This show is unwatchable as an adult
-
Tresix — 9 years ago(November 27, 2016 10:14 AM)
The show wasn't aimed at kids. It would be what is now known as "family friendly", meaning that it was designed for the whole family to enjoy. I STILL like it a lot some 52 years later.
Annoying the world since 1960! -
Navaros — 9 years ago(November 27, 2016 10:47 AM)
I am all-for family friendly shows, but I would argue that:
A> The Munsters is
not
always family friendly, as per the adult themes mentioned in the OP.
B> It's quite possible to have a family friendly show that is still highly sophisticated & realistic, and that tells complex stories, and that features psychologically-deep characters. For example, the show Leave it to Beaver has all of those traits. And it was even made before The Munsters, by the same producers who made The Munsters.
Compared to The Munsters, Leave it to Beaver is akin to Masterpiece Theater and The Munsters is akin to the dumbest reality show ever made, like "Flavor of Love."[
http://www.imdb.com/board/10488262/
]
It's like the producers discarded their brains or something before they created The Munsters. I have no idea why they did that. -
Tresix — 9 years ago(November 27, 2016 01:40 PM)
I think you're taking this show
WAY
too seriously. The show has The Frankenstein Monster married to the daughter of Count Dracula with a werewolf son. You might as well call "Die Hard" a true, hard-hitting cop documentary.
Speaking of "Leave It to Beaver", did you know the houses from both series are next to each other on the Universal Studios backlot? They were both used on the show "Desperate Housewives". I took a photo of the Munsters' house.
Annoying the world since 1960! -
Navaros — 9 years ago(November 27, 2016 06:18 PM)
Maybe I am taking it way too seriously, but the problem with the producers
not
taking it seriously is that it becomes unentertaining/unwatchable to adults. Apparently you can stand it somehow, but I can't.
I take the point that maybe part of the problem is that I'm expecting it to be more of a drama than a comedybut even if it is supposed to be 100% comedy and 0% dramathen my counter-argument is that that the comedy still could have had a tone that was appropriate for people beyond the age of eight. The jokes just aren't funny 99% of the time.
I.e. the other week I was watching an episode where Grandpa says, "I used to fly around the Old Country until I got rheumatoid in my wings." In another episode, the joke is, "Remember when Grandpa invented athlete's foot?"
Those types of unfunny lines are heavily saturated throughout every episode. Rarely does the show ever present anything that is actually funny. So it fails as a drama. And it fails as a straight-up comedy too.
No, I didn't know those things about the Houses. Thanks for sharing. That must be a cool photo that you have. -
hack-stone — 9 years ago(February 08, 2017 04:15 AM)
Didn't they burn down during that fire at Universal Studios back in 1991 (give or take a year)? They were Alain the same street as the town hall in Back To The Future, which was also the main building of Faber College in Animal House.
-
Navaros — 9 years ago(November 27, 2016 06:07 PM)
The whole show seemed like something better was struggling to get out, just below the tepid surface.
I kind of see what you mean. Like the scene where Grandpa finds out that the other guys are rigging Herman's wrestling match or something.Grandpa gets really angry and says something like: "You want to play games, I'll show you games!"
that would have been the perfect opportunity for Grandpa to unleash some epic Dracula-style carnagebut instead all he does is recite some preschool-style nursery rhyme magic words and make the lights go out for a second and them come back on with Herman winning. What a letdown! -
Navaros — 9 years ago(November 28, 2016 08:45 AM)
Well, that speaks to another fundamental problem with the show. They are supposed to be monsters, yet they
never
do anything monster-like.
They might as well not even be monsters at all, since their monsterness is almost 100% irrelevant to the show. The only
very slight
relevance that their monsterness has is that they make unfunny joke comments about being old and undead and things like that. -
jmarkoff2 — 9 years ago(November 28, 2016 10:44 AM)
My main problem with the show is that the conflict of each episode revolves around everyone being stupid. If the characters had a lick of sense, the plot would be short circuited. It would have been better to have the Munsters be smart and overcome a true conundrum. The stupidity of the characters suggests to me that the writers were extremely lazy.
The fantasy angle isn't much fun either, for the simple reason that it violates itself as discussed in an earlier thread:
http://www.imdb.com/board/10057773/board/thread/252899600 -
Tresix — 9 years ago(November 28, 2016 04:01 PM)
That was the joke: that the family were monsters, but they were actually kind and gentle people. They couldn't figure out why people were afraid of them. Also, as far as they were concerned, everyone else in the world were the scary ones. Remember, they think Marilyn is the "disfigured" one!
Plus, Herman was never supposed to be the brightest bulb in the marquee. Lewis and Gwynne were quite a comedy team (although I wasn't a big fan of "Car 54, Where Are You?").
Annoying the world since 1960! -
jmarkoff2 — 9 years ago(November 29, 2016 11:35 AM)
The idea that normal people are scary to the Munsters would have been neat, but wasn't followed through. Whenever Grandpa's magic conjures up an ideal beauty, it's something that looks like Marilyn. And Herman and Grandpa always talk about ideal men like Frank Sinatra or Rock Hudson which also violates the consistency.
-
audierules — 9 years ago(January 14, 2017 09:01 AM)
I recently started to watch the show for the first time since I was a kid and I disagree 100% with you. I even find the show to be way funnier in my adult years. Great cast including both Marilyn's , insane scripts, super supporting cast that did a great job being scared , fantastic sets, a lot of fun.