# Allen Gregory is a ridiculous show that will not last the season and I want him to die in a fire **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 31, 2011, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/allen-gregory-is-a-ridiculous-show-that-will-not-last-the-season-and-i-want-him-to-die-in-a-fire/601436 "2011-10-31T23:08:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2011, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/allen-gregory-is-a-ridiculous-show-that-will-not-last-the-season-and-i-want-him-to-die-in-a-fire/601436/61 "2011-12-21T20:26:36Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Really? I HATED that Meg decided to continue passively accepting the others’ abuse – particularly Lois’s. Lois is the worst of the bunch, because even though she doesn’t physically abuse Meg the way Peter sometimes does, _she knows better_. Peter at least has the excuse of being an idiot who is incapable of learning. Well I would have loved for the dynamics between the characters to change, but we all know that’s not going to happen. Given the constraints, I liked the resolution. At least now I can imagine Meg smugly accepting their abuse and knowing that she could stand up to it if she really needed to. So its a case of liking the lesser evil rather than thinking everything’s fine > [@davidm](#): > > I disagree with the idea that Americans don’t like shows with disagreeable protagonists. Sure, you can list things like Cosby and Everybody Loves Raymond, but that’s being selective. > > Here’s another list: Gregory House, Walter White, Dexter Morgan, Denny Crane and Alan Shore. Is _anybody_ on Seinfeld not disagreeable? Hell, you can go back as far as the 70’s with Archie Bunker. There are plenty of disagreeable protagonists on American television. I’m unfamiliar with some of those characters, but I would say that of people like Dextar, House, or the Seinfeld crew, there are redeeming characteristics and they are at least capable of being funny or ingenious, so the viewer begrudgingly recognizes that instead of just dwelling on the negatives. I just find absolutely no redeeming qualities at all in Allen Gregory, from the little I’ve seen of him. If he was a real boy, I would drown him in acid. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2011, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/allen-gregory-is-a-ridiculous-show-that-will-not-last-the-season-and-i-want-him-to-die-in-a-fire/601436/62 "2011-12-21T22:05:36Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Yeah, that episode left a bad taste in my mouth. Of course, if the characters changed for the better then it wouldn’t be the same show any more. Seinfeld had the right idea: no learning, no crying. I disagree that Seinfeld was right in general: just that he was right for his show. Put another way: if you’re going to have a show with uniformly repellent protagonists, it has to either eventually lead to their comeupance or avoid certain questions. The “Meg confronts everybody” episode was a bad idea because it breaks the fourth wall far, far more than the show usually does; that is, it applies real-world standards to a ridiculous situation. It would be as if _Justice League_ had suddenly started applying real-world physics. ---
**Author:** ![dzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@dzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzero)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2011, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/allen-gregory-is-a-ridiculous-show-that-will-not-last-the-season-and-i-want-him-to-die-in-a-fire/601436/63 "2011-12-21T23:09:01Z")
I just saw this thread since I tend to go sub-forum by sub-forum rather than looking at the latest post listing. I just want to say that I had this set to record, watched about 5 minutes of the first show and thought WTF? There is no level on which I can even conceive of this being funny. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/allen-gregory-is-a-ridiculous-show-that-will-not-last-the-season-and-i-want-him-to-die-in-a-fire/601436.md?page=3)