the super rich owner of the Boston Celtics.

Let the hijinks begin.

Thoughts (beware of spoilers)…

I tuned in because of Jon Cryer.  I stuck around because it sometimes takes a show an episode or two to get going.

Episode One was bad.  One of the kids’ goldfish dies.  There’s a lot of drama about how to best approach this. They ultimately get a new goldfish to spare the child’s feelings. Turns out the kid doesn’t get upset over the fish’s death.  She’s upset over the divorce.  The parents apologize to her and everyone goes to a Celtics game.

Episode Two was bad.  Julia invites her fiance, Trey to spend the night while she is watching the kids.  Jim is upset because according to the “divorce constitution” that they wrote, he should have been consulted.  They argue. Jim ultimately agrees to Trey staying over.  Then Trey can’t sleep on the mattress that used to be shared by Julia and Jim.  So he buys a new mattress.  Constitutional crisis!  Then they settle that and painting the bedroom becomes an issue.  You guessed it.  Constitutional crisis.

More like series crisis, says I.  I’ll try one more episode.

Episode 3 was bad.  Jim has had the kids for a week on his own.  When Julia returns, Jim heads home.  She learns the daughter doesn’t like math and earned a C- on her test.  Her son is hooked on a violent video game.  She thinks that her kids are going to be failures.  She tries some things that don’t work.  She calls Jim back and he doesn’t see the problem.  Trey gets involved.  The kids end up concerned that there will be no future because of climate change.

Strike three.  I’m out.  Your mileage may vary but Extended Family is not for me.

Extended Family: Season 1 (2023) earns 1 of 5 stars.