Pensamientos Acerca de Televisión

Suburgatory: "Pilot"

My favorite first cousin had this show listed on Facebook as being one of her favorite shows so I am reluctant to say anything really bad about it. Then again we are talking about a TV show set in the suburbs which pretends that the only Hispanics to be found out there are maids so I feel equally reluctant to pretend that there is nothing wrong with this series --especially the way it pretends that Hispanics like my cousin don't exist.

Then again my first cousin spent most of her teenage years in the suburbs so I feel weird second-guessing her. After all, when I was growing up, I identified more with the Ritchie Cunningham character on Happy Days than with Mexican-American characters like the Freddie Prinze character in Chico and the Man. It was not that I did not want to identify with any Latino characters on television; it was just that most of the characters I saw there had little in common with the ones I saw in real life. And here in 2015, I still see few Latino characters on television that I can identify with.

Fortunately, I grew up with enough admirable Latin relatives that I don't really feel like I missed out on much but it is amusing to see how little progress we have made -- apart from rare exceptions like American Family and Ugly Betty. And I never would have guessed that I would have been waxing so nostalgic for those shows this soon.

Oh, well. There are worse problems in the world to worry about.

On a more mainstream note, I guess I should be glad to see Jeremy Sisto playing a more normal role than the one he played on Six Feet Under. But -- yawn! -- it is not like this show is exactly exploring new ground. And please don't get me started on actress Cheryl Hines's broad Texas accent. I know her character's name is Dallas but seriously?

Eyes and Dolls

Her name is May.

She has a doll.

She also has a lazy eye.

Her perfectionist mother thought she would be very unpopular because of her lazy eye so she covered it with an eye patch.

But the eye patch made May even more unpopular.

So her mother gave her a doll named Suzy.

Suzy looks like May.

But unlike May, Suzy is trapped in a glass box and never gets taken out.

May never gets taken out either but she at least is not in a glass box.

But she sometimes feels as if she was in one.

May has a friend named Polly.

Polly calls her “doll.”

Polly doesn’t call her “doll” because May reminds her of Suzy. After all, Polly had never seen Suzy.

Polly calls her “doll“ because she’s the type of person who likes to call people “doll.”

They both work for an animal doctor who can‘t speak English very well. Polly can‘t understand him but May understands him just fine.

The person whom May can’t understand is Adam.

Adam is this guy May likes.

She wants him to ask her out but she is awkward in the ways of love.

Adam calls her weird but it’s okay with May because he likes weird.

At least, for a little while.

But after a long while, Adam gets tired of weird and decides to quit May for a more conventional girl friend.

Meanwhile, Polly is coming on to May, teasing her with the fact that she is a lesbian.

Polly is a lesbian, that is, not May.

Though May looks very longingly at Polly’s neck for a so-called straight girl.

May makes her own clothing so she is very good at sewing.

She is not so good at relating to people.

She doesn’t make friends very easily and the only person she talks to on a regular basis who really seems to get her is Suzy.

But Suzy can’t talk back.

And Suzy may have been an okay friend when May was a child but now May is grown up. And a grown up woman can only be content with dolls for so long.

Even if she herself is a “doll.”

May is trying like hell to break out of her own glass box.

But she can’t quite make it out.

And no one around her seems to be helping her.

So one day she decides to help herself.

And, of course, the rest of her story is about what happens on that day.

And about why one should be especially nice to girls like May.

And careful.

Even if they don't have a movie named after them.