Brothers & Sisters: Discussion Thread

[JackPeyton]

Justin & Rebecca

[Sylph]

[MarkH]

Season premiere was pretty tepid. Cancer, car wreck...it all feels so soapily predictable now. I long for the day when this show was surprising and fresh. Come back, Mr. Baitz!

[JackPeyton]

this show was surprising and fresh? when.

ive watched from the beginning and never felt that. true the first season was fantastic, but it just just perfectly written. not surprising. not fresh. a throwback actually, IMHO. simple.

i liked the season premier. im glad the car wreck wasnt actually a wreck, just a close call. that would have been too much.

im interested to see what this cancer will do to kitty and robert.

i find scotty much less annoying so far this season.

and honestly, i love holly, but they need to scale way back on the holly vs nora acting like they are 12 thing. its annoying and makes them look pathetic.

[DRW50]

I don't think the show was ever that surprising or fresh either. The actors saved the tired cliches, as they do now. The main difference then was the relationships between the siblings were stronger, and there was no dead weight, like Rebecca or Robert or Ryan.

[JackPeyton]

i agree, except i think the dead weight is really rebecca, the writing tho is all off. she would be walking that line between dream girl and bitch.

ryan is gone right? gosh, that was a disaster.

and roberst time has really come, as much as i love RL.

again, Holly needs to go too. and Nora needs... something.

and they really need to reconnect the siblings. they dont all need to be besties, but some combination.

[DRW50]

I think Ryan is coming back at some point. I can't wait

The sibling relationships were always the underrated part of this show. Those early episodes were absolutely carried by some of the great scenes between Kitty/Justin, Sarah/Kevin, Kitty/Kevin, Kevin/Tommy. They plowed through the potentially ridiculous stories and dialogue. I miss that so much. Even when characters share scenes now, like Kitty/Kevin, the spirit is long gone. The only one I think is still there is Sarah/Kevin.

I just miss the way people used to sit and talk.

[JackPeyton]

i really wish they would play up the Kitty/Justin sibling relationship, that was a big draw for me early on.

[CassieFan]

I was so disappointed to hear that Ryan is now in main cast...dumb, dumb, dumb move.

[MarkH]

I share the many complaints...except for Sally Field. When she cried at the end of the episode, I FELT her heartbreak. She made the Kitty story meaningful to me.

I think shooting those various sibling interaction scenes costs a lot of time and money. Hence...less of them occur.

ETA: I'm speculating that at some point Kitty will need a bone marrow transplant. And I am speculating that the only match will be Ryan. And this will endear him to the family.

[YRBB]

I have always admired BROTHERS & SISTERS' ability to make me cry whenever they want me to.

[JackPeyton]

last night's episode was one of my faves ever.

[MarkH]

For me, it was and it wasn't.

I liked that it wasn't so plot-driven. This was an episode to take a break, and develop relationships and reactions.

But all that Gilles Marini eye candy stuff -- while hilarious -- felt a lot like filler. I just couldn't shake the feeling that this episode would never have happened when Jon Robin Baitz was there.

The show was a confection, not a main course. That's fine, but it means I have to wrap my head around the fact that this is not the show I initially fell in love with.

[JackPeyton]

this is exactly why i fell in love with it. it was real, honest, funny, romantic, dramtic, and all about interactions and how everyone deals with everyone and everything else.

i loved the pool scenes. it was great to see the family bonding over eye candy and justin and nora being annoyed.

[DRW50]

The show was in its infancy then, but I do remember a lot of stupid filler. Endless, endless scenes devoted to nothing more than various characters telling us how gorgeous Robert was. Gorgeous, and kind, and above it all, and let's not forget, so handsome. Rob Lowe is very handsome, but at some point it became self-parody.

I think Baitz had some good points, he did a much better job with Justin, Tommy, and Nora than future writers have done. I didn't like his version of Kevin (I dislike the baby-obsessed, Republican-leaning Kevin, but I disliked the self-destructive, mopey, clumsy, only-worthy-if-he-is-saved-by-a-sanctmonious-reverend Kevin more), or Rebecca, or Scotty. I have always had mixed feelings about Kitty no matter who the writer is and with Sarah, I just love Rachel Griffiths tossing off one-liners. She would have been ideal for 30s and 40s comedy.

It's 50/50 for me. I think this is really one of those shows that would have needed TLC to truly maintain strong quality, and as soon they started hiring Rob Lowe and Emily Van Camp and moving away from the show's true assets, that changed.