As a small correction, the photo at 1:27:20 appears to be Bill Bixby, and not Mort Lachman. It was an error on the IMDB page I unfortunately replicated. Apologies for the mistake!
Rosalynn Carter's name is pronounced like Rosa Lynn rather than closer to Rosalind minus the D (like the flower, Rose, not Roz). Just in case it comes up again.
I wondered about that. Being 57 years old, older than Archie at the inception of the show, I'm well aware of The Courtship of Eddie's Father, My Favorite Martian, The Incredible Hulk, and The Magician.
i know basically nothing about all in the family, but only 40 minutes into this video and i'm already just blown away by how sociopolitical discourse has practically not changed at all from the things they had in that show. the more things change, the more they stay the same, literally
@@ADragon-gi9mrthings are pretty much the same, except we have twice as many people in the world. The problems are the same, but everything is exaggerated - same 50/50 divide, same oligarchies and greed, same existential threats, same wars, same drugs, same exploitation - but just more of it and to a greater degree. So serial killers are school shooters now. Wars use drones. Smoking weed is chewing gummies, heroin is fentanyl. Nuclear winters are climate change. We have the same abortion issues, and the ERA still hasn't passed. COVID doesn't come close to AIDS but it explains why older medical folks like Fauci were so freaked out about another global pandemic. We still don't have universal healthcare or daycare. AM talk radio is Fox News. Diesel is EV's. Phone booths and pagers are cell phones. And the rich keep getting richer,and the poor, poorer.
I loved this show so much growing up. The most chilling episode is definitely when Edith is almost sexually assaulted at her own birthday party, nobody was expecting a usually lighthearted sitcom to get dark quickly.
This is a perfect example of why I want to just pull my hair out when people complain about new shows “being woke” “catering to young audiences” or how TV used to be so much better, and would probably consider this show amazing but hating on new shows that do the same things. It just blows my mind how generations go from caring about change and progress to maintaining status quo and being averse to progress.
Too simplistic. One major huge creative divide between the two eras is the Norman Lear shows were written by the greatest television writers ever. The material and complexity of the shows still hold up. The cost cutting, union breaking, profit hoarding total control dictatorship of all the major studios decided to cut out all the established or unique new voice writers in Hollywood who pushed back with their own imaginative ideas, higher salaries and with their own ideologies that clash with the inhouse politics. So they colluded, pushed the talented legit great writers and literally hired people who had no credits, no resume, no talent, no interest in the things they were hired to write on, but were cheap, shared the corporate social justice agenda and would bend at the knee without question. That's why all the massive quality drop off the last five years all at once. Everything was produced and created and completed by people who really didn't know what they were doing who just wanted to push their personal politics and it has led to a era of across the board product that follow the same plot structure without any depth or nuance, redundant story beats and episodes of entire series that don't so much seem like characters or situations, but political essays preaching their particular doctrine of truth and not actual stories. The studios then cover this by taking the offensive and saying it's a racist, sexist, out of touch audience that is to blame. No. It's something much more simple and timeless. Good old fashioned corporate greed.
@@pablosonic892 I won't argue against any of that. But I'm speaking more to the discourse surrounding shows. Too often the message is blamed rather than how the message is being delivered, to the point now that many people default to the message itself being "bad writing" rather than being able to separate the message and the delivery. It leads to the discrediting of anything and everything that has certain messages and the delivery is entirely ignored. You then have individuals with their own political agendas basically using that as fodder to try and discount the messages themselves, sometimes even going so far as to obfuscate their points by saying things like "The message would be fine if it were delivered better, but it's too 'in your face'" which on the surface sounds like legitimate criticism but is often used as a means of pushing their own political agendas whilst trying to avoid any political pushback themselves.
In my opinion, this "young progressive - older conservative" mindset is totally normal. At some point, people just grow older and cannot be part of what's new, so they lose touch with the problems contemporary society places on the young. As one gets older, they usually also become attached to the things they are accustomed to. In a healthy situation, they could still talk and negotiate on issues and at least try to intellectually see the point of view of others, even if they cannot *feel* the other's perspective as true. Progressives and conservatives shouldn't even be mortal enemies to each other, as they serve as checks and balances to each other. Or at least they should act like that. Sadly, these positions have been made into political positions, which is kind of stupid, since rarely can anybody be one or the other all their lives or be that way in all matters.
It's really amazing the career Jose has had as a background actor in so many of these shows. He's a real character actor; I can't recognize him at all between parts.
Edith Bunker easily was my favorite character, she had such an impact on so many millions of people over so many decades I'm sure I'm not the only one who occasionally hears Edith bunkers voice and her kind words in our minds and hearts.
I love this show so much, it is shocking how well it's held up and how modern it still feels. Also Carroll O Connor and Jean Stapleton were like two of the greatest actors in television
Honestly, I went back and watched a good chunk of Maude a while back and it feels the same way, with a bit more focus on skewering a particular kind of middle class white liberal (Maude will come off in the right far more often than Archie will, but there's still episodes with, say, her refusing to call out a gay author for being a classist, snobby jerk because she wants to be seen as progressive for having a gay friend) while still mocking more bigoted or conservative views at the same time.
Jean Stapleton's performance in the Birthday episode is so good, they honestly should've just stopped handing out Emmys in that category for as long as the series was on the air because every performance since then couldn't even begin to come close to what she did in those two episodes.
The Edith Bunker rape story line was originally meant for Bonnie Franklin on One Day At A Time and Norman changed it because he felt the audience would not stand for someone hurting Edith.
I was never a big sitcom person, but my grandmother gave us a dozen All in the Family VHS tapes that had 4 episodes each. It was the late 90s and I was only like 9-12 years old, but I watched them and loved them. Mike Stivic was my first encounter with an open atheist in media, and I remember going from thinking the idea was bizarre when I first started watching the show to becoming comfortable enough with it to actually deconvert myself a few years later.
You're one of the few leftist media channels (as in analyzing media from a leftist perspective; not necesarily media analysts who have leftist views in their personal life) I still watch regularly. There's this black-and-white, holier-than-thou, over-emotional, angry kindergarten teacher attitude a lot of people who analyze things from that perspective on RU-vid have. Which is a shame, because leftism is IMO an insightful framework from which to look at media made in liberal and capitalist societies. Your reviews are always thoughtful, nuanced, and sane. Also I'm a janitor so the long-form essay model gives me something to listen to while I mop, which may be your greatest contribution to the working class. Thank you for that.
My parents let me watch AITF as a kid and it was my introduction to racism and bigotry and how flawed these ideologies are. As far as its impact, I can say that it helped at least one person, me. Excellent retrospective, Mr. Jose, please keep up the fantastic work.
This is THE show I wanted you to talk about because it’s so nuanced. Im gonna out an evening aside for this video. So happy you got to this show! Love you’re stuff!❤️
"The Draft Dodger" is by far one of All in the Family's finest half hours and of tv in general. It stands the test of time even though The Vietnam war has been over for 50 yrs. An updated version of this episode could air today with the Afghanistan war of the early 00's and the current Israeli/Palestine war of today.
The amount of shows directly spun off from, or indirectly inspired by this show (Family Guy's intro, Cartman on South Park, etc.) is insane. This show is a shatterpoint for all of late 20th century TV.
Archie reminds me quite a lot of my dad - who I haven't seen in years. I think it's his expressions in the serious moments. He suppresses himself in the exact same way. I don't know what he's doing but he's capturing something real.
I literally said "oh, hell yeah" out loud just now from seeing this show up. I've never seen the show, mind, no specific interest in it, but a new José video? Always a good time.
Will Jose do a Soap episode in the future? Will RU-vid’s algorithm only recommend it to people who watch personal hygiene videos? Will anyone under 45 even know what the hell he’s talking about? Tune in next time to find out!
Great job! This is the best retrospective on All in the Family I've seen. I am happy something like this exists to expose and educate young people on what was going on in media/the culture back before they were even born. If you are unaware of history you're doomed to repeat it.
I’ve been dying for you to cover this show! Of course, not every little detail has aged perfectly, but it’s remarkably progressive for the time. It’s also just a good show. It’s my “The Office” or Futurama. Always on in the background.
Amazing video, and considering how foundational this series was to sitcoms as a whole, I have to say that you've done a phenomenal job of bringing to life this wonderful story. Thank you for your hard work!
I grew up watching this show on Nick at Nite/TV Land and watched it with my grandparents after dinner every night when I was in high school. It's truly the foundational American sitcom and I'm so glad you're finally covering it. This is for sure going to be a favorite episode/cozy can't sleep at night episode of your channel for me.
I love when millennials and gen z say how much they hate stereotypes ... except when it comes to older people. They also hate all the -isms and -phobias, except for ageism. This is why no one wants to listen to you.
my boomer father looked at the whole show this way, “hollywood had the archie character play the bigot to make fun of that section of society, but that section was bigger than they thought and the section liked archie. then hollywood switched gears and leaned in, showing that the ‘hollyweirdos’ tried to push their agenda but real americans pushed back”. id say that proves your point.
Actually, I think this was a racist show. So, I don’t think these “boomers” are missing the point. Also, a gif of the character only represents the character and not the entire show.
This show is great, Used to watch it on youtube for lunch everyday for a while. Even started working on Edith's family tree and thinking to re-watch. So excited for this retrospective.
The subject of "what do you do when you are the subject of family prejudice", interestingly enough, gets explored in what'd turn out to be Lear's last show, the 2017 version of 'One Day at a Time', through the lens of queerness. (It's also, iirc, a not-insignificant part of 'The Jeffersons', through the lens of interracial marriage.) Anyway, this was very thorough and thoughtful and I'd love to see you explore more of the Lear corpus.
ODAAT did a fantastic job with that arc, from the abuela processing it over the course of one fantastically funny scene, to the mother both being worried about her daughter being the target of homophobia and being awkward and stereotyping when trying to be supportive (the scene with her shoehorning in articles from Autostraddle into conversation is pitch perfect cringe comedy, IMO) to the heartbreaking stuff with the dad.
Honestly, All In The Family, Mary Tyler Moore and MASH are all critical to the evolution of the sitcom in the US (hell, the West in general) in different ways. AITF created the topical home-based comedy that eventually got sanded down into the Very Special Episode likes of Family Ties and the like (a change you can see with Archie Bunker's Place already), MTM essentially created the modern workplace hangout comedy - no MTM, no Brooklyn 99 or Parks & Rec - and MASH pioneered the single camera dramedy, especially in markets where there was no laugh track (here in the UK it aired with no laugh track at all)
Wow, what an accomplishment this video is! I can't imagine how many hours went into editing the thousands of hours of this show into something so easy and informative to watch. Bravo! Also, the scenes of Edith in distress are already difficult to watch due to the subject matter but even harder because she looks and acts (though does not sound) like my Mum. I love her.
Edith is basically my grandmother if Edith was Irish Catholic. Some of the same mannerisms & tragedies, & the same appeasing nature, but also this ferociously loving heart. I've been thinking a lot lately about how my grandmothers never forgot my childhood dreams & never stopped taking those interests seriously. I love & miss them so much.
Absolutely beautiful. I enjoyed this while having a few beers. I was born in 1988. My grandmother and mother watched it and I did as a kid. Appreciated it more as an adult obviously after watching all the episodes of All In The Family & Archie Bunker's Place. I miss and love them both and thank them for introducing me to this show as it did have a positive impact on my life.
As gen X/Millenial who grew up with baby boomer parents, this explains quite a bit about the expectations my dad had about fatherhood. I think a lot of (male) baby boomers saw Archie Bunker as a father figure.
Ugh. I cry in almost every one of these retrospectives, and I think I've cried the hardest in this one. Carroll O'Connor & Jean Stapleton were so special.
Sitcom really is the perfect medium for bringing attention to serious social issues. The humorous tone of the series makes the serious moments more striking and memorable
The thing I love about Archie as a character is how much he loves his family and the things he’ll try to do to make them happy when things go wrong. Sure he sometimes made fun of Edith whenever she made a mistake but he still cared a lot about her and tried his best to make her happy again after Beverly was killed and he definitely showed how much he cared about her well-being after she hid the diagnosis she had gotten from the doctor about possibly developing a blood clot in her legs if she stood too long and she kept on cooking without telling him and he told her that her being healthy was more important to him than some food.
I am 40. I was 13 when it came on Nickatnight in the 90s. I am beyond the generation but made part of it. Along with every other old show Nick got me hooked on.
The reruns of this series were a central part of my youth & Norman Lear was an incredible show runner + creator whose work I recognize as having impacted me. Thank you.
I just got curious and looked up how old Carroll O'Connor and Jean Stapleton were when All in the Family premiered. He was 47, and she was 48. I'm 47 now and Archie and Edith both look way older than me.
i like to think of it that in the later seasons in letting go of his bigotry did he achieve his dream by letting those people into his life. its a perfect message
People say this show couldn't get made today because people are too sensitive, and I agree, but it's because people would say it was pushing some woke agenda, it's that kind of sensitivity. in terms of raunchy humor, the mildest episode of It's Always Sunny tops the worst episode of All in the Family, but goddamn you if you try to deal with some kind of social topic through art today.
I always laugh at the Boomer memes that say modern audiences wouldn’t last a minute watching All in the Family because they would be too offended. Norman Lear wrote Archie as a character to be laughed at because his views were so wrong. Lear was a champion of the LGBTQ+ community and even created a research centre for TV writers to better depict minority groups on shows. Norman Lear was woke AF!
Well José, you finally did it. i have been waiting for you to cover this one since you alluded to it waaaay back in the poll that included Fraiser. This show is undoubtedly one of the best american television show ever made. It is easily up there with the likes of Roseanne, Star Trek: TNG, Frasier, and Breaking Bad. My girlfriend in college turned me on to it and we watched quite a few episodes of it together. It hold a special place in my heart and is absolutely the bar by which all Television writing needs to meet. The acting is also top notch and as you pointed out, won many emmys. We are not likely to see another show like it again, but thats not too bad because every issue it touches remains relevant today. Again, great video José.
We'll never see another show like this because people bash the concept of "woke" on sight and refuse to think for themselves or be challenged or ask questions. Not for lack of trying, there are always people that want to try and use media as art with societal value, but people have declared openly and angrily that they don't want to be challenged or be reminded that personal accountability is an option. We desperately need another All In The Family to ask these questions desperately, but these questions would not be understood anymore, due to the devolved mind of Americans in this day and age. An Archie Bunker figure today would just become another Trump in the minds of the intellectually de-evolved today. They'd take everything reactionary and bigoted he says, put it on a pedestal and absolutely claim themselves to be just like him, and toss away any message or commentary as "woke values being shoved down my throat when I just want to have my """"free speech""""" just like he does when he speaks for me". And if there was a 2024 All In The Family to come along in all but name, there would just be 8 million RU-vid videos about it being "more woke propaganda trying to target my """"free speech"""" as not valid." It's not because we don't need it, it's because people won't accept it anymore. They just want Paw Patrol for the kids, and Zack Snyder movies or spite-drenched trash like Rick and Morty for the older kids that refer to themselves as adults.
Interesting reflection on a classic show that continues to surprise me. I grew up on this, and other, shows. Watching this retrospective, looking back at my own life, I am stunned by how much it shaped me. Looking at America now, it seems the answers to today's divisive culture were there, right in front of us. Somehow we forgot those answers. Or, have we discounted them, lessons lost in the weapons of trivialization of our culture war?
No, the media is still at least TRYING to fight as hard as it can to continue to tackle these subjects, it's just that every time they do now, it's screamed down by the ignorant loudmouthed majority who doesn't want "woke" shoved "down their throats", lest the scary boogeyman of asking questions and having self-reflection remind people that things like personal accountability is a societal option. Even South Park has transformed from a show willing to ask or present difficult questions to merely being just another loud annoying wall of anti-progressive pandering, echoed back to justify today's vapid indifference of being challenged through a dingy, cynical lens of "everything is dumb and stupid, woke is dumb and thinking is stupid" that the show now, relentlessly conveys as a shadow of it's former self. Because ever since Trump turned on this county's moron switch and awakened mindless reactionary tantrums towards the concept of thought, as if berzerk, chest-pounding sleeper agents, people have convinced themselves they won't want art to reflect challenge or questions. Only with the tables flipped, as it's no longer the broadcasters, and corproations that want to kill the concept of thought and intelligence in media, it's the people themselves that now reject it.
@@teruienages962 No, I think we as a society have forgotten. it isn't just that media has gone hoarse, large swaths of the public are completely indifferent.
An incredible video once more that highlights why you have one of then greatest channels on the site. Have you every considered doing a retrospective of mash? I think it’s possibly the greatest sitcom of all time, thank you :)
My two favorite Archie Bunker moments are when he objects to the Klan by saying he doesn't want them burning a cross in his yard because he doesn't want his grandson getting the wrong idea of what the cross means (I'm a Christian and I hate how so many Christians are bigots); and when he goes to his Jewish friend's funeral, starts out being bumbling and ignorant, but ends up delivering that beautiful eulogy. Musing that if the blues take years off your life, laughter must add them; and that he wished he made Stretch laugh more.
I would love to see you do a retrospective of the original “misfit tv,” Night Court. There’s so much that went on both in the series and behind the scenes, and the show doesn’t get the recognition it deserves. Plus, you already talked about Harry Anderson in your Cheers video, so this would be a natural outcome of that. And thank you for another wonderful video!
I think Night Court is a bit awkward in the way the back part of Roseanne was, in that the revival is still airing so it's hard to place the show as a whole in context.
The two-part episode series in the videos sixth section, after the content warning, made me cry (a lot). It says a lot that I have never heard anyone mention those episodes when talking about the show.
You did a great job with your analysis of All in the Family. I was hoping to introducing my freinds to the show and I think your video might help me convince them to watch it.
Thank you so much for making this. Your videos are amazing. I get emotional every time, some times more than others. Your content is meaningful to me-therapeutic even.
Excellent video. I’m a fan of the show in my late 20s and a history teacher. It is a fascinating cultural treasure. I show clips from Edith’s jury duty episode to my students. Subbed 😁
I went from thinking "How great could it have possibly been?" When you were talking it up in the intro to thinking "I have got to watch this show" by the halfway point
That was one of the best written retrospectives on AITF I've ever seen. I watched this show on reruns as a kid and grew up with it no knowing about the hidden meaning behind the show. I just found it very funny even though some of the humor went over my head. I did something I rarely do on RU-vid, I watched the whole thing. That's a testament to how good this was.
I work at a library and so many people check out these shows that you cover still. 'Gunsmoke' is a really popular one amongst patrons, but I can also never escape Home Improvement 🙄
Thanks for this. I never knew rhe Carroll O'Conner backstory, and it's so perfect that he was the last one to go, lol, and that the show collapsed in on itself without the tension between him and Lear.
Another incredible job, Jose... I so appreciate and look forward to your retrospectives and insights into various TV shows and other media... Your work is so detailed and informative, and we appreciate it....Have a great summer and I will be looking forward to whatever topic catches your eye next... All the best.....
I grew up watching reruns of All in the Family on Nick at Nite I can honestly say that it had a huge impact on how I view the world and different groups of people It also shows how the difficulties, that a lot of people think of as recent, are in fact decades old and not exclusive to the younger generation. As far as I'm concerned, All in the family is a MUST-SEE show. P.S. As a lifetime fan of this show, I do believe this documentary is a very fair examination of it. Thank you, Jose, for an excellent video.
Interested to see your perspective on this! Been waiting for it, as I grew up with a father who unironically believed Archie's worst traits to be something idolize.
Paused to mention (I have to watch this in sittings, this show was on throughout my entire childhood on repeat), the baptism episode I remember not making much sense to me and being outright unpleasant to me. It was my dad's favorite episode (aside from the godforsaken one with 'the difference between men and women being some 'chair trick', one he uses to this day to prove genetic differences in sexe., yes its as cringe as you can imagine every time). This whole retrospective is really well done, and has helped me tackle a part of my childhood in an adult perspective. Well done again, Jose!
One of the best videos I've seen on RU-vid, and I've been watching great creators for close to 20 years. It gave me perspective on my own relationship with my dad. He can be bigoted but usually only subtlety. Fortunately he's grown over the years, but we still have difficult conversations about work and the economy/capitalism, conspiracy theories, and just life in general. It has always been difficult to pinpoint where his core perspective/personality was formed. I'm now convinced it was probably in the 70s, maybe even with some influence from Archie. He was in his 30s at the height of this show's popularity. He also speaks very highly of his parents, especially now that he's elderly. I imagine I could never speak ill of his father, a man I never met and honestly don't know much about. How much of his personality rubbed off on my dad? What is mostly good or bad? I guess I never really thought about it.
