“Legacy” is a very strange episode of Modern Family, and one that once again deals with a character death in a rather mystifying way. After a holiday break and last week’s solid but rather inconsequential episode, “Legacy” doesn’t exactly get back to the season’s overarching storylines, but it does introduce a new, significant moment that could have a ripple effect.
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves though. We’ll get to the big moment at the end of the episode in due time, but let’s begin with everything else in “Legacy,” all of which feels like the show simply having no idea what to do anymore. This is mostly a dull, uninspired episode that sees the show not only repeating certain storylines, but also failing to offer up much of anything in terms of comedy. There’s a few laughs here and there, but for the most part this is pure filler.
The general structure of this week’s episode involves setting up seemingly unimportant, throwaway storylines, and then at the last minute shifting them into territory that could be deemed important to the characters. Mitch and Claire sort through a bunch of childhood belongings that have been sitting in Jay’s garage and use the opportunity to hunt down clues that their old man cut a family trip short when they were younger; Phil goes to visit his father and all sorts of hijinks ensue; Manny, Gloria, and Cam cross paths as they try to give each other advice and seemingly fail spectacularly.
These storylines are difficult to engage with through much of the episode. There’s just not a lot to connect to. The Manny plot is everything we’ve seen before, with Cam and Gloria giving him contradictory advice about how best to approach an old crush of his. Once again, Manny’s romantic exploits remain incredibly boring. Then there’s Mitch and Claire being Mitch and Claire, which means they’re intensely focused on proving their father wrong simply so they can be right, which is their favorite thing. Phil’s trip to see his father is rather harmless, but their various outlandish situations aren’t funny or endearing in any real way.
As mentioned above though, the show eventually pulls the rug out from under these stories and offers up something more substantial in the final moments. Gloria and Cam end up helping each other out despite both of them being resistant to asking for any help; Cam plays an outlandish character to help Gloria secure her first house sale, and Gloria assists him in getting back at a fellow teacher who apparently stole an award out from under him. All of Mitch and Claire’s digging only leads them to discovering that Jay worked as a bartender for awhile, sacrificing in the early days of his business so that he could pay his employees and get his ideas off the ground. Then, of course, there’s Phil, whose seemingly innocuous day with his father ends up being his last, as the final scene shows the family gathered to honor the memory of Frank Dunphy (Fred Willard).
The moments themselves aren’t bad; in fact, they mostly land. But the structure of the episode is a problem. The idea is that by rolling out seemingly unimportant stories, those final moments hit a little harder because they’re surprising. I’d argue the opposite is true. The show is telling you to check out, to not consider what’s happening on screen to be worth fully paying attention to, which makes those final moments feel like contrived add-ons to an otherwise dull episode. I think the general message contained in Phil’s story works—the mundanity is the very reason we must try to be present, because those could be the final moments we share with someone—but everything else falls flat because of what came before. “Legacy” would have done well to lay out its steps a little more in order to give its climax a more satisfying feel.
Stray observations
- I’m shocked that Jay’s dog bed business isn’t doing well.
- Manny: “11-year-old Manny would be disgusted by me.” Lily: “Now you know how 12-year-old Lily feels.” I love ruthless Lily.
- “You need to show no emotion. Think of your cousin Lily.”
- Fred Willard, gone just like that. Got the same treatment as Shelley Long. So strange.
54 Comments
I realized during that barbershop scene that they were going to kill Phil’s dad – it was just so obviously a passing-of-the-torch moment – but that final memorial scene still felt abrupt and the message unearned. In the early seasons there’s that arc where Luke befriends the grumpy old neighbor man. He passes away and Luke takes his TV, which at first seems like a thoughtless kid thing to do but which we realize was actually meaningful to him, since he used to be able to see the neighbor watch TV alone in his house at night from his bedroom and it was a connection to his memory. Remember how good this show used to be?
Did Phil’s dad die that day?
Wait… Phil states that they didn’t know much that day… did he die at the barbershop?
Wait… the barbershop owner just let them stay in the shop without any witnesses, so no one but Phil and his dad knows what really happened?
Wait… as clumsy as Phil is… was he responsible for his dad’s death?
Wait… why is Phil so insistent that “His dad was OK” on the last day he saw him? Is that why he seem so off during this ‘interview’?
Yeah I didn’t care for the dad’s death. Well, at least the way it was handled. Just rather abrupt. It seemed like they were going the dementia road with him, but I guess not. Just dead. Sad for the character, just not effective the way it was handled.
I didn’t get why they did the dementia fake out. There were any number of reasons they could’ve used to put the characters together, so setting up dementia only to have him die unrelatedly was just weird.
Fred Willard’s character was looking really unstable. We weren’t sure if that was a choice to show his decline before death or if Mr. Willard is really in rather poor health. For as young at heart and upbeat as Willard has seemed for so long, it was a rather shock to see him so frail and shaking so badly.
The last time I watched the show two years ago Willard was looking frail, so I think it’s just his age finally catching up to him.
He looked fine on Jimmy Kimmel a night or two ago.
Yeah, he looked so skinny. I hope that he’s in good health.
He is 81, after all. Looks like he might have a little Parkinson’s, but hopefully the rest is just age. His hair wasn’t dyed like before which probably doesn’t help.
I wonder why they decided to kill off Fred Willard in a total filler episode? Like at least he didn’t die offscreen but yeah.At least Lily was here to summarize this comments section’s opinion on Manny.Finally first they don’t invite Lily to Thanksgiving and now they don’t invite Luke, Alex and Haley to Frank’s funeral. The Dunphys are dicks man.
Watch out Luke.
I wonder why they decided to kill off Fred Willard in a total filler episode? Like at least he didn’t die offscreen but yeah.
It’s a sitcom trope in it’s own right. You have the seemingly nothing episode end with a BAM.One I go to is when Buffy’s mom died. It was at the tail end of a completely unrelated episode.
True, but Buffy followed that episode with “The Body” which is one of the most thoughtful episodes of the show ever.
The Body is one of the greatest tv episodes of all time, period.
A few months after I found my sister’s body, I was watching a Buffy marathon on Logo and The Body came on. I can’t describe how it made me feel.
Oh, I can imagine. I’m offering you warm hugs, internet stranger. Take care of yourself, and I hope there’s someone else taking care of you.
I’m reminded of HIMYM when Marshal’s dad died.
That’s an even better one.
I have to disagree, there was literally a countdown to “Bad News” in that episode.
Buffy isn’t a good example. That was a dramatic sting to get you to come back for the following episode, “The Body,” which really did do justice to the horrible loss Buffy suffered.Next week Modern Family will be back to Cam and Mitchell’s passive aggressive hijinxs. There will be no mention of Phil’s dad.
There are only two episodes left in the series. So we’ll see how (if) this plays into the end game.
But Joyce’s death wasn’t out of left-field. There was a lot of secondary subplot that entire season about Joyce being sick and recovering. The inclusion of Dawn just added to Buffy’s struggles with having to grow-up. She was having to take on a parental role and struggled with it.
In fact, the entire episode leading up to Joyce’s death was all thematically preparing for the rug-pulling. Joyce started dating again (getting back to normal). Buffy acknowledging she can be on her own and needs to focus on herself. Giles’s suggesting he is ill-prepared for a fatherly role with Dawn (despite having ostensibly been Buffy’s surrogate father figure).
And then, at the very end, with seconds left in the episode, Joyce is dead. No more normal for anyone. Giles bears the burden of not having a choice but to be the father he’s already been coming to terms with not being equiped for (see season 6). And Buffy can’t focus on only herself like she wanted to. She HAS to think of her sister before herself (setting up the dramatic choice for the season finale).
The whole point was how death isn’t necessarily a major consequential event. It is bland and mundane just sometimes happens. Similar to Modern Family. But you can’t say the writers of Buffy did it as some sort of out of left field move. It was definitely given more thought than Modern Family gave to poor Frank.
I don’t think of it as a trope. It’s just reality. One day the person you love is here and the next they aren’t. That’s one of the few experiences that is still truly universal.
Yup. And as shitty as that feeling is, life just keeps on chugging around you.
A filler episode would imply that there is either a different original source material and this was an episode that used nothing from it or that the episode did nothing for overall story arc of the series and that the end of the episode ends basically where it started with nothing of not or consequence happening in it, basically you could cut the episode from the series and nothing would be missed. That doesn’t appear to be the case here.
It’s to give the moment more of an impact. You have all this fun hilarious stuff happening, and then suddenly somebody is gravely injured or dies. It pulls you in because you’re brain is currently connected to everybody in a positve emotion. It’s why the first 10 minutes of Pixars Up works so strongly. You have all this fun, it’s happy, it’s great. and then they hit you with a small negative (cant have kids). Then you go back to joy again. and then you finish it off with finality. It’s crushing because in those ten minutes, you watched so much joy. Was teased with reality, given some more joy, and then have it taken all away.My favorite moments in sitcoms, is when the show gets way too serious. Because you aren’t expecting it. It’s supposed to be fun, and happy, and then they remind you that this all can happen in reality.
Not just can’t have kids, but a miscarriage. My daughter, who was about 7 at the time, wondered loudly why all the grown ups were crying.
Sorry. It was insensitive to say small negative. I know it was big. But like you said, for a kid, they wouldn’t 100% understand that bit. So it wasn’t immediately sad for everybody. Some people in the audience at that point would just say: “aw, that sucks…” and that would be that. Then they go back to happy times. And then they finalize it. Anyways, I was using it as an extreme example of why they do these things in Comedy shows. Because they have so much more impact when you least suspect it and are unaware at how invested you are in the characters.
I’d argue that the first ten minutes of Up are for the adults taking the kids to see the movie. I mean, like, there were loud sobs in that theatre.But yes, I agree with you. The sucker punch works because your brain is in a happy mode. And that’s usually how life works. Of course we have loved ones who die after a long, lingering illness, and their deaths usually feel like a bit of a relief (and that comes with its own complicated feelings), but most of the time it’s a shock, even when it shouldn’t be. Just yesterday, when I read about Kirk Douglas, I felt so surprised, even though it shouldn’t be surprising at all that a 103-year old man kicked the bucket.
I never treat Pixar movies as movies for kids. There’s always a tonne of content in there to relate to for everybody. It’s why they became so popular so quickly.
There’s no more tired form of entertainment than the tv network sitcom. It’s always been for the lowest common denominator and you’re expecting depth and quality? It’s like complaining that your McDonald’s dining experience felt shallow.
agree, although I’d have to add the Democratic Debates to that denominator. But the debates deliver much more comedic moments than MF.
So we get Jay bonding with Joe and (indirectly) Claire and Mitch and a grandpa suddenly dying. I’m not sure if they are warning us that they are going to end with Jay kicking it or (having fulfilled their dead old man quotient) reassuring us they won’t, but the point of this was definitely to forefront Jay’s mortality.Stray Observations* I thought Lily and Manny as the feral kids of Cam’s loutish neighbor were weirdly hilarious. If ABC wanted to give those two a van and let them start solving mysteries, I would watch.* The timing on the penguin-squatch story was a nice use of misdirection. I had forgotten about it by the end.* The kid who plays Joe is actually a talented (or at least well directed) little comic actor. The look of indignation he gives Jay at the end when he realizes Jay is talking to Stella instead of him is great.
Your third point–so much. That kid really does deliver. I have no idea if it’s acting, directing, or just that the show went past characters into cardboard cutouts, but he sells it.
Frank Dunphy is my favorite character. He’s always so positive and cheery and sees the best in everyone and everything.Like Phil he’s not afraid to make a fool of himself, but he doesn’t have Phil’s tendency to put his foot in his mouth.
Pam should have been the one who died.
This show has gone from must-watch to on-in-the-background, so I can’t disagree with your main point, but I didn’t think they botched it entirely. Maybe because I’m dealing with aging parent stuff myself, without Phil’s resources to just drop everything and hop a plane, but the mundane “are you okay” stuff (admittedly mixed with the over-the-top of end-season sitcom characterization) felt believable.
Here’s the thing, that’s death. It’s the “Shelly Long treatment” or it could also be called “that’s how the world works” treatment. I’ve seen a lot of family die in the last five years and it’s hurt but as often we had warning and deep personal moments it’s also been quick and brutal and without any warning. I’ve been on the wrong side of the globe at the wrong moment and lost a close family member, I’ve been at the bedside of another when they went. I think the goal is to try and ground the suddenness of the loss in the reality of the world. For all the joy or silliness or moments of brutal lilly there’s only one thing more certain and brutal, death.
This is what I thought too. They didn’t draw out the passing of either Long’s or Willard’s character with a storyline of cancer or some other illness. We lost our Grandpa the day after Christmas 5 years ago and it was as if a light switch was thrown. Just there one second, gone the next.
My condolences to you and your family on their loss.
“The Manny plot is everything we’ve seen before”Replace Manny with any character on the show and this is where we are now with a once great television show.
However, I am OK with any appearance of Fred Willard in pretty much anything.
Jay must getting old. He should have known that Joe is Lily’s uncle.
Jay must getting old. He should have known that Joe is Lily’s uncle.
Yes, I said aloud “Lily’s not Joe’s cousin, she’s his niece.”
You could see his passing coming but I thought they were going to stretch it out a few episodes. An ignominious end for a fun character perfectly cast.
The American way of flogging a successful sitcom to death is remarkable. The BBC basically does a few series 3 at the most, then done. Modern Family has been done for 8 years.
I’ve never forgiven this show for DeeDee’s death, mostly because it was just so botched. If you’re going to kill off a character’s mother, it should have some meaning. It was just a blip for this crew, making them even more unlikable.
Lily isn’t Joe’s cousin, though. She’s his niece.
Mitch and Claire’s detective work has a HUGE hole. TheMonkees were not touring in 1983. So, the marquee in the background of a picture they found was not possible. The band was idle until their resurgence in 1986 thanks in part to VH1.
Duplicate. Don’t publish
There were moments where I was reminded that even though the show hasn’t been as good in recent years, Ty Burrell remains worth watching.
That throwaway line about how ‘the teens were soundly beaten’ after supposedly lying about the giant bird was wonderful.
While the episode was decent enough, it didn’t have the same effect as grace dunphys death. Frank’s death had almost no impact barring a momentary “what”.
I agree with you entirely about how the “surprise!” moment came off. Other than feeling concerned with how Fred Willard looks these days, I’d mostly checked out of their story, enough to say, “wait, WHAT” when they panned out to reveal the wake. I did like the Gloria/Cam storyline, though. Their individual plans at undercutting the other’s nemesis were pretty funny (and my husband suggested we adopt Gloria’s technique about the dresses – only he’ll go shopping with me and try on all the same outfits as I do so I stop criticizing myself in the mirror).The Mitch/Claire storyline leads me to believe that they’re going to kill Jay at the end of the show.
Here’s something I don’t get: Phil grew up in Florida, as this episode mentions. So how did he end up going to a small public college in California (which I think is supposed to be Fresno State, IIRC)? Why not just have the character also be from California?