Tweet
Released by: Shout! Factory
Released on: January 8, 2013.
Director: Mike Judge
Cast: Mike Judge, Nancy Carrell, Linda Cardellini, David Herman, Brian Doyle-Murray
Year: 2009
Purchase From Amazon
The Series:
Almost the complete opposite of Mike Judge's excellent King Of The Hill, at least thematically speaking, the short lived The Good Family lasted only thirteen episodes when it debuted on ABC on May 27th, 2009. Where Hank Hill and his crew were concerned with things like propane, football and traditional American values, The Goode Family lives by the credo 'WWAGD?,' or, 'What would Al Gore do?'
Citizens of an unnamed city, the Goode's take liberal ideas to a ridiculous extreme. The family is made up of father Gerald (Mike Judge), a college administrator; mother Helen (Nancy Carrell), an activist; daughter Bliss (Linda Cardellini), who more or less tends to disagree with everything that her parents are doing; and adopted son Ubuntu (David Herman), a white kid from South Africa who sees himself as 'African American' despite the fact that he's as white as snow. They also own a dog, Che, who they raise as a vegetarian but who, unbeknownst to his owners, loves to eat squirrels and cats. Helen's father, Charlie (Brian Doyle-Murray) shows up often enough to make trouble for the family while snobby rival in all things liberal, green and open mindedness - Margo (Julia Sweeny) proves a constant thorn in the family's side.
The show was cancelled in its infancy due to low ratings and it's actually fairly easy to see why, because the first few episodes of the show are… week. The jokes aren't funny, the characters are kind of stupid and irritating which makes them hard to feel for and the funniest bits tended to revolve around the dog eating various things. With that said, once the first couple of episodes stumble out of the gate, the writing team finds its footing and things improve considerably leading you to wonder if, had the show been given more time, if it would have proven itself to have legs as long as Judge's other, better known and better received animated series'.
Anyone who has tried to abide by liberal values and green ideals knows that it can be a challenge and that for every well meaning person who is out there going at life this way there are just as many others doing it because it's either seen as trendy or as something that will get them in someone else's good books. The series gives us both sides of that - the Goode's really do try to do the right thing. They're environmentally conscious to a fault and care not only about the world around them but about the people who populate it as well. Charlie is a salty old guy who shows up in an SUV and who uses as much gas as he wants but despite the conflict that does occur in each episode, Gerald and Helen have their hearts in the right place.
This contrasts nicely with the character of Margo, the soccer mom type with lots of disposable income who never fails to show up at the local 'Whole Foods' style supermarket to embarrass Helen or one up her in her own efforts to save the world.
Things never seem to go right for Helen and Gerald. When Helen decides she wants to get closer to Bliss and, in an attempt to be as cool a mom as Margo, takes her to investigate contraception options Bliss winds up joining a chastity group. When Ubuntu proves to have a knack for football Gerald tries to be supportive and winds up almost getting in a knife fight with the coach (Bob Odenkirk). Helen's attempts to help out an Asian refugee wind up making the poor woman named Kiki look like their servant during a garden judging contest while her efforts to help place pets in loving homes backfires when her dad adopts the most obnoxious animal you've ever seen. Even their attempts to bond with Ray (Gary Anthony Williams), the black guy who lives next door, just wind up making the Goodes look foolish.
It takes a few episodes for the qualities that made King Of The Hill great to surface here. Not that the show doesn't step out on its own but the sense of family and closeness that made King Of The Hill such a joy to watch isn't as evident early on in this series. It does get there though, and once it does, the jokes seem to matter more and turn out to be more enjoyable simply because we've grown to like the characters more. Evidently it didn't get there fast enough, as it was cancelled and when briefly syndicated on Comedy Central a year later, was gone again after only four weeks.
The show is animated in much the same way that Judge's other shows were so that lanky, sort of loose 'sketch' style will look familiar to a lot of people. Judge's voice work for Gerald will also probably sound similar to those who remember Hank Hill, though Gerald has a much softer tone. The rest of the cast are also fun, with Doyle-Murray's sometimes stealing the show as the grouchy dad who just wants to enjoy life without having to worry about things like being a good parent to his daughter or helping the environment. The show is very often dead on in its skewering of the more ridiculous side of liberal culture - there are good ideas here, it's just a shame that it took Judge and company a little longer than the public was seemingly willing to wait for them to nail the characters properly.
Video/Audio/Extras:
The episodes in the set are spread over two discs and look good presented here in 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen. The lines in the animation stay stable and clean and the color reproduction is handled beautifully. There are no problems with compression artifacts and fans should be pretty pleased with the video quality as a whole.
The English language Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound mixes that accompany each episode are of nice quality. Dialogue is always easy to hear and the rears are used well for the score and occasional sound effects. Optional English closed captioning is also included.
As far as the extras go, there are commentary tracks from executive producers John Altschuler and Dave Krinksy on the pilot episode as well as on Goodes Gone Wild and A Tale Of Two Lesbians and A Goode Game Of Chicken. These tracks are decent, they offer up some insight into who did what on each episode and what worked and what didn't and they move at a decent enough pace. Outside of that we get a bunch of deleted scenes and some scripts for the episodes that were written but never finished or broadcast (Goode For The Gander, Lotto Trouble and Project Bliss). There's also a four minute clip here called Meet The Goode Family that includes some quick sound bits from the voice actors who play the main characters in the series. Menus and chapter selection are also included. The flip side of the cover art includes episodes listings and synopsis/credit information.
The Final Word:
The Goode Family isn't the series that Mike Judge is going to be remembered for but once you get through the first couple of episodes it becomes obvious that the series, had it been given more time to grow, could have and should have gone on to bigger and better things. Shout! Factory's complete series DVD release is a good one offering up every episode in very nice quality and with some good extra features as well.
