Sunday, September 30, 2012

Black Sheep does TV: MODERN FAMILY Season 3

These days, there are so many options on television for people to choose from, it can be pretty difficult to get people to agree on just one show. There is one show that everyone I know never fails to miss though. It doesn't matter who I speak to - my boss, my mother, heck even my cat loves MODERN FAMILY. And while the fourth season may have just started up again recently on ABC, the third season is now available to purchase from 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment. Did I mention that this season also just took home four Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series and Outstanding Comedy Series itself, an honour MODERN FAMILY has now won each of the three years it has been on the air? Oh, I didn't. Well, it did.

MODERN FAMILY also picked up supporting actor Emmy wins for Julie Bowen and Eric Stonestreet, who play Claire Dunphy and Cameron Tucker, respectively. Both are now two-time winners for playing these parts and both of the episodes they won for are stellar examples of how the show continues to find new ways to showcase its incredibly talented ensemble. In "Go Bullfrogs!", while Phil (Ty Burrell, himself a past winner) shows Haley (Sarah Hyland) around his old campus stomping grounds, Claire takes advantage of an empty house to have a night all to herself, which involves a fair amount of alcohol and hilarity. And in "Treehouse", Cameron makes a bet with his partner, Mitchell (Jesse Tyler Ferguson), that he cannot pass for straight and pick up the hot girl at the bar. Best part about this bet, the hot girl is Leslie Mann. The season finale, "Baby on Board", in which Cameron, Mitchell and Gloria (Sofia Vergara) head to a border town hospital to get a new baby brother for Lily (Aubrey Anderson-Emmons), clearly demonstrates why it won the show it's directing honours (for show co-creator, Steven Levitan), as the whole thing unravels into a Spanish telenovela.


After devouring the first two seasons of MODERN FAMILY, I wondered to myself how this show could remain so fresh despite not really progressing much at all. Not much has really changed for the extended Pritchett/Dunphy family over the years but somehow the show is never dull. After seeing the third season, I think I've finally figured it out. The secret to the show's success can simply be attributed to how this mix of people actually seem like a real, genuine family, one that is growing closer every year and that is supportive to a fault. As the real modern family continues to grow further and further apart, it's very nice to be let into a few homes each week where the original pillars of society are not only still in tact but standing tall and proud. And now you can have that in your home.

Review copy provided by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment.

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