Modern Family: “Benched” (1.20)

It’s taken a few episodes, but finally Modern Family has stepped back to address the fallout from Mitchell losing his job. I’d like to say that the show is attempting to mirror the goings-on of the modern economy, but that’s simply not the case. A third of “Benched” is devoted to Mitchell following up a job lead that he’s somewhat ambivalent about but nonetheless interested in, while Cameron tags along and generally messes things up for him by being an awkward drunk. Why he’s there at all is never really explained, but that isn’t the real problem this plotline drifts into.

For a show that attempts so hard to show what it’s really like to live in contemporary America, Modern Family falls flat on its face this episode. In case you’ve somehow forgotten, we’ve been living in a depression (anyone who still calls it a “recession” is delusional) for the past two years and jobs are no trifling matter. Instead of taking on this difficulty in a mature manner, Modern Family chose to finally deal with this issue by having Mitchell literally fall into a job he’s not even searching for. It’s not just misrepresentative of what it’s like out there looking for work; it’s lazy storytelling. Equally egregious is the idea that a couple of new parents could go from a lawyer’s salary to a part-time gift shop worker’s and somehow be ok with this turn of events—that’s just too big a flaw to ignore.

This lapse shows Modern Family diving into territory that, from the first episode, it’s tried to steer away from: becoming a stereotypical sitcom. That the show’s focus is on a bunch of upper class, largely white (the stereotypical representations of Gloria’s life before America don’t help matters much) suburbanites can at times be overlooked, but the utopian land of plenty that it’s set in is just grating at a time like this.

That isn’t to say that the episode didn’t have its strong points, most of which actually came from this same problematic plotline. Cameron messing up Mitchell’s appointment had U.K. _Office_-level awkwardness and some pretty great jokes. But here, too, problems creeped in with the entire bit about Cameron and Mitchell both wanting the same thing but being unable to tell each other another disappointing, only-in-a-sitcom idea. The rather amazing turntable set-piece may have been great, but even this was reliant upon a pretty thin premise.

Elsewhere in the Modern Family world, Phil and Jay feud over who gets to take over their sons’ basketball team. It’s a dumb fight, but plays out some of the tension between these two men that’s been building throughout the season and diffuses, well, some of it. There may have been some real growth between the pair, right now it’s probably too early to say. But we can hope.