I’ve been watching since the beginning – not quite faithfully, since I’ve probably not seen more than 60-70% of the episodes, but enough to qualify as a long-time fan. I loved the show from the beginning because I used to live in suburban Texas and I knew the Hills. Hell, I co-led a Girl Scout troop with a woman so much like Peggy it hurt.
My husband, who’s never lived in Texas in his life, loves the show as much as I do but for completely different reasons – Hank is such a decent, good uy with a rigid sense of propriety and no sense of humor but the desire to do right by his family, his friends, and his lawn that I think he touches an “everyman” chord in Papa Tiger. Growing up in a completely different environment, he still feels like he knows Hank and his buddies.
With the exception of a few comic exaggerations, these are characters that are far more true to life than one would expect from an animated show, and are people we’ve grown used to over the years. It’s not the kind of show that’s going to create superfans, but it does generate a lot of feelings of neighborliness, if that makes sense.
Hell, “That boy ain’t right” is pretty far evolved from catching Beavis and Butthead Hwhaking off in his trailer or was it on his lawn, I don’t remember.
Ok, let’s admit it. In some small ways, we all I are Hank… and Dale, Bill, Boomhauer, Bobby and/or Peggy. and we all know people like Cotton, Luanne, Khan or any of the other characters.
The show works because of the humanity of all of the characters. Face it, we all have our hangups. Like Hank, some of us never really learned to be comfortable with our feelings. I know way too many moms (and dads) who are like Peggy and need to have all of the answers whether they really know or not. Bill Dauterive started his adult life wanting desperately to be a Good Man and got screwed over and passed by for trying, and everyone knows (or is) someone like Boomhauer who is too cool to grow up.
There’s something almost religious about how all of these people, through all of their faults, still manage to live together. To give one example, no one wants to have a broken back, but if it means that a soccer mom who is better than everyone around her gets to dance a Tennessee Waltz with the two-bit Patton that life handed her as a father in law, then maybe some good can come out of it (“Cotton’s Plot”, Season 4, Episode 2.)
I think Lucky’s character adds to the realism of the show. While they may not be the majority, there are plenty of people just like him in the South (and the North for that matter!). That’s why, as I stated earlier, I’d like to see more of him.
He’s already shown his humanity (taking Bobby to eat a corn chip fresh off the line) and ability to relate to other Arlen residents (his membership in Big Mountain Fudgecake).
IMHO, he’s a welcome addition to the cast, and I’d like to see his character developed further.
Very true. In fact, that’s one of the things I like most about the show; it’s actually made me think more about the smaller parts of my own personality. While I may be politically liberal, I find myself agreeing with the staunch, buttoned-down Hank on more things than I ever thought possible (granted, that number isn’t huge, but still…). Hell, there may even be a tiny bit of Lucky in me.
King of the Hill really is far deeper than most people think (again, IMHO). While I don’t have a web site or anything, I’d like to count myself among its few superfans. It’s definitely in my top five shows of all time, and I’ve seen every episode at least a dozen times. I just can’t get enough of the Hills.
Well, it’s certainly not slice of life. Most of us have never tried to beat our son in a dog-dancing contest, or staged an environmental protest so our friend won’t find out we wrecked his car, or were tricked onto appearing on a foot-fetish website, or had to stop our father from stealing Santa Anna’s leg.
I think it is satire of life in the exurbs at the present day, but it’s just a very gentle satire, and like you said, it does take Southern life, and even more so, Texas life seriously. And the satire isn’t directed against Hank and his family. The show is ultimately about a guy trying to hold onto his values in a society that challenges and often contradicts them.
What is this talk of it taking place in an “exurb”. It’s clearly a mid-size city when we see aerial views. There’s never been talk of Arlen being even a suburb of a larger city.
Arlen has definetly grown over the course of the series. It was like one of those small towns far outside a major city, but because of suburban sprawl has become part of the exurbs. It now has a large mall where before it was kind of a Wal-Mart (Megalo Mart) kind of town.
We had a great discussion of where Arlen was here.
I figure it is on the outer part of the DFW exurbs. It is located somewhere on I-35.
Wow, I’m pleasantly surprised to hear the show was renewed. I spoke with Mike Judge about it last summer during a film festival in Austin and even he didn’t think it was coming back. Hooray!
