Where have the good family sitcoms gone?

[Hawkee]

In the TV world I have noticed that there isn't any good family oriented sitcoms being made any more and I would like to know why this reason is? Is it because families do not have any interest in watching TV together anymore or is it because sitcoms today are more geared to adults than families? Because ever since more sitcoms have been made today it has been hard to find a sitcom that appeals to families and now when you look at sitcoms that are supposed to be aimed at families they are always have storylines that seem to be very sad like death and always have one of the characters have a serious illness and when I have noticed this about sitcoms I think that it's really odd that family sitcoms always have storylines like this and I think family sitcoms should have happy and fun storylines that would make it more fun to watch. Another thing I've noticed about family sitcoms is that when you look at the actors and actresses that play TV parents you will not find another Alan Thicke or another Florence Henderson or even another Bob Saget in character personalities of actors and actresses that act on family oriented sitcoms today. While I think sitcoms that appeal to adults are still popular today it would sure be nice to see family sitcoms make a comeback to TV because families always enjoy a good family sitcom to watch after dinnertime before the kids do their schoolwork and family sitcoms will be more fun to watch and have great and fun storylines that appeal to families everywhere
Have family oriented sitcoms disappeared from TV?
Bestie

[OH Nuts!]

Certainly not to current fare. Most is just sensationalistic caca. So where did they go? To oldie DVDs and kick-as* nostalgic channels like Antenna.

[Retro4Life]

Despite all the social media hype (pictures of family vacations, parties, etc.) most families today don't spend nearly as much time together as they used to. Due to non-stop school activities, parents working two or more jobs (and commuting further than ever), "family time" is way down.

Add to that the fact that everybody has their own TV or device to watch shows now, and you get a very fractured audience. So programming is VERY targeted; you get stuff "for the old people", and "stuff for the young people" and all sorts of categories in between.

The kinds of shows most of us grew up on had a very broad appeal. Kids could watch shows for their entertainment value and the parents would get some of the inside jokes. Or...there would be shows about real issues that all family members enjoyed.

That's all gone now. And sadly, I doubt if it's ever coming back.

[LUNCH]

Originally Posted by Alan Brady's Hair

I think that people used to watch TV to be entertained, but now they watch it so that they can tell other people about it and appear to be part of the group of the cool kids. Writers throw all kinds of nasty stuff at the wall because it gives people points they can talk about as daring or groundbreaking.

It's ironic in a way because modern TV also known as the worst TV ever made(my opinion) is the opposite of cool.

[MrCleveland]

Originally Posted by Retro4Life

Despite all the social media hype (pictures of family vacations, parties, etc.) most families today don't spend nearly as much time together as they used to. Due to non-stop school activities, parents working two or more jobs (and commuting further than ever), "family time" is way down.

Add to that the fact that everybody has their own TV or device to watch shows now, and you get a very fractured audience. So programming is VERY targeted; you get stuff "for the old people", and "stuff for the young people" and all sorts of categories in between.

The kinds of shows most of us grew up on had a very broad appeal. Kids could watch shows for their entertainment value and the parents would get some of the inside jokes. Or...there would be shows about real issues that all family members enjoyed.

That's all gone now. And sadly, I doubt if it's ever coming back.

Looks like it...there rarely is family time...If I ever do have a family (I doubt that'll happen), I will have family time. I would have my children do homework on a school night and probably tutor them...I may home-school them and give them extracurricular activities in the afternoon. But I would have that...and yes...with all the options and stuff today, there can be no more shows like Family Ties, The Facts of Life, or the TGIF line-up. Televisions are cheap and almost everyone has their own or they watch it on their tablets or phones.

I do feel that "Family Time is now only remembered in history, since it's Gone with the Wind"!

[principehomura]

Also a reflex of the society we live in.
I opened a similar thread in my first time on the forum: it's been 7 years since then, and things only got worse.

http://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/...d.php?t=276353

[icecream]

Unfortunately the majority of sitcoms today have crude sexual humor. There are a few exceptions though. I would recommend The Middle, it is generally family friendly. Last Man Standing is also family oriented, although it is not nearly as good as Home Improvement.

[Babalu]

Originally Posted by Alan Brady's Hair

I think that people used to watch TV to be entertained, but now they watch it so that they can tell other people about it and appear to be part of the group of the cool kids. Writers throw all kinds of nasty stuff at the wall because it gives people points they can talk about as daring or groundbreaking.

As I'm reading this I'm thinking that's the same reason young people today get these garish tattoos.

[Mr. Television]

They've gone with the wind. That's one of the reasons I don't watch as many current shows. You have to like the people that you watch and for the most part I wouldn't want to spend time with these people.

[um]

A lot of people think that "family TV " of decades ago consisted of overly-saccharine, dull , uninteresting, un-realistic and "old fashioned" plots, and characters.
Of course when "Father Knows Best" and "Leave It To Beaver" were what families watched together (which I think is overstated), TV was not as "daring" as it got in the 1970s with All In The Family and "Maude" and certain other TV shows. So naturally, "family TV" in the pre-1970s presented in-tact suburban-living, generally traditional families with the father as the breadwinner and the mother as the home-keeper and the children went to good schools even though they occasionally played hooky and got in trouble with bullies etc.
Of course TV progressively became what it is today. There is indeed little or no "Family TV" as you describe (and I actually don't currently watch TV to really know by observing such a thing). Probably because most people, whether or not they had watched TV in the pre-1970s, would find it a throw-back to a time in which only one side of the family unit was presented on TV.
It would be odd to depict a father and mother who are married to each other who have children who were born in wedlock and aside from entertaining adventures and mishaps like what happened in The Brady Bunch, there are no severe domestic problems such as kids being into drugs, dropping out of school due to pregnancy, or joining a street gang, etc.

I myself lived through the 60s and 70s but did not have the family life of the Anderson's in "Father Knows Best" and I observed that other people in my neighborhood did not have such idealistic domestic lives and did not sit around the TV together for a "sense of family closeness."
I know that there was once a time in America when the ideal and often-referenced population was suburban middle-class families, so there was little representation on TV of fatherless children, husband-less mothers, etc. Of course "The Rifleman" was about a single dad in the days of the "Wild West" and there was also "The Farmer's Daughter" which depicted a single man with children, yet all that was not about diversity.

However, I myself think that some "older TV" that I grew up with was overrated as "the golden age of TV" but I still think that today's TV just confirms that TV shows as an entity all its own is something that has nowhere to go. It is as if TV has Jumped The Shark and cannot be what it used to be.

[tlc38tlc38]

^Very well said. Especially that last sentence.