I first viewed Married...with Children as a child in watching the hilarious and popular Christmas Episode with Sam Kinison as Al's "benevolent" guardian angel who showed him how much better life would be for his selfish and ungrateful family without him. Even with my murky memory of the scene with his character screaming after being kicked out of Heaven, I was nonetheless hooked.
As the 90s went on, I grew the like the show even more, not just because of the chemistry between the talented cast members (particularly Ed O'Neill and Katey Sagal, Christina Applegate and Amanda Bearse and both of her onscreen husbands David Garrison and Ted McGinley) and several celebrity guests that fit into the storylines but the increasingly outlandish plots drew in my attention (their original family dog, Buck, becomes reincarnated as a new dog, Lucky, and was able to be voiced by three different men, Cheech Marin, Kevin Curran and Kim Weiskopf, the Bundys and the D'Arcys ended up stranded in a lifeboat with Gilbert Gottfried, Al almost commits bigamy just to get back at Jefferson over an April Fool's joke, Robert Englund, Freddy Krueger himself, played the Devil in a 3-D episode, the list goes on).
Once I got to college, I truly was able to appreciate what a clever, well-written and genuinely funny show it was, as well as learn and love the show how it was in the 80s, when I was too young to know of at the time ("Al and Peg weren't nearly as hostile towards each other?", "Kelly had white hair?", "Marcy was married to a Straight Man named Steve Rhoades?", "There was anotherChristmas Episode that came with a Content Warning?", "There was a Banned Episode?!", etc.) I can see why the series survived a good solid decade.
I understand that a lot of the subject matter, then and now, isn't appropriate for all audiences and even some of it even makes me uneasy, but that makes it the perfect, edgy fit for the then-fledgling Fox Network, who were really good sports to put up with the show's constant teasing. Heck, the show's even older than many of its contemporaries (and fellow beloved shows of mine) The Simpsons, In Living Color, Get a Life and Martin. I can stlll get plenty of laughs from reruns and the home releases and I personally hope they don't try to remake it; "lightning in a bottle" and all that. If you like your comedy lowbrow, physical but also slick and unrelenting, MWC is your best bet.
Series Pretty edgy, very funny
I first viewed Married...with Children as a child in watching the hilarious and popular Christmas Episode with Sam Kinison as Al's "benevolent" guardian angel who showed him how much better life would be for his selfish and ungrateful family without him. Even with my murky memory of the scene with his character screaming after being kicked out of Heaven, I was nonetheless hooked.
As the 90s went on, I grew the like the show even more, not just because of the chemistry between the talented cast members (particularly Ed O'Neill and Katey Sagal, Christina Applegate and Amanda Bearse and both of her onscreen husbands David Garrison and Ted McGinley) and several celebrity guests that fit into the storylines but the increasingly outlandish plots drew in my attention (their original family dog, Buck, becomes reincarnated as a new dog, Lucky, and was able to be voiced by three different men, Cheech Marin, Kevin Curran and Kim Weiskopf, the Bundys and the D'Arcys ended up stranded in a lifeboat with Gilbert Gottfried, Al almost commits bigamy just to get back at Jefferson over an April Fool's joke, Robert Englund, Freddy Krueger himself, played the Devil in a 3-D episode, the list goes on).
Once I got to college, I truly was able to appreciate what a clever, well-written and genuinely funny show it was, as well as learn and love the show how it was in the 80s, when I was too young to know of at the time ("Al and Peg weren't nearly as hostile towards each other?", "Kelly had white hair?", "Marcy was married to a Straight Man named Steve Rhoades?", "There was another Christmas Episode that came with a Content Warning?", "There was a Banned Episode?!", etc.) I can see why the series survived a good solid decade.
I understand that a lot of the subject matter, then and now, isn't appropriate for all audiences and even some of it even makes me uneasy, but that makes it the perfect, edgy fit for the then-fledgling Fox Network, who were really good sports to put up with the show's constant teasing. Heck, the show's even older than many of its contemporaries (and fellow beloved shows of mine) The Simpsons, In Living Color, Get a Life and Martin. I can stlll get plenty of laughs from reruns and the home releases and I personally hope they don't try to remake it; "lightning in a bottle" and all that. If you like your comedy lowbrow, physical but also slick and unrelenting, MWC is your best bet.