"The Family": Not Worth the Watch

By Maggie Borgen

Warning: This article contains many spoilers
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ABC’s new show, The Family, premiered in early March 2016, and I confess I didn’t watch it when it aired, but instead waited to watch it recently on demand. The show follows the story of a family whose son/brother, Adam, was kidnapped at the age of nine, and then returned ten years later. It looked interesting at first, but I was scared off by the idea of kidnapping. I mustered up the courage to finally watch the pilot, and I can say it is not worth the watch. The show is filmed well and the plot is intense, but I found it depressing and hard to watch -- not something I’d like to watch on a Sunday evening when it first airs. I found the characters to be unlikable, especially the mother, played by Joan Allen, who seems to care more about campaigning for a higher government office than for her family (even though the show is named after the idea of family). And her husband is no better. It seems he has been having affairs during this ordeal. Their older son (the one who was not kidnapped) is a drunk who sleeps with women all the time. The only character I felt connected to in the least bit was their daughter, who is emotional, shady, and always picks her mother’s side in family disagreements. She was very attached to the crime of her missing brother, which made her seem humane.

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