Fester was my least favorite character in this. I think I’ve just seen too much Fred Armisen / Portlandia, so he felt like a Fred Armisen / Portlandia character.
That’s his problem. Same issue in “Our Flag Means Death” and honestly in almost anything. He is always Fred Armisen and I guess I don’t really enjoy Fred Armisen. I mean it worked for Sean Connery, but Fred is no Connery.
Pugsley in the recent animated films was a master of explosives, but honestly the films are pretty forgettable and stupid.
Or serial killer Karl on Last Man on Earth. His dead-pan characters are all the same.
Yeah, that’s why I specified the motion picture versions. And the comic-Wednesday although creepy, just wouldn’t have the gravitas to be the Wednesday-Wednesday.
Maybe if there’s a spin-off series, Pugsly, we’ll get the Mean Widdle Kid.
Not only is it Netflix’s most watched show, the hand dance has exploded on TikTok. If you watch one person doing it, you’ll end up seeing dozens more. Even CNET has an article about its influence.
In another thread I brought up having been in Argentina for a few months (the thread about why we aren’t USians instead of Americans), and it got me down a Google rabbit hole. One thing I remember about being there was that, in Spanish, Daffy Duck is named “Pato Lucas”. Looking up why (apparently Lucas evokes Loco), I discovered that, in Spanish, the Addams family names are different. Uncle Fester is “Tío Lucas”. Cousin Itt is “Tío Cosa” (Uncle Stuff). Pugsley “Pericles”, Lurch “Largo”. Wednesday is named “Merlina” which means Blackbird, as the Wednesday’s child reference doesn’t work in Spanish. Morticia kept her name, but most oddly, Gomez is called Homero. Really? Gomez didn’t work in Spanish? This being Straight Dope, I did a little bit of research and Gomez derives from Son of Gome, derived from a Visagoth name meaning “man”, which gets you to some Germanic cognates related to the Latin Homo (man) leading us to Homero.
I was honestly surprised he didn’t find a way to convince TPTB to let Fester play the drums at some point. Fred Armison seems to wedge that into just about all of his characters. Or so it seems, I don’t really care for him and haven’t watched enough of him to know if that’s as common as I think it is.
I think they only thing I’ve ever liked him in was Brooklyn99 (even if he still managed to include playing other instruments or singing into many of his cameos).
Also, someone pointed this out to me. I’m annoyed with myself for not noticing it.
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I thought the entire cast was really good. With the exception of Armisen. You’d expect someone to take a role like that and either try to mimic the Festers of the past or at least put a new spin on it of some sort. He apparently just decided to be himself with make-up on.
Speaking as someone largely unfamiliar with Fred Armisen, and have no strong opinion of his shtick, you guys are being way too harsh. He was fine, and seemed perfectly Fester-ish to me.
I don’t think you know Fester then. 
I mean, I’ve watched the movies and the TV series. What more do I need to know?
Uncle Thing is more accurate. Gomez was probably changed because it is a well known last name and “last name as first name” probably wasn’t a thing back then.
I found this on wiki
In the Charles Addams cartoons, Gomez—as with all of the members of the family—had no given name.[1] When The Addams Family television series was being developed, Charles Addams suggested naming the character either Repelli or Gomez. Addams left the final choice up to portrayer John Astin, who chose Gomez.[2]
Because “Gómez” is strictly a surname in the Latin American world, the character’s name was changed to “Homero” (“Homer”) in Latin American translations. In Spain, he is called Gómez, where the surname originated.
I had to look up Fred Armisen. I didn’t recognize him while watching Wednesday, but I did recognize him from his IMDB picture. He seemed reasonably Fester-ish to me also.
Fred seems a lot more Fester-ish to me than Christopher Lloyd. Of course Jackie Coogan was the best Fester (IMHO).
Now I’m wondering if The Simpsons is available in Latin America and if so…
And I agree with e_c_g on all points. I was unfamiliar with Fred Armisen and thought, “He’s channeling Coogan,” when I was watching.
Fred Armisen‘s stock comedic demeanor isn’t far off the one Coogan created for Fester.
I think part of the problem with Armisen as Fester is that many of us disliked Armisen long before this show so we started out already biased against him.
If I didn’t know him, I probably wouldn’t have given his portrayal of Fester much thought.
Not that I think I was particularly harsh in my post, but to add to it I don’t think he was necessarily a bad Fester, it just that it overlapped too strongly with dozens of other Armisen sketch comedy characters, so for me it gave suspension of disbelief a shot under the water line.
Wednesday is like Aubrey Plaza playing Seven of Nine. Half way through Season 1 and love it.