This is your typical family ensemble-cast sitcom that focuses on three separate families. One is a big white upper-middle-class white family. One is a multiethnic family - the step-father is white, the mother Hispanic, and they take care of one pudgy little boy with an obsession with girls 5 years his senior. Finally, one is a gay couple who've just adopted a little girl from Vietnam.
The series is shot in an Office style: there's a shaky cam which follows the protagonists around, with intermittent "interviews" with them in which they speak directly to the camera.
The problem with the episode (and if it's any indicator, the series) is that everything's been done before. The fifteen-year-old who brings home the senior to watch movies on her bed with her, and the mother who panics about this. The father who tries too hard to be cool in front of his kids. The know-it-all 9-year-old. The older man with a beautiful younger wife. Heck, even the gay jokes have been done before.
The sole redeeming moment in the episode is when the gay couple invites the whole family over to reveal their baby girl, Lily, to them. As one half of the couple tries to assuage everyone's apprehensions about why they've asked them to be there, "The Circle of Life" from The Lion King suddenly erupts and the second half emerges with the baby in his arms, lifting it above his head into a spotlight like Rafiki did to Simba. Seriously laugh-out-loud funny.
The twist - which manifests itself towards the end of the pilot - is that all three of these families are related. This is where I see the most potential for this show - the chemistry between everyone together was much funnier than with them apart.
My suggestion? Watch the commercial. All the funny moments are in there. And then youtube the Lion King moment. In fact, I'll find it for you. Don't bother.
-spire
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